Ruach Raah play scummy black metal with an punk evil spirit (as their name translates). Probably best received live in a crumbling stone walled, graffiti splattered basement in their native Portugal. All members in ski masks and faded black everything spazzing angrily. There are no samples, no solo’s, no interludes, no god forsaken frills. […]
Tsjuder is back with their brand of uncompromising black metal, their 2nd release since returning from a brief hiatus and they continue to keep the pace and to rise within the ranks of the black metal elite with this release. Tsjuder started out slowly for me, the 1st release I heard from them being Kill For Satan, […]
Seeking to take the classic sludge sound into busier, high traffic avenues, Arizonians Gale spare no expense and leave no boulder uncrushed in their mission to plow eardrums under six feet of sediment in the name of their mission. They’re atmospherically heavy like before Neurosis went all soft on us, heavy and ugly like an […]
I first came across Poland’s Mord’A’Stigmata with the 2011 release AntiMatter and I was intrigued with their take on black metal which contained avant-garde elements and slight progressive influences to bring forth a different form of darkness and with current members also in Arkona and Preludium, I knew there is a history behind them. I […]
Considering the band name, logo, album’s title and cool cover art, I braced for some ‘brootal’ death metal. However, what I actually got was some sharp if derivative Germanic melodic death metal/metalcore in the vein of the label’s 00s stuff like Feast For the Crows, Six Reasons to Kill, Deadsoil the american sound of the time […]
Speed… speed… and more SPEEEEEEEDDDDD!!! That’s what you should expect out of the 3rd LP from this Italian brutal death metal quintet. They want to play as fast as possible, and fast they most definitely can do. I remember this band from their last full length, Degenerating Anthropophagical Euphoria, which was a good album, […]
Holland’s Nailgun Massacre return with their second album and will be a top ten for me this year, easily. 2011’s Backyard Butchery was a killer debut with tons of Autopsy tinged, memorable brutality. Boned, Boxed and Buried has it beat. Opener “Where’s the Head?” is so ridiculously catchy-your head will fall off from the non-stop […]
When it came to pushing the envelope of extreme metal to, well, its outermost extremities, few did it better that the UK’s Akercocke. This was a band with not only a passion for extreme metal in all its twisted forms, but also a taste for the avant-garde that would meander anywhere from electronica, to opera, […]
Strap on your gas mask and be attentive for the air raid siren, citizens. The enemy can strike at any time! Kommandant‘s ranks are filled with Chicago metal veterans having between them played in area acts such as Forest of Impaled, Cianide, Enforsaken and, to no one’s surprise, each member had at some point lent […]
‘Oppressive’, that’s what comes to mind when listening to this. The Encarta dictionary defines this word as; “Exerting a worrying, troubling or burdensome pressure on somebody,” and with this, the latest release from Finland’s Tyranny, it does exactly that, the sense of foreboding in the mind, the weight on a individual, it brings them down […]
del·uge ˈdelyo͞o(d)ZH/ noun 1.a severe flood. synonyms: flood, torrent, spate. “homes were swept away by the deluge” verb 1. inundate with a great quantity of something. “he has been deluged with offers of work” synonyms: inundate, overwhelm, overrun, flood, swamp, snow under, engulf, bombard. “we have been deluged with calls” Hailing from France, the debut from Deluge is cut from the […]
Like fellow North Carolina instrumental sages Husky (now known as Watch Husky Burn), three-piece Boar weave gracefully manic, deviously diverse jams across their debut Self-Titled EP. Their tricky, psychedelic work casts a magician’s mind control spell on the listener as it traverses the briny depths of psychedelic rock, ascends the mountainous plateau of heavy metal […]
So back in 2004 I compared Vehemence’s God Was Created to Entombed’s Left Hand Path, granted, a brash comparison by a relatively younger , inexperienced me. However, I do stand by the fact the album is fantastic, and it remains one of my top 25 albums of all time. And the track “She Never Noticed Me” […]
I moved from the US to Scandinavia last year, and as we head into our second winter here, I understand why so much dark and depressing music comes out of the region: it gets dark and depressing. By mid-December, it’s dark until 9am, gray all day, and dark again at 3:30. And we’re in Southern […]
So this a the French death metal band with a very similar name to the long running Italian death metal, Antropofagus band huh? Well, Ok, but the results are the same; damn solid tech/brutal death metal, although these guys are not quite as brutal and have a little more quirk and experimentation to them. I […]
Despite some reviewers trying to liken Cavern to post-nappers Russian Circles, I’m just not hearing it. In fact I think Russian Circles are overall pretty poor but that’s just one asshole’s opinion so don’t mind me. These Baltimore bashers have far more in common with the ruthless riffing and angular stops n’ starts of NOLA’s […]
Last Poem/First Light, the 2013 debut from these NYC blackgazers, was a gorgeous affair, layering dramatic (and real) orchestration and choirs on top of a Deafheaven-y black metal backbone. Since signing on with Prosthetic Records, the band is reaping the rewards, and has increased the orchestra size from 10 to 30 for their second release – which is a full-on […]
Hailing from Boston, Mass, I had never heard of Composted before. They’re an interesting band of fellows. After looking at the insert pictures, cover, layout and reading the lyrics I made this assessment. If you took Larry “The Cable Guy” and gave him some instruments with 3 other doppelgangers I believe Plump Up The Volume […]
Prior to happening across their entry in this sites secret and fathomless vault of promo offerings, I hadn’t yet heard of Mefitic. By light of my candle I glimpsed a familiar name upon the shelving racks, just at the point before they spiral so high as to disappear into the fog like dusty blackness above: […]
Here’s some goddamn fine woodsy, melodically aggressive black metal from the deep, dank forests of Virginia. First up, Bearstorm are signed to Grimoire Records, so that’s practically a blood-stamped seal of quality right there. Secondly, these badasses have an interesting approach to the genre that’s hard for me to put a claw on. They remind […]
The veteran collective of assorted talents comprising the band VHOL cooked up an impressive self-titled debut in 2013. However, like any band assembled in this fashion there was always a hint of uncertainty about whether it would wind up as another short lived entity as the members returned to their main projects, or remain the […]
Ævangelist will always hold a special place in my metal heart. The first review I ever wrote was for their 2012 debut, De Masticatione Mortuorum in Tumulis, and I’ve covered every full-length that they’ve done since. Putting their inhuman sounds into words hasn’t been easy, but I’ve enjoyed the challenge. This fourth full-length in as […]
There’s been some pretty odd band names this year (Mutilatred, Dysrider, Famishgod, Meatwound, Neurotic November, Weak Aside). There has also been some fine old school Swedish death metal (Morbid Vomit, Wombath, Mass Burial, Entrails, Abscession, Infected Chaos, Skelethal, Feral, Cult of Endtime). Belgium’s Torturerama have the honor of being on both lists. However, it’s the second one they might […]
I’ve been having a hard time putting words to paper about the fourth album from Germany’s Thormesis. You see, when Freier Wille – Freier Geist, (Free will- Free Spirit) is actually playing, I’m enjoying the hell out of its super melodic, sometimes black n roll , airy, bouncy take on black metal. To the point where I’m […]
Dave Rotten’s Xtreem Music Label is one of the very best around, especially for his stellar reissues. So Famishgod is a side project he is lending his guttural vocals to and Pako Deimler is playing all the instruments which also includes the drum machine programming. Famishgod play an ultra heavy down tuned form of doom/death […]