Author Archive

Carrion Throne – The Feast of Human Vices EP

Formerly known as Epitasis, Chicago’s Carrion Throne is listed as a Doom/Death band on Metal-Archives, but after hearing this debut EP, I’m more inclined to list them as a more Brutal/Slam Death metal band more in line with Devourment and Wormed. The 6 songs here (4 new songs and 2 demo songs from 2022) are […]

HELL IS OTHER PEOPLE Announce Signing & Debut New Single From Upcoming Album Moirae

HELL IS OTHER PEOPLE Announce Signing & Debut New Single From Upcoming Album Moirae Stream “Fates” HERE Transcending Obscurity is proud to announce the signing of Canadian black metal band HELL IS OTHER PEOPLE. Known for their unique blend of atmospheric black metal and post-metal, HELL IS OTHER PEOPLE delivers an elegant concoction of stirring, throbbing music […]

Limbonic Art – Opus Daemoniacal

Early in their career, the Norwegian duo Limbonic Art was close to being mentioned in the same circles as the likes of Emperor, Arcturus, Borknagar, and such. Their 1996 debut The Moon in Scorpio and 1997 follow up In Abhorrence Dementia, were heralded as near classics in the symphonic black metal genre. However, the band […]

Wormwood – The Star

Sweden’s Wormwood burst onto the melodic black metal scene with 2017’s excellent Ghostlands, followed up by Nattarvett, the first of a planned trilogy of albums. Part two of the trilogy, 2021s Arkivet saw the band take a melancholic downturn befitting the tale of mankind’s general shittiness. I was hoping for a return to the more […]

GOD DETHRONED Release Furious Single & Music Video “Rat Kingdom”

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE  GOD DETHRONED Release Furious Single & Music Video “Rat Kingdom”. Watch “Rat Kingdom” Here Four long years after the release of their highly acclaimed album “Illuminati,” Dutch black/death metal icons GOD DETHRONED descend from the shoals of silence with their brand new offering, The Judas Paradox, due out on September 6, 2024, through Reigning […]

Henry Kane – Circle of Pain

Henry Kane (AKA Jonny Petterson from Wombbath) has released two fine grindcore/crust albums under this Poltergeist-named project; 2017s Den förstörda människans rike, and 2020s appropriately named Age of the Idiot. Both delivering furious, Nasum-ish-styled Swedish grind/crust. However, his third release is a completely different beast altogether. and you should probably brace for it a little bit. […]

Anthropophagus Depravity – Demonic Paradise

Every so often I crave unadulterated brutality; Just a break from the keyboards, atmospherics, and moods my other favorite genres provide. And when I’m in such a mood I simply go and look for what Comatose Music has sent into the promos, as they are predictable and reliable when it comes to such music. Comatose […]

SOLSTICE sign deal with PROPHECY PRODUCTIONS

UK epic doom pagans SOLSTICE are setting their signatures under a multi-album deal with Prophecy Productions on this longest day of the year on the northern half of the globe.SOLSTICE will release their fourth album via the label and have already been confirmed for this year’s edition of Prophecy Fest. SOLSTICE comment: “We are heartened and honoured to be working with Prophecy – a label whose discernible courage […]

Ulcerate – Cutting the Throat of God

From the 2007 tech death debut, Of Fracture and Failure, New Zealand’s Ulcerate has been one of the death metal’s most consistently elite bands with 5 albums since. The band has evolved from the pure tech death of the debut into a murky, dissonant, almost black death band (they are on Debemor Morti – a […]

Nyrak – Devourer of All

Devourer of All is the second album from Belgian black metal band Nyrak, (I could not find who or what a ‘Nyrak‘ is) a new band to me, but based on this excellent second effort they will be a regular band in my playlist and a band with a bright future. Playing a blend of […]

EDGE OF SANITY – Launch Digital Single And Video For “Black Tears (Remaster 2024)”; First Chapter Of Catalog Reissue Campaign Out Next Week!

Watch “Black Tears (Remaster 2024)” HERE Century Media Records and InsideOutMusic have recently announced the upcoming “First Chapter” of a comprehensive catalog reissue campaign for legendary and groundbreaking Death Metallers EDGE OF SANITY as well as versatile Prog/Hardrock outfit NIGHTINGALE, who were both fronted by Swedish vocalist, multi-instrumentalist and acclaimed metal producer Dan Swanö (OPETH, […]

Body Count, Kerry King, Eluveitie and Thy Art Is Murder will be performing at Finland’s legendary midsummer metal festival, Nummirock!

Body Count, Kerry King, Eluveitie and Thy Art Is Murder will be performing at Finland’s legendary midsummer metal festival, Nummirock! Finland’s most legendary metal festival Nummirock will take place for the 38th time in Kauhajoki, Finland from 19-22 June 2024. This year’s performers from abroad: Body Count (US), Kerry King (US), Thy Art Is Murder (AU), Suffocation […]

Death/doom metal legends OFFICIUM TRISTE announce new full length via Transcending Obscurity

Widely regarded as legends in the style, Dutch death/doom metal band Officium Triste have mastered the art of playing emotive yet elegant music and have honed their sound even more on their seventh full length album. ‘Hortus Venenum’ is a special album as it celebrates the band’s 30th year anniversary and it’s remarkable that even […]

Suffering Souls – An Iconic Taste of Demise

Thanks to this YouTube group, I spent much of 2023 discovering newer symphonic black metal, or at least releases in the genre that aren’t from the golden age, or releases that somehow I completely missed from 2010 on. I found superb bands like Spain’s Ensom, Canada’s Obscuris Romancia, Russia’s Skylord, Cuba’s Mephisto, Finland’s Shade Empire, […]

Pathology – Unholy Descent

18 years, 12 albums, 9 labels, 8 vocalists. You have to hand it to the lone remaining founding member/ drummer Dave Astor; he is certainly persistent and keeps shuffling lineups and releasing albums on multiple labels, even with all the above he’s seemingly settled on a somewhat stable lineup for a few albums now (Obie […]

XASTHUR release new single ‘Selling Yourself to Die’ taken from forthcoming new album “Disharmonic Variations”

XASTHUR release new single ‘Selling Yourself to Die’ taken from forthcoming new album “Disharmonic Variations” XASTHUR ‘Selling Yourself to Die’ taken from the album “Disharmonic Variations” https://youtu.be/iaCb9b2CHlI XASTHUR comment: “Giving too much of yourself, or whatever you have, and receiving very little in return”, mastermind Scott Conner writes. “It means not being able to live any kind of […]

(Un)Worthy – This Present Darkness

The last Christian metal record I covered was Voluntary Mortification‘s Suffer to Rise back in 2020, which also happened to be Rottweiler Records, which is fast becoming the premier label for extreme Christian Music with bands like A Hill to Die Upon,  Death Requisite, xDOULOSx, Krig, Desolate Tomb, Symphony of Heaven and such, much like […]

Dauþuz – Uranium

Mining-obsessed German duo Dauþuz (‘Death’) has been on my radar for a while now. I initially heard them on their third album, Monvmentvm in 2019, and then in 2021, they crept onto my year-end list with Vom schwarzen Schmied. I wondered how they would, like other specifically themed bands (i.e. Alestorm) how they would continue […]

Moisson Livide – Sent Empèri Gascon

I grabbed the promo for this release because A) it was on Antiq Records, home of the finest medieval black metal, and B) the band moniker reminded me of French folk metal act Boisson Divine, whose La Halha I reviewed back in 2020, and rather enjoyed. Well, lo and behold Moisson Livide (‘Angry/Livid Harvest’) is […]

Baron – Beneath the Blazing Abyss

Despite being around since 2016, Beneath the Blazing Abyss is the Finnish band’s debut and boy, is it an excellent, pummeling example of death/doom metal that is a very, very impressive first effort. If you enjoy mid-tempo trundling death with sprinkles of doom like Temple of Void, Grave, Malignant Altar, Vore, Hooded Menace, Frozen Soul […]

Arð – Untouched by Fire

I don’t know how I missed the debut of this project formed by Mark Reed, keyboardist from Winterfylleth, one of the UK’s very best black metal exports of the last 15 years. They released an album in 2022 called Take Up My Bones, which I shall immediately be procuring after hearing Untouched by Fire. Like […]

Vesperian Sorrow – Awaken the Greylight

Although one of the USA’s early purveyors of European symphonic black metal in the late 90s and early 00s along with Dragonlord, Scholomance, Dreamscapes of the Perverse, Epicurean, Venificum, Santus, and such, Austin TX’s Vesperian Sorrow and most of those listed) never quite garnered a ton of attention. The Europeans just did it better with […]

Skulldozer – Non Stop Ruthless Crushing

Non Stop Ruthless Crushing …..what???? I feel like there’s another word that was forgotten here. Anxiety? Diarrhea? Parental disappointment? I keed,  I keed What we have here is a re-release of a 2023 effort from this Texas act formed by Jason Ramsey (notably from Baton Rouge’s Suture, who released solid albums on Deepsend Records, Unmatched […]

Synestia/Disembodied Tyrant – The Poetic Edda EP

Synestia is a new symphonic deathcore duo consisting of Minnesota’s Sam Melchior (all instruments, writing) and Finland’s Ville Hokkanen (vocals). In 2022 they released their fantastic debut album, Malificium, but it was digital only and got kind of bulldozed by that year’s slew of stellar releases in the genre from Shadow of Intent,  Worm Shepherd, […]

Korpiklaani – Rankarumpu

Listen, I was Korpiklaani fanboy for many years loving the band’s boozy folk metal anthems like “Beer, Beer” and “Happy Little Boozer”, but somewhere around 2008s Korven Kuningas up to 2015s Noita I started losing interest in the band and their albums. The band seemed to get a bit of a hangover, lose their fun […]