You do not fuck with javelina. We have ‘em here in Arizona – big wild pigs out in the desert, usually sleeping under mesquite during the day but out foraging for food at night. Get too close to one – or worse, the babies – and they’ll charge you, running you down and tearing your […]

Wow, where did this come from? David Galas‘ background is in darkwave (playing with Lycia), but The Cataclysm melds goth-rock, doom, alt-country and the blackest of post-rock to create a lush, oppressive odyssey to get utterly lost in. I haven’t heard the other band, but I hope he sticks with this sound – it’s completely […]

First off, I will not mention that guitarist/vocalist Paulo posts on a message board I frequent (damn). Second off, I have to say that the artwork for Muay Thai Ladyboys by Scott Porterfield, is absolutely fucking fantastic. Unfold the inlay for a surprise that’s like John Baizley artwork (Baroness, Darkest Hour), but felched through the […]

I missed this Arkansas’ band 2005 debut, The Head and the Heart, so I had no real expectations for what this band sounded like other than I knew that had former and current members of Rwake in their ranks and that guitarist Chuck Schaaf did a great job producing the last Serious Grind album. But […]

I’ve been getting a lot of shimmery, melodic post rock influenced metalcore/screamo type stuff of late such as Tides/Giant, November 5, 1955, Empires, Day Without Dawn, At The Soundawn and such, but when I got this 3 track CDEP/10″ release that features members of Philadelphia rockers Balboa and Towers, (including former digitalmetal.com writer and site […]

Here’s a release that would seem really odd when you look at its  actual parts: a 2 year old symphonic black metal album (originally rleased by Deepsend Records in 2006) from Canada, featuring former Ion issonance vocalist Sébastien Painchaud (going by the far more black metal name of ‘Ill-Fate’ here) as well as at one […]

Completely unfamiliar with the band coming in, I was advised before doing this review to do a little research regarding France’s Destinity, as it seems they’ve gone through some sort of direction change since their inception in the mid 90’s. After digging around at their website and Myspace, as well as their page at metal-archives.com, […]

Well for those of you hoping for a return to Engineering the Dead, there’s always next album. To be honest I liked the direction they were going in from Goremageddon on as I tend to prefer melodic death more to the bloodsoaked gore of their early albums. I’ve just never been that into gore for […]

Taking cues from legendary acts such as Neurosis and Electric Wizard, Italian Sludge-merchants Ufomammut release Idolum, their fifth full-length album, upon an unsuspecting world. With the raw aggression of a rabid wooly mammoth coupled with the psychedelic shadings of early Pink Floyd, Ufomammut’s sound churns and swells like an ocean of Post Metal muck, lapping […]

And so the omnipotent metalcore behemoth keeps rolling and seemingly unable to even slowdown a morsel, in fact, as more and more predict the sub-sub-sub genre’s extinction, more and more bands mushroom forth, prolonging its life. Given, the quality is becoming lower and lower but it is still amazing that a) there are plenty of […]

Believe it or not, in fact, you probably won’t, but once upon a time, Century Media put out some of the damn hardest hardcore albums in existence. Such classics as Merauder’s Master Killer, the superlative Kickback’s Forever War, and Turmoil’s The Process of, not to mention a slew of others that have gone on to […]

Seems like the whole retro punk/post-punk thing’s been around for so many years now that it’s become modern again. Band after band continues to crossbreed genres, reference points and each other to create output that maintains a core of familiarity, but still manages to sound fresh as well. New Hampshire’s Transistor Transistor sit somewhere in […]

The easiest way to explain Kataklysm of the past decade is a box of Cheerios. Listening to Kataklysm is like eating Cheerios, you know they are not the most exciting death metal band out there but it is a safe bet they are palatable. The most daring they have gotten in recent years is Honey […]

Last time I enjoyed a Kataklysm album through and through was Serenity in Fire, perhaps due to Martin Maurais’ ball-bustingly fast drum performance, so much so that it made me question whether the drumming was performed by a person or if the double kick pedals were cleverly disguised as a game of Whack-A-Mole, packaged with […]

Recently, I attended a Japanese Taiko drums show at my local performing arts center and during all the thunderous percussion, chanting, and Kai yelling I thought to myself how cool it would be it this stuff was mixed with metal… Enter Japan’s Birushanah. Leave it to the Japanese to take a tired metal genre, in […]

With all the complexity and technicality being thrown around in death metal this year, the third full length album from Japan’s Coffins is a welcome relief of earthy, primal mid paced doom/death metal that will appeal to fans of Cianide, Runemagick and Autopsy. With a phlegmy, hacking, feedback drenched, down-tuned guitar tone plying simple oozing […]

Although the name ASRA sounds like an obscure piece of Buddhist meditation jargon, it’s simply an acronym for Alleged Satanic Ritual Abuse. (Which, for some reason, brings to mind Lou Diamond Phillips in The First Power.) And even if they’re Black Box’s newest grind signing, ASRA is looking firmly backwards towards a more classic sound. […]

Progressive metal sometimes isn’t very progressive – it’s become easy to predict that an album in that genre is going to offer dense, snaky rhythms, soaring vocals and perhaps a smattering of synthy sci-fi grandeur. What you might not expect, then, are delicate female vocals laid over contorted compositions, with random bursts of smooth jazz, […]

I hate it when bands try too hard. In the case of Drain The Sky’s album Haunted By Rivers, the band is trying too hard to sound creepy and intense, but all they manage to muster is boring. It’s a noisy mish-mash of blast beats, slow (trying to be) creepy passages and dissonance. They’re trying […]

So here is Umesh’s second release of droning, one man black metal for Moribund, and while still retaining the undulating, icky undercurrent of the claustrophobic Dagonite, Angel Eyes sees more of a focus on sickly doomy riffs rather than ambience or mood, and the result while certainly oozing with tentacled horror and dread, is at […]

Like many a listener I discovered Cult of Luna in 2002 when I heard their masterpiece, The Beyond. However I lost track of them after that as I was bored by Salvation and don’t even recall Somewhere Along the Highway.  I decided to give them another chance though as I loved The Beyond so much. […]

The kings of Austrian BDSMetal are back for yet another go. Having seen them live and enjoyed their last few albums I can say this without fear. They are getting progressively more insane by the moment, and we the listener benefit more than we can ever know. They are somehow getting more melodic and more […]

If early christians had witnessed Belphegor they would not have had to demonize pagans, the truth would have been enough. Someone had to try to live up to the biblical descriptions, why not Belphegor. The bible insists all pagan rituals are abominations and claim pagans are not only apostates and blasphemers but fornicators and baby […]

After boldy claiming their Victory Records debut Goodbye to the Gallows was the ‘most brutal CD of 2007′, Emmure return with their more humble, yet equally devastating follow up. And while admittedly, most metal heads will turn up their nose at this group of cocked hat, short haired kids and their hoodies, but truth be […]

If Joe J. Fogarazzo were to walk into a headhunter’s office one day in search of a job, the agent would likely ask what his skills and qualifications are. And he would be able to list off his audio engineering degree, his music degree – and his three years spent studying mortuary science. And of […]