Author Archive

Hailing from Michigan (Detroit), Hellmouth are a snarling, gnarly crossover band that meld, punk, thrash and hardcore into a mix that’s a refreshing change from the usual Ferret fare though it lacks real staying power, once the initial burst of feral energy wears off. Citing influences like Celtic Frost, Black Flag, Venom, Black Sabbath and […]

March 18, 2009, The Riot Room, Kansas City, MO It was a night of firsts at the tiny Riot Room; my first pagan/Viking/folk metal show, my wife’s first metal show after 12 years of marriage and my first ever in person meeting with another member of the metal media-Blabbermouth and Outburn’s (and now our own […]

From the label that brought us the excellent When the Deadbolt Breaks comes a grooving, loping doom/sludge act, though this one comes with a thick stoner doom haze and features (former) Metal Maniacs scribe JJ Koczan on vocals. Hailing from New Jersey, Maegashira (some rank in Sumo wrestling I gather) is armed with a beefy, […]

Portland Oregon’s Nanda Devi (named after the second largest mountain in India) aren’t doing anything particularly original or inspiring with their take on the suddenly popular to hate post rock, Neur-Isis styled metal, but it’s a worthy entry into the genre. Five relatively rangy songs (6-10 minutes) and three untitled instrumental fillers make up the […]

WHITE WIZZARD, LA’s high-energy, NWOBHM-influenced metallers – who could be described as a cross between DIAMOND HEAD and VAN HALEN – have signed a worldwide, multi-album deal with Earache Records. WHITE WIZZARD formed in 2007 and shortly afterwards recorded their HIGH SPEED GTO demo, which only made it into the hands of a few select […]

New Album Due This Fall  Shadows Fall have announced the formation of their own label in conjunction with Warner Music Group’s Independent Label Group and Ferret Music. The band will release their 6th studio album this Fall. More details coming soon.  Lead singer Brian Fair has this to say about his bands new venture:  “All of us […]

New York-based extreme metal band BURNING HUMAN has completed work on its debut album, titled Resurrection Through Fire. The record will drop on April 21, 2009 via E1 Music (formerly KOCH Records). Resurrection Through Fire administers ten frighteningly intense tracks of underground death metal that inflict lethal doses of crushing brutality, relentless speed and blast-furnace […]

Oslo City District Court has delivered a verdict on the main question in the GORGOROTH trademark case, which took place at the end of January 2009. The court has decided that King Ov Hell’s trademark registration #243365 of the band name GORGOROTH is NOT valid and shall therefore be deleted. The court states that King […]

UNEARTH AND LAZARUS A.D. TO SUPPORT!!! Bay Area thrash legends TESTAMENT are taking the stage once again for their first US headlining tour in support of the award-winning The Formation of Damnation. The band’s first new studio album in nine years won “Album of the Year” at the 2008 Metal Hammer Golden Gods Awards. The […]

Originally released on 625 Thrash Records back in 2007 and now re-released by arguably the original grindcore record label, Texas’s Insect Warfare continue where the monstrous grindcore recent efforts of fellow Texans Kill the Client, Maruta, Captain Cleanoff and Napalm Death, left off. Basically, Insect Warfare is like my mother in law; short, explosive, loud, […]

I really, really wanted to like this; an experimental black metal duo from New Hampshire, from a cult label with a history of solid releases? Cobalt anyone? Even more so after reading lots of positive press including our own Scott Alisoglu and a Nathan T. Birk interview of the band in Metal Maniacs that gushed […]

Hailing from Finland, Folk three-piece (with the aid of some noteworthy session members) Crimfall entered the folk metal fray back in 2008 with their Burning Winds demo. And now with their Napalm Records debut, As the Path Unfolds, those demo tracks as well as eight brand new tracks deliver exactly what you’d expect from a Finnish Folk/Viking band-and more. With the luscious Helena Haaparanta providing an operatic gloss to the expectedly up beat, typically Finnish, blackened yet epic and bouncy fare, Crimfall, like the recent release by Kivimentsan Druidi, Arkona and country mates Battlelore, have given folk/Viking metal some elegance amid the grime and chain mail driven throes typically associated with the genre. From the bombastic chorus of “The Crown of Treason” through the ethnic chants of “Wildfire Season” and Middle Eastern Aura of “Sun Orphaned” to ballad “Aubade” the album covers all of Folk Metal bases with confidence, gusto and an orchestral grandeur. I visited with guitarist Jakke Viitala to find out a little more about one of Finnish folk metal’s newest additions…

If your self released effort gets reviewed here, you must be doing something right, and the UK’s (Bradford) The Belonging show that a self released effort can compete with most label released efforts. I don’t remember much about the bands prior release, Setting the Scene, so it could not have been that good, but on […]

As I start to get to the last of my 2008 releases that I feel worthy of review, I stumbled across the full length debut from Modesto, California’s Better Left Unsaid, a band whose demo, The Silencing, I reviewed and enjoyed at another site. Now on Jamey Jasta’s Stillborn Records, BLU play a form of […]

Whereas the upcoming release, Lullabies For the Dormant Mind from label mates The Agonist is a vital, powerful and stunningly good example of female fronted metal done right, the debut from Wisconsin’s Luna Mortis is little more than a mish mash of styles that while, has some promise simply does not do enough to justify […]

If you have some interest in a gasmask clad Chicago black metal outfit which has members of Nacthmystium, Cianide and Dysphoria in its ranks, plying a form of relentlessly  simple yet effective, Marduk/Dark Funeral meets Impaled Nazarene styled thrashy black metal, then look no further than Kommandant. There’s not much more to elaborate on really; […]

There was a lot of buzz about the Relapse debut of Germany’s tech death band Obscura, especially since being joined by Necrophagist members Christian Muenzner (guitars), Hannes Grossman (Drums) and Pestilence bassist (for Spheres) Jeroen Paul Thesseling. Now I’ve had about a month to let the album, sink in, I can confidently say the hype […]

It’s been a while since I heard anything remotely metal from Victory Records, but all of a sudden they release a slew of records in the form of Arise and Ruin’s improved thrash attack, Corpus Christi’s As I Lay Dying impression, Wretched’s impressive The Black Dahlia Murder worship and this fine melodic death core assault […]

Hot on the heels on Century Media’s Kivimetsan Druidi, come another female fronted, dirt, fur and paint covered folk metal band infusing classical/orchestral elements into the tried and true Finnish take on folk/pagan/Viking metal as plied by the likes of Ensiferum, Turisas and such. The results are largely successful, mostly due to Helena Haaparanta who […]

Walkerton, Ontario based Odium has signed with Year of the Sun Records for the release of their upcoming debut album “At The Bottom“, which was produced by Greg Dawson (The End, Moneen). Odium’s debut will surface in March 2009. The group has posted a new song online at www.myspace.com/odiummusic.  “We’re excited to join the Year […]

Swedish progressive death metallers SKYFIRE have wrapped up the recordings for the follow-up to 2004’s “Spectral,” entitled “Esoteric.” The album’s music was self-produced at Powernest Studios in Gothenburg, Sweden, while vocals were produced by THE FORSAKEN guitarist Patrik Persson. “Esoteric” is set to be mixed by Jonas Kjellgren (SCAR SYMMETRY, SONIC SYNDICATE, ZONARIA, THE ABSENCE) […]

Cleveland’s 6-headed metal beast, CHIMAIRA,  are set to give the world their first taste of The Infection, with the release of their first single, “Secrets of the Dead.” The song will be available for purchase via iTunes and can be heard streaming on the band’s official MySpace (www.myspace.com/chimaira). “Secrets of the Dead” is also featured […]

Swedish black metal cult AVSKY are currently recording their third album (and second for MORIBUND RECORDS), to be titled Scorn.  Reports guitarist/bassist AE, “We’re extremely satisfied with the result so far. The material is much better and more complex than before, and we will have Nox from CRAFT make a guest appearance on one of […]

Seriously, what are you expecting to read here? I suppose I’d better write something I guess…. 20 years, 11 studio albums, 1 million records sold worldwide, Cannibal Corpse are the very epitome of death metal consistency and even though the band is often still referred to as the band Chris Barnes used to be in […]

In a statement made on Friday, February 27, 2009: “NACHTMYSTIUM has sad news today with a once-again recurring issue surfacing from the wake of our past. We’ve been forced, at the request of the promoters and the folks at Scion / Toyota, to pull out of the Scion Rock Fest, scheduled for Saturday, February 28. […]