New Black Anvil Track Rips, Reminds Me of Peas

You guys, how awesome are peas? Nothing fancy like lima or garbanzo, just your regular, garden variety green peas. They’re such a seemingly mundane vegetable (legume, actually) that they’re oft forgotten. Just now I went to a salad bar to get lunch — I figure I need some greens in my system after being mutilated by this wretched sickness — and, after assembling the usual consortium of leafy greens, cucumber slices and cherry tomatoes into the takeout container, I happened upon a lonely, forlorn bin of peas on the side of the aisle, seemingly begging for attention. So I went for it. I FUCKING WENT FOR IT! I shoveled a whole damn giant spoonful of ’em into my salad. I’m a real risk-taker, I know. And holy shit, that was a great decision! They’re so sweet and tasty! My salad was all the more enjoyable for it.

Stretched analogy time: Black Anvil are kinda like peas. They’ve been away for so long (four years is an eternity in metal years) and they played NYC so often last time they were active that I kinda just got used to them and took them for granted. But holy shit, does this new track rock or what? “Eventide” comes from their new album Hail Death, coming May 27th via Relapse (pre-order here), and not only does it bring the requisite slices of black metal and punk for which Black Anvil have become known but it also finds the band pushing in new directions, expanding their sound. Such is the benefit of waiting four years between albums to let ideas gestate and grow and instead of becoming locked in the never-ending two-year album + touring cycle. Sometimes you’ve got to let the fruit ripen all the way before picking it.