I really want to like these Massachusetts metallers  more. They feature Colin Conway (ex- Cannae), one of the coolest dudes I’ve ever interviewed, and my reviewing brethren Luke Sanders gushed over their last record, 2013s Blood and Black. Throw in a beefy, modern take on East Coast death/thrash metal and you’d think the recipe was […]

Hailing from Rochester, NY, duo Mavradoxa  play a form of atmospheric black metal that would be right at home on Bindrune Recordings. It’s a woodsy, Agalloch rooted form of black metal akin to the likes of  Falls of Rauros, Alda, Wodensthrone and such. However, it does not mean its as good as those bands. While Mavradoxa […]

I rather enjoyed this bands second effort, 2013s Atonement, but the band waited a little long for a follow up ( four years is an eternity for brutal death metal), so me waiting a few months to get a review out is excusable. But not much appears to have changed. The band are as brutal […]

There are a few records that left an indelible mark on me as a young metal head. One such record was Fleurety’s 1995 debut, Mid Tid Skal Komme.  And most of it was due to the vocals of Marian Aas Hansen, who added a bluesy, sultry sway to the avante garde black metal. Another more recent effort […]

It’s been quite a year for the old guard of American Death metal. Obituary, Immolation, Suffocation, Broken Hope, Incantation, Dying Fetus and such all releasing albums in 2017. But none may be more important to any band right now than Morbid Angel‘s 10th (proper) album, Kingdoms Disdained.  After the controversial shit show that was Illud Divinum Insanus back […]

Hailing from Toronto, Decatur play a beefy from of groove/thrash metal inspired by the Northeastern US scene (Shadow’s Fall etc), but the selling point here is the debut effort was produced by Gojira’s Joe Duplantier. So you would expect this thing sounds great, and it does with Duplantier glossing the rhythm section with his heavy fingerprints, and […]

What we have here as an impressive self released debut of Lovecraft themed melodic black/death metal from  Denver’s Crafteon. Eschwing the usual Lovecraftian throes (churning miasmal chaos or deep complex, atmospheric black metal), Crafteon go for a cleaner, sharper sound more akin to Dissection, Dimmu Borgir or Ancient’s better output. The guitars have a crisp clean […]

Though a Milwaukee super group of sorts, featuring current and ex members of  new black metal act Prezir (who I highly recommend) , gloomy hardcore act Protestant and crust mongers Enabler, Pig’s Blood would have you believe they come from South America, by way of Pete Helmkamp’s (Angelcorpse) fever dreams with a debut album of bestial, snarling, barbaric black/death […]

If there was one band I feel like I could copy and paste a review from a prior release, change to song titles and call it good, it would be Cannibal Corpse. And sometimes that’s not necessarily  bad thing, and that’s the case with Cannibal Corpse‘s 14th studio album. Despite all the pre album talk […]

Despite switching from FDA Rekotz to FDA Records, the German label has stayed true to delivering  old school death metal, especially the Swedish/Stockholm style finding bands from Germany like  Endseeker, Revel in Flesh, Lifeless as well from as other countries like Funeral Whore, Fatalist, Ending Quest and Massive Assault. Well, add Italy to the list in […]

There is a host of bands vying for the throne left vacant by Dismember. The likes of Infected Chaos, Brutally Deceased, Harm, Blood of Seklusion, Evocation, Endseeker, Massive Assault, Fatalist, Interment and Germany’s Lifeless are certainly near the top of the list. I’ve cowered the bands prior two efforts, 2010 Beyond the Threshold of Death and […]

First, hats off to Mariusz Lewandowski, who created the cover art for Bell Witch‘s third album, for it was this striking artwork that got me to check out this otherwise new to me band. Second, holy. fuck. I have not been utterly moved by a Funeral Doom album for a few years, probably since Funeral’s From […]

I wasn’t sure how these young Canadians would follow up their excellent 2014 debut, The Lucid Collective, a completely over the top , noodling clinical and triggered tech death tour de force, only since topped by First Fragment‘s Dasein since then as far as sheer tech death insanity goes. Well, they are up the the […]

It’s been 10 years since Kansas City’s  Lo- Ruhamah released their impressive debut, The Glory of God, and then a subsequent interview with the band, cleared up the band’s deep philosophical themes and leanings, leanings which again arise on the band’s long awaited follow up, Anointing. Though not a Christian band, as you see by […]

It wasn’t until 2014s Titan that I got into Greece’s Septiciflesh, which is a surprise considering I’m a sucker for big, epic orchestration in metal. But as with Titan, and even prior releases like The Great Mass that I went back to, Septicflesh remain all fluff and no real substance.  But the fluff, remains some of […]

Last year, I received a demo from San Francisco’s Sentient Ignition, they didn’t want a review, just some feedback from me about their sound. The basic premise of my feedback was they were promising, talented, sounded like Black Crown Initiate, and the vocals needed some work. Well, they wrote me back earlier this summer and sent […]

Belphegor has always been one of those consistent, respected veteran bands on my periphery that I’ve ‘liked’ but never ‘loved’. The first  album I heard and covered was 2005s relentless  Goatreich Fleshcult,  and while I thoroughly enjoyed it, subsequent albums like Pestapokalypse VI, Walpurgis Rites- Hexenwahn and Black Magick Necromance, left me pretty ambivalent. So much […]

It’s been 8 years since I reviewed Crimfall’s  debut As The Path Unfolds, a solid entry into the Finnish folk/pagan/epic/melodic/Viking genre along sides stalwarts Ensiferum, Brymir and Turisas. They released a second album, The Writ of Sword back in 2011, but I never heard it so I can’t tell how they have developed since then. What I […]

Under the alias of ‘Zornheym’, bassist/guitarist Tomas Nilsson, played in Dark Funeral from 2011-to 2014, and now he and some of his Swedish metal pals (notably Diabolical drummer Angst and Facebreaker’s Richard Bendler on vocals) has formed his own band under that moniker but those expecting anything like Dark Funeral will be sorely disappointed, as Zornheym play a […]

You know home in some sports and other contests there is a USA vs the World? Well, if we did that for deathcore, despite a valiant effort from the likes of Enterprise Earth, Rings of Saturn, Shadow of Intent, Fit For and Autopsy and Oceano (and negative points from Suicide Silence) , the rest of the world […]

After completely gutting and then revamping the line up, Dani Filth seemed invigorated for the surprisingly good Hammer of the Witches back in 2015, and that renewed energy has carried over into the follow up, the darkly seductive, 12th album, Cryptoriana – The Seductiveness of Decay. A tale of Victorian debauchery, magick, death, the afterlife and Gothic, supernatural […]

On paper, I should be super pumped about Ursinne, (Swedish for ‘fury’) a project featuring Dave Ingram (Benediction, Downlord, Down Among the Dead Men, Echelon) and Jonny Pettersson (Ashcloud, Henry Kane, Gods Forsaken, Wombbath, Just Before Dawn, etc) rounded out by bassist Sonia Nusselder. Even more so when I heard Kam Lee (Massacre) makes an […]

UK power trio Dyscarnate got on my radar with the 2014 reissue of their 2012 sophomore album, And So it Came to Pass, an impressive display of groove and heft that many compared to Dying Fetus- and rightfully so as the band has a bit of hardcore buried in their death metal salvos. And they […]

It’s been  3 years since Anders Biazzi (ex –Amon Amarth, Gods Forsaken, Blood Mortized) released a Just Before Dawn album, the war themed Swedish death metal project with a veritable host of guest vocalists and musicians. There has been a couple of EPs and a single, and now right before the band’s next full length release, […]

Contrarian caused a few waves back in 2015 with their highly regarded debut, Polemic. A supergroup of sorts founded by Jim Tasikas with Brian Mason (Sulaco), Leon Macy (Mithras) on guitars with George Lollias (Nile) on drums. It was a Death homage, with  a heavier lean on the band’s latter, more progressive tones, adding some […]