Jewish Juice - Soaring Above Death
Jewish Juice are a blackened death metal band from Italy. They take the raw blastbeat soundscapes of black metal and top it with death metal vocals. The music isn't the raw, distorted black rock n' roll some may expect; much of Jewish Juice's music has quite a bit of melody to it. On their EP the band mixes raw black metal with some of the more melodic, pagan influenced kind such as from Satyricon or Reverence. There isn't much in the way of flutes or synths, but the atmosphere the music creates is still grim and cold. The album begins with "The Night Of The Long Knives," which is a slightly long track and features plenty of electric black metal melodies. The vocals are a throaty growl to match the intensity of the music- as in the vein of Belphergor- and the drums hollowly hammer away in the background. It is pretty minimalistic, but works to the band's advantage. "Human Ferosity" is a bit more straightforward black metal, forsaking melody for speed and intensity. Of course, the faster a track is, the shorter it is, and this one is quite short. The same can be said for "My Kingdom."
"Acid Tears" has a bit more groove to it, and features more black metal vocals than the growl that listeners might have been hearing for the past several tracks. The raw blasting of the guitars may remind fans of earlier Immortal music, but it doesn't impress as much as some of the other longer tracks because it is even more minimalistic than the first one, and offers more than enough distortion to shroud the other instruments. However, some of the guitar melodies are very catchy and sound like a march to war. The closing song, "Green Forest," is the most melodic of all as it offers single picked melodies rather than just buzzing chords, and the way the later chords progress is certainly chilling. The vocals here are truly done in a black metal style, and the way the song pauses in the middle for some percussive beats and acoustic guitar moments really give off an Agalloch feeling to the song. Overall, the best track on the album. Jewish Juice's lyrical content may raise an eyebrow due its mention of Anti-Semitism, but since a lot of black metal is controversial this shouldn't faze anyone. The music is certainly good enough for any average black metal fan to enjoy, and hopefully the group will continue to make their work more atmospheric and dig even farther back into their roots to deliver some unique, chilling black metal.
"Acid Tears" has a bit more groove to it, and features more black metal vocals than the growl that listeners might have been hearing for the past several tracks. The raw blasting of the guitars may remind fans of earlier Immortal music, but it doesn't impress as much as some of the other longer tracks because it is even more minimalistic than the first one, and offers more than enough distortion to shroud the other instruments. However, some of the guitar melodies are very catchy and sound like a march to war. The closing song, "Green Forest," is the most melodic of all as it offers single picked melodies rather than just buzzing chords, and the way the later chords progress is certainly chilling. The vocals here are truly done in a black metal style, and the way the song pauses in the middle for some percussive beats and acoustic guitar moments really give off an Agalloch feeling to the song. Overall, the best track on the album. Jewish Juice's lyrical content may raise an eyebrow due its mention of Anti-Semitism, but since a lot of black metal is controversial this shouldn't faze anyone. The music is certainly good enough for any average black metal fan to enjoy, and hopefully the group will continue to make their work more atmospheric and dig even farther back into their roots to deliver some unique, chilling black metal.