Willowtip’s strength as a label has long been their association with forward thinking and technically proficient metal bands willing to push the envelope and challenge the listener. Naturally they have wisely broadened their roster over the years to include artists of a more cut-throat and straight-forward brand of extremity. Yet my original attraction, and continued […]
Back in 2009 I reviewed the debut EP from this aptly named Italian act, and came away rather impressed with the heavy, lurching salvo and a after a 4 year wait, a debut full length via Italy’s own Memorial Records album has surfaced and it was well worth the wait. The band’s moniker fits perfectly […]
Church of Misery are an institution. When it comes to big, bluesy doom riffs they are untouchable, and if you’re into metal and have yet to hear the band’s serial killer-inspired doom boogie then I suggest you head over to Youtube, punch in “Killifornia” and give a good listen. I’ll wait… All set? Now if […]
After giving the Prosthetic records debut of Skeletonwitch, Beyond the Permafrost a relatively lukewarm review, I simply didn’t give the band’s follow ups, Breathing the Fire or Forever Abomination, the time of day, despite the band growing immensely in popularity with their modern, black thrash meets melodic death metal spin off. I simply lumped them […]
Portland’s Red Fang are a band I feel I should like more than I actually do. On the surface their style of greasy heavy rock meets stoner metal jams holds great appeal. Yet the significant hype that has been bestowed upon Red Fang and the commercial headway they have made suggests something extra special boils […]
Ossuary Anex is a brutal death metal band from Russia, so you know what to expect, since Russia is putting out some of the most vicious slam death metal bands right now. My iTunes, when, I loaded the cd in, said it was a 2013 release, this was released pretty much on New Year’s Eve […]
What we have here is the complete discography, 26 songs in total, of now defunct Swedish act, Fulmination, who were around for a few short years in the early 90’s and featured yet to be members of Uncanny, Centinex and Entrails but never actually releasing a full length album. The band played a pretty straightforward […]
This is fucking ugly. A bleak, miserable, experience fit only for the most masochistic listeners. Those uninitiated should stay away. If you’re still reading, you’ll be rewarded. Starting off as a way for 2 incredibly talented and classically trained musicians to take out their frustrations with music in general, Venowl was spat forth from hell […]
Somewhere in the Ukraine, Metal Scrap Records must have unearthed a lost cache of mid to late ’90s melodic death metal and just now unleashed it on the world. That or the label and the underground metal scene in Eastern Europe has just now discovered the genre, as the label has recently released a slew […]
In music, there are said to be innovators and consummators. Consummators perfect pre-existing forms; innovators pave the way for new movements. However, to draw the line that distinctly is misleading; innovators always build upon previous forms. They never innovate from scratch. Beethoven, one of the most important innovators in music, first went through an entirely […]
Mr. Dan Swanö, the renowned Swedish vocalist/multi-instrumentalist/producer (Edge Of Sanity, Nightingale, Moontower and Bloodbath, among many others) has been rather quiet for some time. Recently, it was revealed he had been working on a new collaboration with the rather unknown fellow Swede and multi-instrumentalist Ragnar Widerberg after they worked together in a Swedish music store. […]
“Art of the ugly soul. One is limiting art much too severely when one demands that only the composed soul, suspended in moral balance, may express itself there. As in the plastic arts, there is in music and poetry an art of the ugly soul, as well as an art of the beautiful soul; and […]
With UK metal and death metal in particular being in a full and impressive resurgence, one only need to look to Scotland’s Man Must Die for arguably the catalyst for the current swath of killer death metal coming from the fair isle. With 2004’s …Start Killing and then two subsequent releases on Relapse Records (2007’s […]
It wasn’t long ago that the albums you heard mostly depended on what was worth your money. With more and more music becoming easily, cheaply, and often freely accessible via services like Spotify, Bandcamp, SoundCloud, iTunes and all the full-album streams that labels are surprisingly eager to post, what you listen to nowadays is more […]
Mega thanks to Matt, from Dark Descent Records, for not only having one of the best underground record labels out there, but for also being such a cool dude. This ep was a surprise that he sent me, I never heard of this Australian act, and San La Muerte plays a filthy dirty raw brand […]
I’ve been looking forward to this release since Blast Head announced it a few months ago. Not just because it’s a Blast Head release, and the new label is really coming into its own, but Eternium hail from St Louis, Missouri my metal bereft neck of the woods, and feature Chad Griffin, formerly of short […]
It would be easy to assume that a band who takes their name from an Electric Wizard song would fit in nicely with the bleary eyed stoner doom bands roaming metal’s landscape nowadays. It’s an easy assumption, but a wrong one. Despite the implication of their moniker, Las Vegas’ Demon Lung stands out as a […]
Having honed their craft since 2007 in the UK metal scene, Scordatura have unleashed their first full-length (originally self released but picked up by Blast Head Records), and this thing is an impressive debut. Jumping from the gates following a horror movie sample, “Necromantic Disposition” gets the show started, and the brutality starts to flow […]
Pathology has been one of the most, if not the most brutal death metal band to come out of San Diego, California and the band has only been around a mere 7 years. When vocalist Matti Way departed after the 2010 release of Legacy of the Ancients the band still plowed forward and the 2011 […]
First off, my apologies to Helcaraxë, for as much as I enjoyed 2012’s Red Dragon, I simply never got around to reviewing it after I purchased it despite really enjoying it as well as all of the band’s prior efforts (2007’s Triumph and Revenge and 2009’s Broadsword). So when Children of Ygg showed up in […]
Helm. The name first crossed my path after a mate filled me in on his night out at a Dead Letter Circus gig, mentioning in passing that “the support band Helm were pretty good”. Sometime later I find myself at a Karnivool gig at The HiFi in Brisbane, and who wound up supporting? Helm. By […]
Where is Grimulfr when you need him? Here is a short sharp review of a short, sharp, 4 song 12″ vinyl EP from the USA’s Teratism, a long running and prolific (10 releases in just under a decade) black metal band that shares veteran members with the likes of Catholicon, Theatre of the Macabre, Demonic […]
The world of metal may be saturated with death/black metal bands, but occasionally you find an album that stands out from the rest of the pack. Satan in the Death Row is such an album. Hailing from the same country and city that gave the world such luminaries as Sepultura and Sarcófago, Despot is an […]
Concrete Icon. The name alone intrigues me. First off, it just has a nice ring to it with its hard “C” alliteration. And, then there’s its ambiguous meaning. Does it literally refer to a religious statue made of concrete or is it more figurative, like something true to believe in? Either way, it alludes to […]
The second best release from Hypnotic Dirge’s recent offerings, you’d expect this to be a German crazy, industrial, off kilter black metal release based on that moniker and such. However, the band while in fact German, and is somewhat ambitious, they share more with the progressive, avant garde black metal movement of the mid 90’s, […]