Sweden’s Havamal ( ‘the words of Odin’), is a relatively new Norse/Viking-themed melodic death metal band with one album under their belt from 2019, Tales from Yggdrasil, which I have not heard. I was in the mood for something Viking -y to tide me over until the new Thyrfing, and this has fit the bill […]
Who is the mood for some awesome new U.S Epic Doom? Sign me up! Being from Minnesota and friends of Brad Miller (Among the Serpents) I was extremely excited to hear he was assembling this group. Come June 2021 here we are with Grief Collector’s En Delirium. I must say that recruiting Robert Lowe (Ex-Candlemass, […]
As I said in my review of Passéisme’s album of the year contender, Eminence, Antiq Records is becoming a very good, consistent label, plying black metal that’s a bit medieval , a bit avant-garde and sometimes both, as in the case of the French act, Ascète and their excellent debut album, Calamites & les Calamités. Also, […]
Last year Sinira, a 1 man black metal band, self-released this debut album The Everlorn. The album went unnoticed and he eventually inked a deal with Northern Silence Productions to put out the album physically and with an alternate album cover for 2021. . So this year when I first heard this album I really […]
You are starting to hear and feel the impact of covid and the chaotic final year of Trump’s administration on some albums being put out now. Albums that were written in seclusion, online, in depressive states, in rage. I think we are seeing a real creative burst in the metal scene, that might be one […]
Back in 2018 when I was back again with Internal Bleeding and we headed up to Canada, for part of the Bloodletting Tour, I met Phil Brousseau and Nickolas Lauzon and took a picture with these young gentlemen. They really enjoyed our set and super cool dudes. Fast Forward to 2020, a little bit right […]
Denver’s Noctambulist return with their second album, The Barren Form. I was not familiar with this group and wanted to check out their material. It is quite pummeling and reminds me a bit of Hate Eternal and Virtriol at times. I do wish at times that the guitars had a bit more clarity as at […]
And so the killer, 2021 Bolt Thrower/ Hail of Bullets worship/homage continues, this time from notable Australian duo, Dave Haley (drums/recording) and Jason Peppiatt (vocals, guitar, bass, artwork) of Psycroptic. And if the prospect of these two delivering 8 songs about various battles in history doesn’t give you a howitzer-sized boner, then move along. Of […]
Fuck. So back in February, I swore that Ominous Ruin‘s Amid Voices That Echo in Stone would be the tech death album of the year. Then shortly after that, Stortgren’s Impermanence, was definitely going to take that mantle. But then Hannes Grossman dropped To Where the Light Retreats, earlier this summer, and THAT album was […]
Austin Texas’s Cathexis return with their second full length effort Untethered Abyss. I have been spinning this album for the last few months and my first impressions of them were a black death band with influences like Immolation and Ulcerate. They are a bit more varied in terms of groove and riff variety. The Title […]
Germany’s Empyrium have been around for close to 30 years, with a hiatus in the 00’s. I’d always seen the band name, but always stayed away from them because of not quite grasping the folk metal genre, until relatively recently. Their prior releases are a mixed bag containing a variety of sounds, vocals and instruments. […]
I’ve interviewed Alestorm twice over the years, both at this very site. And in both interviews, legendary Brit fantasy metal act Bal-Sagoth comes up as a huge influence on Alestorm’s Chris Bowes. Now, he developed that influence a little bit in his power metal outfit Gloryhammer, but I’ve been waiting for him to truly flesh […]
I rather enjoyed 2019s Tyrannotophia, from this Dutch downtempo band, as it ended up being one of the better deathcore/ downtempo releases I have still heard. Then I found the follow-up EP, Dawn of Curruption a bit boring, and the band got surpassed by label mates Bound In Fear as the best band in the […]
GO! Now that I have that totally necessary exclamation out of the way, let’s talk about At The Gates’ new album, The Nightmare of Being. A title I totally feel right now, guys… but this isn’t about me, although I’ll probably inadvertently do my damnedest to make it. On full length #7, and the third […]
Transcending Obscurity Records and Fetid Zombie are a perfect combo. This is full length #7 for Mark Riddick and this death dealing project, but if you were to count splits and EPs, he might have as many releases as Johnny Sins (ba dum tiss). As a casual fan of the project, I was more than […]
California’s Skeletal Remains burst onto the scene extremely quickly with a debut album in 2012, one year removed after releasing a demo that same year. So for about 10 years they have remained one of my favorite death metal bands and all their releases are of high quality. I feel their fourth album, released last […]
In my 20 plus years of music ‘journalism’, I’ve had the pleasure of meeting lots of folks at shows, for interviews, over the phone, etc. However, a few dudes standout out as absolutely the nicest , chillest guys I’ve met; all the chaps from Between the Buried and Me, Carnifex drummer Shawn Cameron, and Mike […]
I had high hopes for this, the second album from Sweden’s Deathswarm. It’s on FDA records, which is almost always a good sign. !t features members of cult Swedish act Sarcasm, and the promotional materials threw out words like ‘Bolt Thrower’ and ‘Dismember’. And even after opening tracks “We Still Burn” and “Unshackle the Jackal”, […]
Finland’s Sadistik Forest flew under my radar until their third full-length album, Morbid Majesties, came out in 2018. Their intense combination of death metal mixed with some blackened thrash metal had me thinking of early Skeletonwitch. I went and discovered their prior 2 excellent albums, however Morbid Majesties is still my favorite release from them. […]
Well, if this isn’t a pleasant surprise, then I don’t know what one is. I’m not quite sure how I missed and/or forgot about any hype surrounding the release of Inhuman Condition‘s debut album Rat°God. I mean hell, the band literally released four singles from said debut and I never heard one of them until […]
Oh Spotify, you know me so well. Your algorithms get me. Your daily playlists are the perfect blend of stuff you know that I already like, and stuff you think I might like, but and occasionally throw something in my Daily Mix that makes me instantly buy stuff, case and point, when you played “Awakening […]
By the time I’m even beginning to write this review, anyone who has wanted to listen to Crypta’s debut album, Echoes of the Soul, has already had plenty of time. You know the story by now, but for those keeping score, bassist/vocalist Fernanda Lira and drummer Luana Dametto left Nervosa in 2019, that band then […]
So I’m finally getting to a couple of FDA Record’s releases from earlier this summer, Deathswarm’s Forward Into Oblivion, and this, the third full length album from Greece’s Rapture, a band I have not heard before. Both deliver what you’d expect from FDA Records at this point, but Rapture certainly has a bit of a […]
Maybe it’s just me. I mean I was listening to a lot of old German thrash, the usual culprits, Sodom, Kreator, and Destruction, at the time of my reviewing Aggravator‘s new EP, Unseen Repulsions, but I’ll be damned if I don’t hear a marked increase of Teutonic influence in Aggravator‘s sound of late. When I […]
Take a small journey with me, friends. A journey much like the one I recently took back to my hometown for a day. It didn’t take long to get there, I had a good time, some things surprisingly changed, but for the most part, it was exactly what I expected. I’ll definitely visit again soon. […]