MOTD - Engorged: A Breath of Fresh Death Metal Air

Mp3 Of The Day  

Band/Artist: Engorged  
Song: Eating The Afterbirth 
Album: Engorged demo
Style: Death Metal  
Country/Location: Worcester/Auburn, Massachusetts 
Release: 1993

Last week the Metal Thursday/Worcester metal scene family gathered to celebrate the birth of our brother in horns and arms, the one and only Matt Smith. This man has been an active member of the New England metal scene for years, winning our hearts while headbanging his gorgeous golden locks or playing in fuzzy heavy incredible doom bands or just being one of the friendliest and most badass mofos ever. I call him my hair brother for we share the blessing of having blond curly hair that is perfect, but he's also my brother in metal.

So in honor of this most metal of men, I share with you the early days of Matt Smith's metal career, a band called Engorged. Not to be confused with the slightly more well known death/grind band from Portland, Oregon, this Engorged was formed around 1992 or so in the Worcester area. Matt and his buddies set out to produce their own brand of brutal and dirty death metal. This brand consisted of chunky brutal riffs, fast skillfully chaotic guitar licks, grind blasting pummeling drums and inhuman gruff grunts. All this plus a gritty satanic atmosphere which provided the final key to their brazen sound. Engorged were definitely a force of death metal nature, releasing a killer 4 song demo in 1993 (which I share one song with you!). Sadly, their brutal time together was short, disbanding around 1995.

Fortunately for those of who missed their early run there's a new chapter in the story of Engorged. 2011 saw the return of Engorged from the band. Today they continue to show Worcester and Boston how real old school death metal is done. They sound fresh and new while keeping true to their traditions. It's always to pleasure to see Engorged punish audiences with dirty and raw music, plus they do a fantastic cover of Venom's "In League With Satan." Anyways, happy (belated) birthday Matt Smith! Continue to be the most metal person I know!

Engorged - Eating The Afterbirth

MOTD - Nightwish: Nemo dumps snow & silly young metalhead memories

Mp3 Of The Day  

Band/Artist: Nightwish  
Song: Nemo  
Album: Once  
Style: Symphonic Power Metal  
Country/Location: Kitee, Finland  
Release: 2004

In true unpredictably predictable Wren fashion, I am attempting to restart my lil' blog with a play on a recent meteorological event. Even truer to myself, I'm posting a really really cheesy song that most true metalheads will find repulsive. Ain't I a stinker?

The biggest snow storm of the century has come and gone. This mammoth storm dubbed Nemo by scientists and media caused all sorts of excitement, including a driving ban which has caused me to be happily trapped at my home in North Grafton surrounded by 28.7" of snow. That is a shit ton of snow right there!

Anyways, the name Nemo reminded me of an old favorite song of mine by one of the first metal bands I got into when I was first venturing out into the heavy music realms. I remember first discovering Nightwish randomly on the iTunes music store back in 2004 and thinking "what is this!? This is awesome!" At the time, the idea of heavy metal mixed with operatic vocals was foreign to me but man it got me hooked. I mean, Evanescence I liked a lot but this was way heavier (well, to a young metalhead) and the symphonic elements were even more pronounced. Each song was a tasty bombastic over-the-top nugget of crunchy toned goodness that digested themselves into my brain like Khan's Ceti Alpha V eels. Tarja's powerful classically trained voice was a bright and shiny gem that sparkled over the raging metal fire. Today, I realize and hear that this album "Once" is considered their sorta sell-out record, taking a nu-metal/mainstream rock turn from their usual hyper melodic and solid power metal. Even I admit their earlier work is much better and more honest then this, however you know what, this still holds a very special place in my heart and every time a song from "Once" is played I smile.

Nightwish - Nemo