What a perfect album name and title for the current global isolation: Exulansis;  The tendency to give up trying to talk about an experience because people are unable to relate to it. Sequestered: To keep a person or a group of people away from other people. Sympathy ; feelings of pity and sorrow for someone […]

It’s been 6 years since Milwaukee’s Ara released Destroyer of Worlds, and although guitarist Jerry Hauppa (who once wrote for this very site) remained busy with the likes of Steel Iron, Northless and Prezir,(sadly his instrumental project, Concentric is no more) it’s a new Ara record I’ve been waiting for from Mr Hauppa and co. […]

I vaguely recall interviewing The Black Dahlia Murder, back around the release of 2003s Miasma. Young bright eyed young men, with the world ahead of them, having fun and the metal world at their feet as the darlings of American metal. Well, the faces have changed significantly since then, as guitarist Brian Eschbach and vocalist […]

“Warning! What you about to hear is extremely extreme. If think you can handle it by all means listen. However, if you have a preexisting condition that is aggravated by things that are evil, extreme, infernal brutal, cult , unholy or just sort of negative in general, you are urged to turn off this recording. […]

Within a matter of days, I received 2 really good symphonic black metal albums from the UK, and promptly purchased both. First, Argesk’s heavily Hecate Enthroned influenced  Realm of Eternal Night, and this, the conceptual debut album (they do have 3 EPs under their belt, which I have not heard yet) from Northern Ireland’s Drakonis. With […]

So here is reunion album number 3 for Wombbath, one of the 90s Swedish death metal bands that reunited for another go. This time, lone original member Håkan Stuvemark and Johnny Petersson (Henry Kane, Ashcloud, Gods Forsaken, Ursinne, Just Before Dawn) has yet another set of different guys helping them out for this album by […]

Germany’s metalcore/death metal veterans have always been one of those bands I kinda like. I own quite a few of their prior 12 albums, but I don’t think I have listened to them fully,  and I pick  them up used if I happen to find them rather than instantly buy them or seek them out. […]

With their fifth album, Germany’s Fear My Thoughts have now evolved in to a full on modern melodic death metal act, and a good one at that. And while Hell, Sweet, Hell was a glossy but flawed transitional album, Vulcanus sees the band deliver an improved effort that should elevate the band into elite status. […]

Germany’s Fear My Thoughts complete they shift from rumbling metalcore to melodic death metal that was hinted at on last years ambitious The Great Collapse, and while Hell Sweet Hell is a solid album, it just doesn’t leap out at me and I still prefer the band’s more extroverted stylings of V.I.T.R.I.O.L. That being said, […]

Frantic Bleep Feature ImageThe Sense Apparatus (The End Records) If prior albums from The End by Peccatum, Arcturus, Winds, Age of Silence and Madder Mortem bored you with their overly artistic facades, Frantic Bleep is just for you. Culling elements from all the aforementioned acts and even borrowing members from Madder Mortem (Kjetil Fosseid, Daniel […]

Kaamos -Lucifer Rising Feature Image(Candlelight ) In 2002, amid all the Swedish retro hoopla of Bloodbath’s Resurrection Through Carnage and even original recordings from Swedish veterans Centinex, Vomitory and Fleshcrawl, one band lithely slipped under the radar that year with their self titled debut. Now, personally I didn’t care for it that much especially compared […]

To me, God Dethroned have never quite recaptured the glorious mix of brutality and melody displayed on 1997’s The Grand Grimoire, with a string of mediocre releases following that great album up. Last years Into the Lungs of Hell came the closest of all the subsequent releases, but still didn’t touch the sophomore album in […]

I deliberately reviewed this album next to Merlin’s lackluster effort to show that Great White North has some decent bands on their roster besides Merlin, Divina Enema, and Aggression AD. OK, so they have Fuck The Facts which saves them immeasurably, but they also have this nifty little Canadian outfit called Paroxysm. With artwork done […]

Holy shit. Two major league things going on here. First, a great release on Crash Music. Second, a filthy, piss ridden exercise in death/thrash from Finland of all places. One part gritty Entombed, one part At The Gates and one part grimy leather and spikes retro black thrash a la Bestial Mockery, Pyuria deliver a […]

Often, the terms “progressive”, “experimental” and “avant-garde” are overused (my self included) to describe any music that simply can’t be pigeonholed, categorized, or maybe defies our metal shuttered concepts of what should be construed as “metal”. Bands like Arcturus, Ulver and Solefald, who break the mold of metals restrictive constraints are either hailed as geniuses […]

Edge of Sanity. Yup, that’s the first band that popped into my head when the opening chords of the tile track rumbled from the speakers. Not the ambient experimental metalcore outfit who blew me away with V.I.T.R.I.O.L, and while a drastic style change such as this might usually disappoint me, Fear My Thoughts actually pull […]

This is one of those albums I have to put review blinkers on for, because as much as I’d personally like to rave about the brilliance and influence of Grave, the fact is, for the follow up to last years ‘comeback’ album , Back From the Grave the word ‘Regression’ is an apt title. I […]

Imagine for a moment that teen deathsters Decapitated played screamo-punk instead of death metal, and that they were from Staten Island and Brooklyn. You would get Quantice Never Crashed; an adolescent gathering of talent equal if not greater than their peers. Part early Hopesfall, part You Fail me Converge, part Thursday and part Fear Before the March […]

The far-reaching influence of At The Gates‘ Slaughter of the Soul has resonated throughout the death metal genre and as recent releases by Dew-Scented and Corporation 187 have shown, the influence remains as powerful as ever. Even the Middle East now has felt the ‘Gates influence seep ever further afield. While Israel has produced a handful of […]

What a perfect name for a doom/death album. Slovakia’s Thalarion have been one of the bands I’ve always liked as they have perfected the “beauty and the beast” sound, mixing guttural death metal, atmospheric doom elements, and a hint of goth for three albums now. With their fourth album Tunes Of Despondency, Thalarion appears to […]

The U.S. has seen the melodic metal/hardcore mix blossom into a small musical renaissance, so it comes as no surprise than as with most musical phenomena, Europe follows suite, which is actually a reverse in trends, as the U.S. is normally the one a few years behind. So, here come Germany’s FearMyThoughts, with their second […]

Yes, Grief Of Emerald’s first three (four of you count the as of yet unreleased debut) albums did sound like Dimmu Borgir. Yes, they appear to be riding to coattails of other more commercially viable bands, and, yes, they do use keyboards. However with Christian Termination, the Swedes appear to have possibility shaken loose from […]