Hammers of Misfortune

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Hammers of Misfortune
General information
origin San Francisco , California , United States
Genre (s) Progressive metal , heavy metal
founding Mid-1990s as Unholy Cadaver
Current occupation
Joe Hutton
Electric guitar , vocals
 John Cobbett
Keyboard , flute , vocals
 Sigrid Sheie
Electric guitar, vocals
 Leila Abdul-Rauf
Paul Walker
Will Carroll
former members
Electric bass, vocals
 Janis Tanaka
Drums
 Chewy Marzolo
Electric guitar, vocals
 Mike Scalzi
Electric bass, vocals
 Jamie Myers
Electric bass
 Ron Nichols
Electric guitar, vocals
 Patrick Goodwin
singing
 Jesse Quattro
Electric bass
 Max Barnett
Drums
 Christian Gonzalez

Hammers of Misfortune is an American progressive and heavy metal band from San Francisco , California , which was founded in the mid-1990s under the name Unholy Cadaver .

history

The band was founded in the mid-1990s under the name Unholy Cadaver, at which point the line-up consisted only of guitarist John Cobbett and drummer Chewy Marzolo, who shared the vocal posts. With the help of other musicians, including singer and guitarist Mike Scalzi of The Lord Weird Slough Feg , they recorded songs for an album as well. However, only three of the nine songs were released on a demo . The recordings for the releases simply titled Demo # 1 took place in 1996 and 1997. All material was released in 2011 on Shadow Kingdom Records as the album Unholy Cadaver .

In 2000 the band called themselves Hammers of Misfortune, named after a song from the Unholy Cadaver demo. In addition to Cobbett, Marzolo and Scalzi, the line-up consisted of bassist and singer Janis Tanaka. In 2001 the concept album The Bastard, produced by Justin Weis , joined Tumult Records . In 2003 the band signed a recording deal with Cruz del Sur Music , which resulted in the album The August Engine being released towards the end of the year . In the spring of 2003 Tanaka left the band and then worked for Pink and Fireball Ministry . Thereupon she was replaced by Jamie Myers. Sigrid Sheie (keyboard, flute, vocals) also joined the team. This new line-up went on two US tours. In addition, the album The Locust Years was recorded, which was released in 2006 by Cruz del Sur Music. The recordings had taken place in the Trackworx Studios in San Francisco under the direction of Justin Weis. After the release, the line-up changed again: Scalzi left in order to concentrate on his main band and Myers also left the band to devote himself to his family. The former was replaced by Patrick Goodwin, Myers by singer Jesse Quattro and bassist Ron Nichols. Marzolo left the band, but rejoined it a short time later. The double album Fields / Church of Broken Glass , which was released in 2008 by Profound Lore Records , was recorded with a new line-up . 2010 Quattro, Nichols and Goodwin separated from the remaining part of the band. The bassist Max Barnett, the guitarist and singer Leila Abdul-Rauf and the singer Joe Hutton were added as new members. In March 2010 the band signed a recording deal with Metal Blade Records . Here About initially were The Bastard , The August Engine , The Locust Years and Fields / Church of Broken Glass re-released before the album in October 2011 17th Street appeared. In 2012 the band could be seen at the Roadburn Festival . This was followed in 2016 by the album Dead Revolution , which was recorded under the direction of Nick Dumitriu at Light Rail Studios in San Francisco. The release was delayed because Cobbett and Sheie had a baby, Hutton was involved in a motorcycle accident and Cobbett, Sheie, Abdul-Rauf, Paul Walker, who was now the bassist in the band, and Will Carroll, who was the band's drummer had come, were involved in other projects.

style

According to laut.de , the band has “committed to a very tricky and time-consuming genre of music”, which “at least has its basic essence in metal ”. The Bastard is an epic concept album that is divided into three parts, on which three different voices can be heard. Eduardo Rivadavia from Allmusic said that the band's music can be described as Celtic Power Metal . The music combines double guitar harmonies in the style of Thin Lizzy and Iron Maiden , operatic singing, Celtic- inspired interludes with acoustic guitars and musical (non-textual) elements from Scandinavian Black Metal . progarchives.com found the band wavering between passages of Doom Metal and elaborate heavy metal. Occasionally the group incorporates acoustic and folk elements. In The Collector's Guide of Heavy Metal Volume 4: The '00s, David Perri reviewed The Bastard . The group then takes traditional metal and enriches it with versatile and esoteric experiments. The music is difficult to compare with that of others. Perri also reviewed The Locust Years , after which he noted chants that may have sprung from a 1970s progressive rock album. He also heard influences from Dio , Hammond organ- heavy music from the NWoBHM , Queen , Voivod and The Beatles . In the same book, Martin Popoff reviewed The August Engine and rewrote it as a mixture of NWoBHM and Voivod in Jason Newsted's time , with melodies and acoustic inserts in the style of Pink Floyd's album Animals . You can also hear classic Doom Metal and Death Angel . The lyrics, the chants, which are male and female, would perform lyrics that would be reminiscent of Chris Goss . Popoff rewrote the music as a psychedelic version of Iron Maiden's best moments. The first part of Fields / Church of Broken Glass sounds like a mixture of King Crimson , Uriah Heep , Bal-Sagoth , Primordial , Týr and Bigelf or even Jethro Tull , Iron Maiden and Manowar . The second half sounds rougher and more malicious and is more like the music of Manilla Road , Cirith Ungol , Wild Turkey and Voivod. Overall, the music is similar to that of Bigelf and Porcupine Tree . In an interview with Mandy Malon from Rock Hard , John Cobbett revealed his preference for old instruments, including the Hammond organ. The group used real, old instruments in their songs, and he wished he could use a Mellotron as well . In the same issue, Boris Kaiser reviewed Dead Revolution . The band processed influences from Classic Rock , Progressive Metal and Doom Metal in their songs . The style of the music is similar to that of Slough Feg and Dawnbringer . The songs are mostly nested and bulky at first. The song Here Comes the Sky is reminiscent of Ghost in terms of melody and atmosphere . Detlef Dengler from Metal Hammer noted in his review of The August Engine that Hammers of Misfortune can be assigned to Progressive Metal, but you don't need to expect Progressive Metal in the style of Dream Theater , you can hardly compare the music with anything else. The members would play at a technically high level, mixing “rough, tricky Power Metal with theatrical and ballad-like elements” and especially emphasized the “abrupt breaks and tempo changes”. In a later issue, Matthias Mineur reviewed the album The Locust Years . You can hear a Pink Floyd-style organ on it. Otherwise he heard influences from King Crimson, Renaissance and Rick Wakeman and summarized the music as a mixture of rock , progressive metal, metal and symphony , which reached the limits of Meat Loaf and Queen. A few years later, Dengler reviewed 17th Street and found that the group now sounded less, weird, idiosyncratic, and "against the current". The album combines “Doom elements, especially NWOBHM influences, psychedelic insertions, stoner atmosphere and a bit of Thrash ”. The use of a piano and Hammond organ brings back memories of Uriah Heep and Deep Purple . The music seems bulky at first, but opens up to the listener after a few runs.

Discography

as an Unholy Cadaver
as Hammers of Misfortune

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d HISTORY OF THE BAND. hammersofmisfortune.com, archived from the original on March 25, 2016 ; accessed on November 15, 2016 .
  2. ^ A b c Eduardo Rivadavia: Hammers of Misfortune. Allmusic , accessed November 16, 2016 .
  3. ↑ a b c d Bio. metalblade.com, accessed November 16, 2016 .
  4. ↑ a b Hammers Of Misfortune. laut.de , accessed on November 16, 2016 .
  5. ↑ Biography. (No longer available online.) Rockdetector.com, archived from the original on April 16, 2016 ; accessed on November 16, 2016 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.rockdetector.com
  6. ↑ Petra Schurer, Thorsten Zahn: Roadburn 2012 . Days of thunder. In: Metal Hammer . June 2012, p. 122 ff .
  7. ↑ Hammers of Misfortune biography. progarchives.com, accessed November 16, 2016 .
  8. ↑ Martin Popoff , David Perri: The Collector's Guide of Heavy Metal Volume 4: The '00s . Collectors Guide Ltd, Burlington, Ontario, Canada 2011, ISBN 978-1-926592-20-6 , pp. 201 f .
  9. ↑ Mandy Malon: Revolution? Bullshit! In: Rock Hard . No. 351 , August 2016, p. 44 .
  10. ↑ Boris Kaiser: Hammers of Misfortune . Dead Revolution. In: Rock Hard . No. 351 , August 2016, p. 86 .
  11. ↑ Detlef Dengler: Hammers of Misfortune . The August Engine. In: Metal Hammer . December 2003, p. 106 .
  12. ^ Matthias Mineur: Hammers of Misfortune . The Locust Years. In: Metal Hammer . January 2007, p. 106 .
  13. ↑ Detlef Dengler: Hammers of Misfortune . 17th Street. In: Metal Hammer . November 2011, p. 105 .