I think most (except Johnny Hedlund himself according to a recent botched interview), would agree that Sworn Allegiance was this legendary Swedish death metal/Viking act’s real comeback album, and that Hell’s Unleashed was a sick joke. Either way, with a change in label, these Swedish stalwarts are truly, truly back with a blistering album far […]

Plying an up-tempo, melodic mix of Darkest Hour, God Forbid and Unearth, California’s Antagonist are competent, enjoyable and skilled, but still rather unoriginal. Though arguably falling under the vast metalcore/American metal umbrella, Antagonist have a healthy does of modern tight, Euro thrash in their sound (sort of if Carnal Forge played metalcore), and deliver it […]

Though this nice 2CD/DVD combo will only appeal to the Hot Topic Crowd, (5% of the profits from this DVD go to the Hot Topic Foundation), it’s still a well put together package that feature most of the bands that today’s kids are digging.The 2 CDs (38 tracks in all) contain nothing too special, mostly […]

While generally, most US black metal seems to be either one man grimness, rather superficial attempts at 1990’s Scandinavian with little or no creativity or identity, or even have some sort of metalcore tinge, California’s The Funeral Pyre have delivered one of the most surprising melodic black/death metal releases to come from a very young […]

Here’s my first exposure two this dual drummer owning band and their hefty form of crumbly, dissonant sludge and Im sort of torn on it. On one hand when absorbing this release on a 300 watt stereo at full volume, the Mastodon-ish vibes that careen from the speakers with muscular and angular tones and shuddering, […]

I assume if you actually clicked on this review, you are either a Killswitch Engage/metalcore fan, so will forgo the usual metalcore is saturated and KSE is the darlings of MTV 2 spiel and get too it.Despite plying basically the same sound as the previous record and an overall sense of metalcore cliche overload, As […]

I’ll make no bones about it. I liked this band. A lot. In fact, I prefer them to the like minded Darkest Hour and The Black Dahlia Murder as far as their modern take on slightly melodic, uber tight thrash metal is concerned. That’s right, I said I liked them better than Darkest Hour, and […]

Like semi commercial Christian metalcore? Like Demon Hunter, As I Lay Dying, A Love Ends Suicide, As Cities Burn and War Of Ages? Just go ahead and grab this and forgo my review. Though not as heavy as label mates Becoming the Archetype and August Burns Red, Destroy the Runner are neither as commercial as […]

I’ll be the first to admit that none of My Dying Bride’s post As the Flower Withers albums haven’t really done much for me. First, mainly because have always found Aaron Stainthorpe’s clean croon insufferably whiny. There, I said it. Secondly, 34.788% Complete just ruined the band’s legacy for me. Even with the band’s sort […]

Although St. Louis, Missouri hardly has a thriving metal scene, it does have a handful of dedicated and consistent metal bands that always seem to surface when a national tour comes through. Such is the case when I covered a recent Dismember/Vital Remains/Grave/Withered show at the Creepy Crawl where one of the opening acts and […]

The acclaimed debut from this German three man act, Back to Times of Splendor, was my top album of 2004, and I was not alone in my praise for an album that took melodic death metal and made it exiting, progressive and challenging. However, as the release of the follow up Gloria grew nearer, I […]

First, after re-listening to The Codex Necro in preparation for this review, there is no doubt in my mind that the debut album from this British duo was and is one of the most extreme releases ever and arguably the most important extreme record to come out of the UK since Scum. That being said, the […]

Well folks, they have done it. One of my favorite bands has finally forced me to write the review that metal fans and COF detractors have been waiting for. While, there’s no question these arguably influential British shock rockers have been shedding the black metal guise of their fat Nick Barker, top hat wearing, precocious […]

I was very curiouss to see how these depressed Finns would top Since The Day It All Came Down, on of the very best album of 2004, but as it turns out not only is Above The Weeping World a crowning achievement for Candlelight in an already stellar year, it’s the band’s finest hour and […]

Holy fucking shit fuck. I know most of you will switch or click off the moment I mention ‘core to start a review, but I swear to you this is some of the best aggro/tech/math/grind core I’ve heard. If you’ve recently been jamming Deadwater Drowning, Animosity, The Glass Casket and The Red Chord, this shit […]

fter plying her sultry tones in Cradle of Filth, Therion, Covenant, Mortiis and others, Sara Jezebel Deva goes head to head with former Without Face singer Jule Kiss (To-Mera) as ‘famous chick singer from another band now in her own band’, and both have pretty good results.Far more contemporary and orchestral than the more ‘proggy’ […]

I’ll make no secret of it, I happen to think Amon Amarth have been treading water for the last few albums, and frankly I have not ‘really’ enjoyed an album from these Norse death metal warriors since Once Sent From the Golden Hall. However, with album number six (and a more simple cover more akin […]

What are you expecting from a band discovered and signed by As I Lay Dying’s vocalist Tim Lambesis and subsequently signed to Metal Blade? Satanic, primal black metal? Political grindcore? Nope, this is decent quality Christian metalcore, and it comes dangerously close to being as good as if not better than As I Lay Dying’s […]

First off, I’d like to warn and apologize to Digitalmetal readers about the impending influx of contemporary hardcore/punk reviews about to inundate the site. It is fall after all. Second I’d like to tell Digitalmetal readers about the best of the bunch of this aforementioned contemporary hardcore/punk I’ve received in the mail in the from […]

Yet more sludgy, earthy, rectum splitting noise to add to my stack of Lair of the Minotaur, Ultralord, Black Cobra, Starkweather and Desolate Void. Honestly, I think I’m losing my hearing, and TAIS is partly responsible as listening to this album repeatedly made me kind of feel like that first torture victim in the movie […]

I’ve always thought there was something pretentious and lazy about self titled albums. A self titled alum smacks of either “This album is so good we don’t need to put any thought into what it is called” or “This album is so bad we couldn’t be bothered to name it”. Luckily, Suffocation’s much anticipated 5th […]

Many, many year before they turned into rock stars, I saw Korn in concert to support their debut album. The opening act was this wretched electro-nu-metal, programmed pile of puke called Cradle of Thorns. Upon listening to the god awful Anticore I briefly thought I was listening to the same band. This album only further […]

Of all the big metalcore releases this year, the sophomore album from Misery Signals was arguably my most anticipated, however with the superb, similarly styled debut from Rosesdead basically stealing some of this bands thunder, I was wondering how Mirrors would stack up in the melodic, layered and emotional metalcore sweepstakes. It stacks up just […]

Finally a re-issue from Paragon Records that’s a worthwhile release (sorry, the Rigor Sardonicus and Black Crucifixion releases didn’t cut it for me). Originally released in 1998 on Mascot Records, this Latvian pagan metal gem is arguably, along with the more infamous Nokturnal Mortum, the godfather of Eastern Europe’s Pagan metal movement that took some […]

If you, like me, wish that Protest the Hero’s excellent Kezia was a little harsher (especially vocally) and less emo or that Between the Buried and Me’s Alaska had even more sweeping arpeggios and less chaos, the fine debut from LA’s The Human Abstract should be right up your alley. Right now I’ll tell you, […]