In 2022 UK deathcore/slam titans  Ingested dropped Ashes Lie Still, a more experimental and tempered album that showed the band’s more introspective side as frontman Jason Evans dealt with the loss of his father. The band also clearly saw some of the success Whitechapel had with their duo of The Valley and Kin, as more […]

Shattered Earth Records is a relatively new label with ties to the excellent Dragoncorpse and has awesome bands like Hanging the Nihilist, Spitpool, Obscure Mantra, Loathsome and The Pelennor Field Tragedgy (yes, epic Tolkien-themed deathcore) on their roster. So when they sent me the new release from Memento Mori, I had to check it out….eventually […]

After a solid career that saw TLTSOL emerge as a solid upper-tier US deathcore act with 6 albums, guitarist Wyatt McLaughlin saw his band gutted back in 2022. He rebuilt TLTSOL and delivered a solid EP, The Disquisition of an Execution in 2023 to get the new lineup greased up and ready for what was to […]

Cariosus is a new young Chicago duo comprised of Alex Pfister on vocals/bass and Kevin Kryszak on guitars (I can’t find any drummer information, so maybe programmed? They sound fine if so). The duo plays a form of modern metal that pulls from metalcore, melodic death metal, deathcore and such that leans into bands like […]

This UK deathcore band has been busy over the last few years in terms of writing and playing shows.  Osiah’s last full-length album in 2021, Loss, I felt was pretty damn monstrous and their best album.  The band somewhat falls into the category of technical deathcore and while there are those prevalent influences, I find […]

France’s Embrace Your Punishment started as a pretty standard hardcore Hatebreed-ish band with some death metal hues back in 2014s Honor Before Glory, but has got progressively heavier with 2019s Nameless King, especially vocally. And now with album number 3, Made of Stone, are an absolute beast of a band that blends hardcore, brutal death […]

Unique Leader Records? Check. Caelen Stokkermans cover art? Check. Blackened Technical deathcore? Check. Cool band moniker? Check. Christian Donaldson (Cryptopsy) mix/master? Check Album title I can identify with? Check. Yeah, I’m definitely reviewing and digging this. Portugal’s The Voynich Code is named after the Voynich Manuscript, a mysterious 15th-century codex full of images and writings […]

I realize Deathcore is a polarizing form of extreme metal and quite honestly I could give 2 shits.  Many people and fans, as well as current and former members of my alma mater, Internal Bleeding have even said our earlier work had a direct influence on Deathcore.  The main points discussed were our second album, […]

Despite being one of the first deathcore bands to dabble with black metal keyboards, Carnifex seems to have never quite fully committed to being a full-on symphonic/blackened deathcore band. The last two albums, 2019s World War X and 2021s Graveside Confessions, flip-flopped between more Whitechapel-styled deathcore and slightly more blackened deathcore that they introduced with […]

Mortem Obscuram initially got on my radar with their debut Eradication of the Human Endeavor back in 2021, a solid if unspectacular release of blackened/symphonic technical deathcore/death metal. It was OK, but I really didn’t give it that much attention, post-release. But boy, with The Wretched Divinity, they certainly have not gotten on my radar- […]

It seems my reviews are becoming scarce, but when I do review something these days, it’s almost always an AOTY sleeper. It might be that I don’t spend time on anything unless I enjoy it. This is because I am typically doing one of three things; working, sleeping, or attending concerts, with the occasional opportunity […]

This summer, two major deathcore heavyweights will be vying for your attention. On one hand, is Signs of the Swarm and the subtly evolved and technical Amongst the Low & Empty. A still brutal, but intricate, deft evolution of modern Deathcore. On the other hand, is the pure fucking beatdown of Colorado’s Crown Magnetar and […]

It almost seems silly to type the phrase “old-school deathcore.” It means bands such as All Shall Perish, Despised Icon, and Suicide Silence, at least in my view. I’m sure it means something different to others. Nowadays, with the awareness to know I am sounding like an old man yelling at clouds, it’s symphonic deathcore […]

I love head-banging. It is a great feeling to release pent-up energy at a Metal show, the crowd is into the experience; each head is like those fucking drinking birds you can get at the novelty store. Unfortunately for me, my head-banging days are pretty much over. I just kind of shake my head like […]

Starting as a standard brutal death metal/slam band, Germany’s started adding some keyboards around 2019’s Inferis, but it was for 2021’s excellent A Hill to Die Upon, where they went full-on symphonic deathcore, and on the heels of Lorna Shore‘s genre igniting Immortal, comparisons to Lorna Shore were inevitable…. and warranted. However, they also had […]

Belgium’s When Plagues Collide released a damn solid debut album of symphonic/blackened deathcore back in 2019, Tutor of the Dying, before the genre really took off. And honestly, it probably should have got more attention but then Lorna Shore happened, Mental Cruelty happened, Worm Shepherd happened, and Shadow of Intent happened. And then 1,234 other […]

Who knew there were not one but TWO excellent symphonic/blackened deathcore bands right here in my backyard in, Missouri? One is Kansas City’s Vile Revelation, who released their killer debut EP Ov Vultures and Flesh back in 2022 (though I only discovered it earlier this year, hence no review) and Abaddonia, hailing from the darkest […]

One could argue, that along with Distant’s Heritage, To the Grave‘s Director’s Cuts, Chelsea Grin‘s double album, and Suicide Silence’s newest, the debut from Ov Sulfur is up there as one of 2023’s early high-profile deathcore releases. Featuring former Suffokate vocalist Ricky Hoover (who has beefed up considerably in the 9 years since his Suffokate […]

There is only 1 Suicide Silence album I do not have in my collection and if you guessed it was their self-titled affair from 2017 you would be correct.  I am not a fan of that album or the musical direction they went in.  I was especially disappointed in it after they released the great […]

The Netherlands’ Distant has the unenviable task of now being on the same label as Lorna Shore after a stint on Unique Leader. And then, as one of the first, larger profile deathcore bands to release an album in 2023, after Lorna Shore‘s Pain Remains changed the game for deathcore (labelmates Ov Sulfur look to […]

International (Canada/ US/ Australia) act Dragoncorpse, has garnered quite a bit of on line hype with their take on deathcore meets power metal and anime (self-described power core), with three rip-roaring singles,  as well as a rather amusing online presence full of memes and self-deprecating humor. Well, now it’s time to see if the hype […]

I have not listened to a Comatose Music release in a while, so I thoughts I’d check in on the reliably predictable label and see what one of their latest releases was like- and boy the label’s shift to proggy power metal was a real surprise! I keeeeed. It’s brutal slamming death metal – what […]

Let’s be honest, any deathcore records released in 2022 are going to be compared to Lorna Shore‘s Pain Remains, and releasing the same month as Pain Remains is a ballsy move. But Unique Leader pulled off two successful competitors with A Wake in Providence and Bonecarver. Let’s see how Nuclear Blast’s entry, the debut from […]

What’s the fucking point? Seriously, what’s the point of deathcore anymore? When Lorna Shore raised the bar so high, yet A Wake in Providence and Angelmaker came very close to clearing it with their releases early in the year, I just wonder why any band would even try. That’s the thing about deathcore, though. It […]

As heralded by their single “Rebirth” (which appears on this album as a remixed bonus track) from earlier this year,  one of the UK’S leading deathccore/slamming death metal acts, Ingested is a band reborn. Now a three-piece consisting of drummer Lyn Jeffs, guitarist/backing vocalist Sean Hynes and vocalist Jason Evans and aided on this album […]