Though Maryland is often most known for its legendary punk/hardcore and doom scenes, there’s just about every kind of kick ass music imaginable coming from its fertile creative soil.  Mutated sludgy crust/grinders Musket Hawk are a prime example of the variance emanating from the state with their 3rd and most vicious full-length yet, Upside of […]

Der Rote Milan is a black metal band from Germany that has couple of members of solid death metal band Ichor in its ranks, so I thought their second effort, Moritat was worth a look, especially seeing as the version I got for review was packaged in a  pretty cool deluxe A5 digibook format with […]

Last month marked the 20th anniversary of Metallica’s S&M show with the San Francisco symphony. I was at that show, and it was a grand and sonic spectacle, as the band jammed out on stage with a phalanx of tuxedoed musicians and film composer Michael Kamen wielding the conductor’s baton. For most of the metal […]

Sometimes as a reviewer social networking helps.  A YouTube link from a record label might pop across your timeline and give you the choice to listen to or not.   Thus was the case with Atlanta’s Paladin and their video for their tune, “Shoot for the Sun”.  First off, the riffing is so over the top […]

Though I enjoyed every release from Italy’s Fleshgod Apocalypse, going back to 2009s Oracles, I’ve enjoyed some, like 2011s Agony (My album of the year) and 2016s  King, more than others (2013s Labyrinth), but King, really saw the band create the perfect balance between the tech death chaos and the sweeping orchestral majesty that is […]

Anders Biazzi (ex Amon Amarth,  ex Blood Mortized, Just Before Dawn) and his arguably more busy  Just Before Dawn cohort Jonny Pettersson (Wombbath Ashcloud, Nattravnen, Henry Kane, Heads for the Dead,) and drummer Brynjar Helgetun (Crypticus. Megascavenger, Just Before Dawn, Putrevore) are back with the second album under the Gods Forsaken moniker. However, some new […]

Part II of my Destruction reissue review series focuses on Mad Butcher, Release from Agony and Cracked Brain.  Part I contained Sentence of Death, Infernal Overkill and Eternal Devastation.  In 1987, 1 year removed from their amazing second album, Eternal Devastation, Destruction graced us with the Mad Butcher ep.  Years ago it was usually common for bands to release eps between full length albums and this ep marked an improvement in the production […]

Bear with me me here…….. back in 1992, whilst in college, I read in Pitch Weekly ( a free, alternative Kansas City paper) , that Entombed were playing at a local VFW. Of course, I was going, so that night, I loaded up up beers and other substances and headed out with a friend. Well, […]

Richmond Virginia’s Appalling return with their second full length album Inverted Realm out on Redefining darkness records.  I must admit I was not familiar with this group until reading the band’s bio in which Angel Corpse was mentioned as an influence.  Appalling play quite a catchy form of blackened death thrash that reminds me of […]

When stacked against the barren wasteland of the 2018 thrash metal scene, comparatively, 2019 is off to a much stronger start. The likes of Critical Defiance, Inculter and Exumer have dropped solid albums thus far. And now, up and coming Detroit band Euphoria Ω return with the follow-up to their impressive 2016 debut, Operation: Genesis. […]

I’m a little overdue on this one and frankly I didn’t really feel like chiming in with a review on Pig Destroyer’s latest platter of pain until some of the usual hype that comes with their releases died down.  They’re pretty much a love it or hate it proposition for most people at this point […]

Over the course of the Amon Amarth‘s 10 album, 20+ year career, they have been one of the most consistent bands in metal. If you were to plot a line with their albums on it, they are almost all certainly in a straight line when it comes to quality with a couple that go over […]

Germany’s Corrosive stomped onto my radar last year with their second album, Lucifer Gave US the Faith, a big, beefy mix of Grave, Entrails,  Illdisposed and Hypocrisy, that delivered a damn solid assault of groovy Swedish death metal and the follow up is improved enough to put these guys on the cusp of the genre’s […]

I’m not much of a traditional metal sort of guy. Of course plenty of exceptions have popped up over the years, but generally my tastes are aligned in different directions. However, Chicago’s Black Sites impressed with their deft mix of old school values and modern sensibilities with classic heavy metal and prog influences on their […]

Baltimore Maryland’s death/grind band Noisem return after a 4 year album hiatus to bring us Cease to Exist, their third and most devastating album to date. Several things have happened since their monstrous Blossoming Decay album from 2014. Sometimes fame too fast can have effects on a band. When Noisem’s debut Agony Defined came out […]

For a while, Whitechapel were the true darlings of deathcore’s peak, with 2008s This Is Exile being the genre’s arguable apex along  with All Shall Perish‘s The Price of Existence. However, since then, the band hasn’t quite been on the same level; a ‘dumbing down’ of the lyrics, a simplification of the music into a […]

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 […]

I’m fairly new to Sweden’s Meadow’s End despite my love of all things that melds symphonics and metal, having only recently discovered the band’s 2016 release, Sojourn (in part to a brilliant piece of evocative cover art), and thusly grabbing the bands other 2 previous releases and pre ordering this, the band’s fourth effort. What […]

Warning: I am going to say the words Bal-Sagoth, a record breaking number of times in this review… Man, I haven’t had this much anticipation for an album in a looooooong time. Why? Well friends, Let me tell you of an Age undreamed of…. Back in the 1990s a band called Bal-Sagoth arose from the […]

Well this is most definitely a front runner for EP of the year.  Wow!  Chicago’s Wounds have got my tech death appetite drooling with their debut EP Light Eater.  I had heard from word of mouth from other bands in my area here in Minnesota regarding this incredible band.   I had been hearing the name […]

Willowtip Records have to be one of the most diverse underground metal labels out there.  With over a half dozen new releases on deck for 2019 Jason Tipton has built quite the label lineup of diverse talent (Ceremony of Silence, Vale of Pnath,).  New Jersey’s Hath are no exception.  Debuting way back in 2015 these […]

If you are reading this review, I’m going to assume you know this history behind this veteran Louisiana brother act. If you don’t, here is the cliff notes version: Two brothers from Louisiana form a band called Incubus and band release two pretty influential releases in Serpent Temptation (1988) and Beyond the Unknown ( 1990) […]

I was pretty impressed with my first exposure to Stephane Thirion  and his third album,  A fleur de peau, from his one man project, In Shadows And Dust. It delivered black metal rendered with a Stockholm death metal guitar tone with good effect, and apparently the guys over at Redefining Darkness were also impressed, enough to […]

Greek Metal Masters Rotting Christ have returned with another fantastic release with their 13th album The Heretics. The Tolis brothers Themis and Sakis, fresh off their recent arrest for Terrorism (not that kind-the fearful religious kind) in Georgia (the country, not the state) have given a spirited middle finger to organized religion once again. Although, […]

Every once and a while a band manages to make a few lineup changes and all of the sudden their sound has been elevated.  Thus is the case with Nordjevel’s latest effort Necrogenesis coming out latest this year on Osmose Productions.  Holy hell!  Does this album pair well with -50 degree weather! I must say […]