I once read a review regarding Belgium’s Pestifier and their then, sophomore release, Reaching the Void, where the group was described as sounding like a collision of Obscura, Beyond Creation, and Vektor. I’ve always like that analogy of the band. It’s true, clean, concise, and includes by association other influential acts such as Pestilence, Death, […]

I’m not sure what to make of the U.K.’s Lucid Conformity and their debut album, Architects of Madness. While it’s definitely not a bad album per se, I’m not willing to throw out heaps of praise or vital recommendations for it either. The fact that the group/duo employs more than a few, i.e. way too […]

It’s funny how life is with its odd and overall meaningless coincidences. Just recently, I reviewed Unhumanized, the latest release from Cianide, and in that review I had made the reference, for the unfamiliar, of imagining Bob Bagchus (Asphyx, Soulburn, Grand Supreme Blood Court), John McEntee (Incantation, Funerus), and Paul Speckmann (Master) coming together in […]

Okay friends, lets just skip all the rigmarole and pointless backstory and just get right to it. Testament‘s newest release, their twelth full-length of all original material, Titans of Creation, is good. Really good. Actually, I’d say it’s pretty damn great. In fact, it may be the best thing the Bay Area thrashers have released […]

I remember reading a review of Horrified‘s 2018 full-length release, Allure of the Fallen, where the band was described as having a sound familiar to Horrendous, but without the prog attributes. While this isn’t my favorite description of the band’s style, it’s admittedly, not too far off either, and ends up working well since more […]

If you’re like me, then the Fall and Winter seasons sees an influx in your doomy/gothic/rocking death metal listening schedule. Whether it be the colder temperatures, the dying/dead fauna, the colorless and cloudy skies, or the realization that we as individuals and as a whole are yet another year closer to our own demise, this […]

In the forever immortalized words of the WWE’s Stone Cold Steve Austin, “Can I get a Hellyeah?!!!” Those were pretty much my sentiments when checking out the debut full-length offering, Summary Execution At Dawn, from San Antonio, Texas’, Oath of Cruelty. Do you like your metal raw, a bit blackened, and dripping with the influential […]

Popularity and/or notoriety are definitely elusive attributes when it comes to extreme metal trying to branch out to a larger audience. Trying to build a band legacy while making an actual financial living from it is indeed the epitome of extreme metal being a ruthless and fickle bitch. What is it that gains one artist […]

Do you like the Alien film franchise? I like the Alien film franchise. It’s a mixed feelings type of thing when it comes to these films. Some people like them all, some people hate them all, some people like a few and hate a few, while others couldn’t care less. Me though, I dig ’em, […]

If you were to ask me where Infirmity was from, based solely on their sound, I’d be hard pressed to come up with an answer. The band and their full-length debut, Descendants of Sodom, is brimming full with influential might. A journey of brutal, melodic, and even blackened tinged death metal groove, Descendants of Sodom […]

If you have ever been out to dinner with Toxic Holocaust, you know what to expect from the band’s sixth full-length album, Primal Future: 2019. While Toxic Holocaust releases have never been the Wolfgang Puck or Gordon Ramsay of thrash metal, they are far from being the local McDonald’s brand of drivel that barely satisfies, […]

Sweet Texas watermelon! Has it been two years already? Wow…it really doesn’t seem like a couple of years have passed since Exhumed released their fan and critic praised Death Revenge, but here I am blasting my eardrums as well as my face, clean into oblivion with the aural onslaught that is Horror, Exhumed‘s seventh full-length […]

Admittedly, I was zero percent familiar with Aggravator and any of their previous output before their new self-titled EP. Though after spending some quality time with said EP, thanks to Unspeakable Axe Records, who have just recently re-released Aggravator after being independently released earlier this year, I will be hunting down their earlier efforts and […]

Well summbitch…As if I needed another reason to love Denton, Tx;  here comes Creeping Death, hot off the heels of their last EP, Specter of Death, with their full-length debut, Wretched Illusions. Besides being a cool place that I’ve always had great times in, whether playing shows with my own band, scouring records shops for […]

What can I say about Bones and their new, and third full-length album, Diseased, that hasn’t already been said before about a few other bands; namely, the ones that seem to influence Bones and their trade of crusty and sometimes even punky, no frills, basic, bare boned death metal. If Terrorizer/Nausea meets Celtic Frost/Obituary by […]

You’ve heard of the Six Degrees of Separation right? Hell, you’ve probably even heard of the quirky, Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon. Well, I guess you could say that it was the Six Degrees of Dave Ingram that led to my introduction of  Cropsy Maniac. You see, it goes like this: I’m a big Benediction […]

Ahh Thrash Metal…For the most part there are usually two camps when it comes to the liking of the genre. One camp simply being lovers of the trade, relishing in everything it is, in all of its neck breaking glory; the other camp tends to keep its distance from the beer and sweat smelling, denim […]

Hot damn! The floor is lava, my ass. The floor is pure fucking Death Angel fire! Rest assured, the band’s newest thrash platter, Humanicide, will burn you up, consuming your pitiful little being, leaving nary a trace that your ever existed, much less mattered.  A bit much? Maybe, but Humanicide really is that good, we’re […]

Chicagoan four-piece,  Nucleus, have returned with their sophomore LP, Entity, and while I haven’t necessarily been on pins and needles awaiting new material these past three years since their debut full-length, Sentient, I have been looking forward to seeing where these cosmic laced death dealers would take their brand of brutality with future releases. Sentient […]

I don’t know what it is with England/the U.K., but that little island nation just cranks out fantastic metal, plain and simple. From originators to imitators, the amount of quality and varied material is quite astonishing, and while I wouldn’t put London’s Lvcifyre in the hallowed halls of British metaldom just yet, I would recommend […]

I first heard about Usurper, via Metal Maniacs magazine, roughly about twenty years ago. The band had released their second LP, Skeletal Season, in 1999 and were due to follow it up with their third full-length, Necronemisis, in 2000. As it always does, extreme metal was once again going through stylistic changes and Chicago’s Usurper […]

Skulls? Czech. Wild corpse paint? Czech. Black attire? Czech. Hooded/cloaked member? Czech. Spiked wrist band(s) and/or gauntlets? Czech. Finger claw ring thingy? Czech. Satan as the bands frontman? Czech. Wait…What? That’s right friends, Hnus Umirajici’s frontman/vocalist is apparently the Prince of Darkness himself, or at least according to the band’s press bio. In fact, the […]

Remember in Rocky IV when Ivan Drago beat the beloved Apollo Creed to literal death? Do you remember the brutality of the beatdown and the shock and awe of witnessing what had just occurred? Well friends, I do. I remember it well, and the feeling I get from listening to Moscow, Russia’s Critical Extravasation is […]

Well I’ll be damned, color me impressed. Brescia, Italy’s, The Scars in Pneuma, and their debut album, The Path of Seven Sorrows, really caught me by surprise with its mature sound and songwriting. While the band cites influences from the likes of Rotting Christ, Mgla, Dissection, Be’lakor and others, in the end it’s just a […]

I’m always going to consider Malevolent Creation to be in the top-tier of death metal bands. This is probably due to the fact that I am an old-school fan from their first few early 90’s offerings, and those feelings I have for their earlier material, coupled with the fact that the band has consistently released […]