Back in 1998 Nile, a death metal band from South Carolina, released Amongst the Catacombs of Nephren-Ka on Relapse Records. One could argue, and i would be one of them that the release reinvigorated American metal (as well as Relapse), a death metal scene that was saturated in Nu metal, Pavement Records, JL America and Crash Music bands that were simply soulless speedy death metal clones. However, Catacombs, changed the game.

I’m pretty sure that 2014/15 has been the strongest year for the Swedish Death metal revival movement since the genre reignited back in 2008/09.  And its just not bigger names like Bloodbath, Entrails, Feral, Just Before Dawn, Puteraeon ,Revel in Flesh, Usurpress, Brutally Deceased, Wombbath or dusted of compilations and of ‘lost classics’  like Goddefied, Sorcery and Festerday.  New, fresh, […]

I’ve said it before, I’m saying it now, and ill say it again; I don’t know what the fuck is going on at Mighty Music. Once a bastion for burly European death and black metal, the label is churning out mainstream rock, or just tripe like The Grumpynators, Fried Okra  Band, Franklin Zoo, Bullet Train Blast, See the Sky, Black Book […]

So deathcore has been fading for a few years now. Even prior heavy weights Oceano, I Declare War, Impending Doom and Whitechapel barely registered with their respective last releases or bands are simply becoming more tech death metal (Abiotic, Job For a Cowboy). But last year, New Jersey’s Lorna Shore released a solid little EP called Maleficum, […]

Back in  2013, Germany’s Sulphur Aeon made quite a splash with their debut  Swallowed By The Ocean’s Tide. And rightly so, being a crumbling, cavernous, but memorable sonic monument to Lovecraftian horrors. And yet here we are two years later, and the follow up seems to have been, well… swallowed up. I’m not sure I can […]

Switzerland’s Schammasch made quite stir last year with their second album, Contradiction (it made my 2014 year end list), so Prosthetic Records has reached back and dug up the band’s 2010 Black Tower Productions debut Sic Lvceat Lvx  (meaning ‘Thus, let the Light shine’), given it a nice new mix and remaster and new cover. And […]

Bindrune with past and present bands/releases has really found a superb niche within a particular style with its folky, natural black metal acts like Panoptcion, Nechochwen, Obsequiae (though no longer on Bindrune) , Waldgefluster , Infera Bruo, Ahamkara, Falls or Rauros and such, so it seems that Washington State’s Alda and Bindrune is a match made in heaven. Clearly […]

Translated as ‘loss’, France’s Verlies is a new three piece act, and Les Domaines Du Hommes was self released back in 2014, but the re-release has been picked up fittingly by Hypnotic Dirge Records. So the combination o the band name, country of origin and the label should clue you in as yo what to expect here. Yes, […]

I pressed play on Decreation, the second album from Stockholm’s The Ugly, fully expecting some spikes, beer ‘n’ Satan drenched black thrash. And while the band may have started out in that style on their demos, (I can’t speak for 2008 debut Slaves to the Decay), Decreation follows a much purer, black path of fellow Swedes […]

There was a time in the late 90s and early 00s where England’s Cradle of Filth were one of my very favorite bands, and whether you liked it or not, they were legitimate superstars in extreme metal. I enjoyed 2000s Midian, 2003’s Damnation and A Day, and really liked 2004’s Nymphetamine, but I never really loved […]

I think most death heads will agree that there are a few immensely satisfying experiences when it comes to death metal; 1) a random new find that kicks ass and 2) that moment when death metal is done perfectly, achieving the immaculate balance of speed, power and brutality. Well, on their second album Italy’s new to me acts, Inverted […]

Hate, the 2012 second album from these Aussie deathcore mongers, was a solid slab of techy modern deathcore/death metal, that grew on me a little bit as time wore on. And now, three years later it appears the hopes of deathcore have been but on TAIM and Holy War as the genre seems to be in a […]

While Sweden is the birthplace and home of buzzing, midrange death metal, other countries have dipped into the sound and come up with impressive takes on the sound. The Czech Republic (Brutally Deceased), Poland (Ulcer, Hereza), Greece (Wreckage), France (Skelethal) and even the US (Fatalist, Unwilling Flesh). Well Finland has their own impressive addition in Mörbid Vomit, an eclectic collective of current and former dudes from Black Sun Aeon, Devilhorn, Kivimetsan Druidi and The Zombi.

Christ…… Just when I think I literally cannot hear anything fresh new and different in metal, along comes Maladie. This 9-person German collective is comprised of folks from various mid-level German Death metal acts like Tombthroat, Deadborn and Spheron, as well as Belgian post-rockers We All Die (Laughing). That totals up to 3 Guitarists, 2 vocalists, a saxophone player and […]

I’m having a hard time coming to grips with the second album from Finland’s Oceanwake, Sunless. Not that I don’t like it or anything, it’s just its sort of in stylistic limbo between traditional melancholic lumbering Finnish doom metal and a more Post Metal ebb akin to country mates Callisto or fellow Europeans like Desert Beneath […]

So Floridian black metal act Mindscar were around back in the early 00s with a few demos and such and back then, their guitarist/vocalist Richie Brown was the bassist for Trivium for a year, before Heafy and co got famous. But the band faded out of existence after a lone 2001 EP, However Brown reformed the band with in […]

Gruesome released one of the best death metal albums of this year in ‘Savage Lands’. Not only that, but the album is an excellent love letter to the older Death -albums, old school death metal and most of all, to Chuck Schuldiner. We chatted briefly with one of the main motors of Gruesome, drummer Gus Rios, about how the band came to be and how ‘Savage Lands’ turned out how it did. So sit down, pour yourself some Chianti, eat a corpse and let death consume you.

Black Tower is a Canadian trio that play a form of punk/thrash/power/heavy/black metal that’s a perfect fit for Unspeakable Axe Records, and might actually be their best release yet. And while that mish-mash of styles might overwhelm some, it’s going to appeal to a lot of folks, as it’s done with an awesome retro but fun […]

Symphonics/orchestration and brutal death metal aren’t uncommon bedfellows, but it isn’t exactly a thriving, saturated genre, due to the obvious dichotomy the two style provide. Fleshgod Apocalypse certainly elevated it to critical acclaim and mastered the sound but before that the likes of arguable trendsetters Nocturnus as well as, Agiel, Scrambled Defuncts, Ovid’s Withering and a few […]

I can usually tell of I am going to like or dislike an album after a few moments. A few skips from track to track, hear the vocals, the production etc. I can get a general idea pretty quick. Sure, there are anomalies, growers, late bloomers and stuff I’m just not feeling at that time in […]

So now France is finally joining the European masses like the Czech Republic (Brutally Deceased), Croatia, (Hezera), Italy (Undead Creep), Germany (Revel in Flesh), Poland (Ulcer), Greece (Wreckage) The Netherlands (Funeral Whore), Finland (Morbid Vomit) and even the US (Fatalist) getting in on the Boss HM2, Swedish death metal revival with the duo known as Skelethal. A […]

For 5 years and three previous albums now, Sweden’s Entrails, reactivated from the 90s has been arguably the forerunner and top band in the Swedish death metal revival. After two killer albums on FDA Rekotz/Dark Descent, they were elevated to the big leagues with 2013s Raging Death, on Metal Blade Records, and didn’t lose a […]

So this “extreme progressive metal’  movement is becoming I thing I see. The Great Discord, Black Crown Initiate, Ne Obliviscaris, France’s Maladie, and this long running Swedish act named after a subterranean lake in Antarctica are delivering metal that switches on a dime between prog metal, thrash, technical death metal, symphonic metal, power metal and everything else under the metal […]

I was not overly impressed with the 2012 debut Symbiosis, debut from this Florida tech death/deathcore act. There was nothing inherently wrong with it, it was just yet another faceless (no pun intended) modern tech death/deathcore record with little soul and all twiddle and breakdowns. The kind of stuff that Ive heard too many times […]

I’m not usually one to get to reeled in by hype. Even more so for Sweden’s Tribulation, who left me unimpressed in 2009 with a pretty standard Swedish death metal release, The Horror, then their death metal got all proggy and developed with the rather hyped  The Formulas of Death, a transition that really didn’t […]