Chase Wigmore - "Sonic Apocalypse" Album Review!!

It's now time for our 156th monthly CD review at The Sault Metal Scene, and keeping with our ongoing backlog of new metal, hard rock, and punk album releases, let's look at prolific local extreme metal/folk punk solo artist Chase Wigmore's newest album "Sonic Apocalypse" today! Released on April 6th, this is Chase's twenty-fifth album by release date on his Bandcamp page (note that not all of his prior albums or EPs are there), and it's the first one that was immediately on sale from it's online premiere since 2019, which is why it's taken me almost two years to review another one of Chase's albums. Independently recorded last year and into early 2022, "Sonic Apocalypse" was "recorded passionately" by Chase alone using candidly sub-optimal equipment, with him on all instruments, vocals, and programming. "Sonic Apocalypse" is on sale on Bandcamp on a "name your price" model, so you can get it for free if you so choose.

You can also stream the album for free there, but of course, consider buying the album to support Chase's work! No word on physical copies, but note that Chase hasn't played formal public concert sets to sell them at since the pandemic began. With seven songs running for about 37 minutes, let's begin this review with the kinda-sorta title track!

The album opens with it's shortest song, "The Apocalypse Of Sound", which immediately signals that this is an extreme metal album, with Chase breaking out his black metal-inspired vocals to boot! The song, however, has more of a leisurely paced rhythm with a bouncy riff and a traditional verse/chorus structure, it's just the vocals that take this off of a conventional road in the first half. A bridge does lead into a more chaotic (if still melodic) stretch that lets Chase show off on guitar, but the song does get messier at this stage. The atypical structure won't be for everyone, but it's a fun & varied track! Next is "Angry & Jealous God", which immediately lets Chase's guitar skill take center stage with some fun melodies and solid riffs, but his distorted vocals here are very ephemeral to the experience and just add noise to the audio.

The pacing and rhythm keep up their melodic edge, if in a way that better serves the genre, and the song improves as it goes with more strong soloing to demonstrate Chase's talents! Better song than the opener, though it seriously could have been an instrumental. Third on the album is "Mad Scientists & Witch Doctors", whose lo-fi recording methods and programmed drums show in the audio quality the most here compared to earlier tracks. A slower and more deliberate song, Chase does sing clean on this one, albeit with obvious effects to add a sinister overtone, and the song plods along in a dark, ominous tone until his guitar solo (fittingly rough in tone) pops in. More vocal effects and laughter also pepper the bridge, but it ends on a cleaner, upbeat fade-out. Interesting experimental song whose ups make up for its downs!

The middle song on offer is "Black Storm", which is the purest black metal song yet based on the structure and intensity of vocals, but Chase still lays down a very classic rock-inspired guitar riff underneath it all that almost feels like it's playing at a different speed than the vocals. I like how they contrast here, and this song has Chase's best vocal performance yet, but the second half is purely an instrumental, and the song gets darker in tone while still keeping up with the nice guitar melodies of earlier. One of the best songs for me, I like the differing styles mixed up here! Next is "Sacrifices", which is the album's first instrumental. It opens with a minute-long sonic collage before getting into metal territory, albeit with some more casual guitar strumming breaks, and while not a shredder's valhalla, it does have strong instrumental showcases throughout! "Sacrifices" doesn't strive for more than what it is, but it's a strong instrumental that fans will enjoy!

The penultimate song is "The Algorhythm Of Soul" (any relation to the local cover band The Algo Rhythms is unintentional), and this one makes heavy use of post-production effects and techno-inspired elements, so fans of Chase's work as/in The Black Lodge Masters will appreciate this! There are vocals in the mix, but this is effectively another instrumental, and it's organized chaos for the duration. If you like chaotic drum & bass/techno music, this will do the trick, but it's not my cup of tea compared to Chase's preceding metal songs. The album closes with (by far) its longest track, "In The Name Of The Master", which runs for over 13 minutes! As such, this is a hard song to succinctly break down, but Chase does bring back vocals briefly, as well as the most prominent keyboard part yet. The song starts slow and deliberate, moves into dark territory, and gets fast and brutal quick, with the midsection delivering Chase's most blistering guitar work!

The keyboard playing does seem very out of place when it more obviously re-enters the song, but this song is effectively just a long showcase of Chase's multi-instrumental talents, especially on guitar, and while long, it's never boring. I do think the song does suffer a bit from a lack of structure as it goes, but as a pure talent display, Chase delivers the goods! So, what are my final thoughts on "Sonic Apocalypse"? Overall, it's a fun album that will appeal to fans of Chase's metal material, while also containing enough lead guitar flourish to appease fans of his solo video uploads! Compared to his previous album (to have a paid release upon launch) "One Last Act Of Defiance", this mostly focused on contrasting black metal & distorted harsh vocals with atypically melodic guitar work, and while that mix had its ups & downs, "Black Storm" balanced the line very well, and the epic closer shows us why Chase's playing is must-see!

Production-wise, Chase was candid about how "Sonic Apocalypse" came together, but with minor exceptions, it sounds fine aside from sometimes too-obvious drum machine work. In terms of things I'd change... the processing on Chase's vocals could be overdone (especially on "Angry & Jealous God"), songs sometimes lacked in structure, and if you're not into industrial music, "The Algorhythm Of Sound" will not be as appealing. Still, as a dark slice of extreme alt-metal, Chase delivers the goods for fans of his metal work, and definitely consider buying or streaming it for yourself at the above links! I hope you guys liked this month's CD review, and our run of backlogged new album reviews continues in July, and it will be a new album by revived local "blue Chinese metal crash punk" quartet Sykotyk Rampage, but which one? I originally planned to look at "Hell Bent Heaven Sent", but as it turns out, it's not a newly released album.

The canon release date on Bandcamp is January 1st of last year, despite the delayed Reverbnation release, but there is another. On June 1st, the band released "Wyrd Radio 2: Kype The Jesus Boots, Gospels According To Sykotyk Rampage", a triple length concept album that I will be covering in an upcoming post, and that is new. It will probably be our longest album ever reviewed on the site, but it is next in release order, so that will show up likely later in the month! That's all for today, but stay tuned for weekend concert previews on the site tomorrow! Thanks everyone!