Author Archive

Only 2 albums into their career, Scotland’s purveyors of “True Scottish Pirate Metal”, Alestorm hardly need any introduction. Their debut, the raucous, Captain Morgan’s Revenge, put the fun back into metal, and with the follow up, Black Sails at Midnight, the band have further upped the Pirate-y goodness. Chock full of brazen metal seas shanties of rum, women and plunder, the band seems destined to truly blow up on an international level, aided by the bands recent tour of the US. I caught up with the pleasant and portly pirate who plays guitars, Dani Evans to find out a little more about this group of amicable musical privateers….

Despite the fact this is pretty obvious The Black Dahlia Murder worship a la Wretched, Mirror of Dead Faces, Sons Of Azrael etc, but it’s better than those bands and I have to say I’m kinda digging this- a lot. From the killer cover to the injection of some excellent Woe of Tyrants – like […]

Award-winning Glendale, AZ heavy music powerhouse JOB FOR A COWBOY (JFAC) has completed work on its hotly-anticipated sophomore album, entitled Ruination. The record will see a July 7, 2009 North American release date via Metal Blade Records. The brand new JFAC song “Unfurling a Darkened Gospel” has been posted online today and is available to […]

As regular readers of this site may know, I’m generally not a huge fan instru-metal or instrumental metal as I feel vocals are an integral part of metal. However, with the likes of Scale the Summit, Animals As Leaders, Shelter Red and North Dakota’s Sleeping In Gethsemane, my stance may be softening a little. Admittedly, […]

Nashville natives Destroy Destroy Destroy will exclusively premiere their new music video for “The Wretched Forest” today on MySpace Music. The video for “The Wretched Forest,” directed/produced by Steve Stemac and edited by Ryan Kendrick of Digital Bohemia, transcends historical time periods, taking us back to when quests for the Holy Grail and slaying dragons […]

Band Leader PATRICK MAMELI Makes Statement and Apologizes To the Fans HOLLYWOOD, CA (May 24, 2009) – The innovators of Death Metal, Pestilence will not headline today, May 24, 2009, at the Maryland DeatFest due to their detainment at the US border. Band leader Patrick Mameli and guitarist Patrick Uterwyck were kept in custody for […]

A Canadian band playing bouncy, synth filled, epic, Finnish styled folk power/black metal on Sumerian Records (though Nuclear Blast did do the European release) with a female drummer? Yup. Culling from the likes of Ensiferum, Wintersun, Turisas, early Children of Bodom and such, Blackguard (formerly known as Profogus Mortis) give folk fans another solid entry […]

One of the most influential melodic hardcore bands of our time, Strike Anywhere, has found a new home at Bridge Nine Records, as announced today by the label. Bridge Nine owner Chris Wrenn said, “We’re really excited about working with such an established and hard working band as Strike Anywhere. I’ve wanted to work with […]

I have to admit, my expectations weren’t to awfully high for this. An English tech-metal/deathcore band on Earache, but Fetish actually ended up being a surprisingly solid release that will appeal to fans of recent releases by Burning the Masses, Within the Ruins and such. Straddling the line between atonal, grinding, spazzy, metal, tech death […]

Sinister is perhaps one of the most underrated death metal acts ever to emerge on the 90’s metal scene. In 1988 they begun their quest for metal annihilation, recording several demos and EPs which slowly paved the way for future success. Today, after releasing eight LPs and one DVD, Sinister can proudly stand next to […]

Coroner Records, a new italian metal label located in Torino, is gearing up for their first two releases: Disarmonia Mundi’s first album “Nebularium” remastered plus 6 new tracks in stores on the 26th of June! Italian death metallers Disarmonia Mundi announce they just signed a deal with Coroner Records. Before the release of their new […]

So after my review of Finsterfirst’s latest album, Einheit Produktionen were kind enough to send me a trio of the labels releases from the tail end of 2008, and all three warrant your attention, especially the 5th full length album from this long running German folk/Viking metal band. Much like Heidevolk, there’s a huge Vintersorg […]

The American/Swedish collaboration BONE GNAWER, which features the legendary Kam Lee (Massacre/ex-Denial Fiend), Rogga Johansson (Paganizer), Ronnie Bjornstorm (Ribspreader, Hate Ammo) and Morgan Lie (Naglfar) is readying to unleash their debut album Feast Of Flesh. An early June 2009 release date is to be expected. To ease fans of their insatiable hunger for this crushing […]

ANIMALS AS LEADERS GUITARIST DRAFTED FOR SUMMER SLAUGHTER Tosin Abasi to join Born Of Osiris on “the most extreme tour of the year”  ANIMALS AS LEADERS guitarist Tosin Abasi will join Sumerian recording artists Born of Osiris on this year’s Summer Slaughter tour, which kicks of June 5 in Baltimore, Md. The seven-week traveling festival, […]

Swedish progressive death metal act SKYFIRE has made its new song “Esoteric,” available for download on their myspace page at www.myspace.com/skyfiremusic.  The band will release a 4-song, digital-only EP entitled Fractal in July via Pivotal Rockordings. Fractal is made up of songs that were written between 2004’s Spectral and their yet-to-be-released September 2009 Esoteric album. […]

TRENTON, N.J. – Frontiers Records is proud to announce the release for the second Sunstor album, “House of Dreams.” This AOR masterpiece, featuring former Rainbow, Malmsteen, and Deep Purple vocalist Joe Lynn Turner, will be out in America on May 19 via Frontiers/Super D and in Japan on King Records. The first Sunstorm album saw […]

CARACH ANGREN – STOP – RECORDING IN AUGUST – STOP – ALBUM NAME: DEATH CAME THROUGH A PHANTOM SHIP – STOP – RELEASED END 2009 VIA MADDENING MEDIA – STOP – SAVE YOUR SOULS – STOP  On their pillage through the seven sickening seas, the haunted Dutch four-master CARACH ANGREN boarded countless freighters and encountered […]

EARACHE RECORDS is pleased to announce the signing of UK hardcore act, YOUR DEMISE to a North American licensing deal. YOUR DEMISE plays a style of metallic hardcore popularized by bands such as HATEBREED and EARTH CRISIS and combines it with elements from all over the musical landscape, including elements of drum n bass. This […]

Behemoth will release their newest album Evangelion on August 7 via Nuclear Blast in Europe and August 11 via Metal Blade in US. Check out the cover artwork! “Evangelion combines a pure art form with a direct message. It was also important for us to ensure that the graphical presentation did justice to the record. […]

So here is album number two from the UK’s Trigger the Bloodshed who along with the likes of Sarpanitum, Detrimentium, Man Must Die (and since, Ignominious Incarceration) have recently resurrected the British death metal scene and with a slight line- up change, Trigger the Bloodshed remain as technical and visceral as the debut. Of course […]

Reunited “cosmic doom metal” band YOB has completed work on its new full length album entitled The Great Cessation. The record will see a July 14, 2009 release date via Profound Lore Records. Long respected as one of doom metal’s finest and most potent bands, YOB creates mastodonic, mind-bending music. The Great Cessation was recorded […]

From the Hail of Bullets official message board: Dutch Death Metallers HAIL OF BULLETS go to war again with Warsaw Rising, an EP featuring two brand new tracks, one cover and three live recordings! The new songs are ‘Liberators’, a rumbling ode to one of the most magnificent bombers ever built and the title track […]

Competent Russian Viking Metal veterans NOMANS LAND have successfully completed the recordings for their fourth album masterpiece Farnord, which was produced at Finnish Sevik Audio studios. Release date for this new magic moment will be August, 29th 2009. First audio impressions can already be checked at: http://www.myspace.com/nomanslandrus     Norwegian Viking Metal pioneers THUNDRA, featuring founding […]

For reasons beyond my comprehension, the second full length album from Funeral Mist (now comprised solely of Arioch) has received a large amount of criticism and negative response. Whether it’s the fact the album was unleashed without warning 6 years after the highly regarded Salvation, that Necromorbus is no longer on drums, or that Arioch […]

Super group Birds of Prey consisting of Ben Hogg (Beaten Back to Pure), Erik Larson ( The Mighty Nimbus, Alabama Thunderpussy, Hail!Hornet), Bo Leslie (The Last Van Zant, Throttlerod), Summer Welch (Baroness), and Dave Witte (Municipal Waste, Burnt by the Sun, Discordance Axis, Human Remains) have always been promising with their Southern take on groovy […]