Schammasch - The Maldoror Chants: Hermaphrodite [EP]
Review by Apothecary

 

When bands that have won themselves a sizable following through the employment of a certain sound suddenly change their sound radically with a new release and piss off a good portion of their fanbase, I love it. Why? Because it shows the band in question doesn't care about pleasing fans by recycling a certain formula, and that a lot of fans are a lot less about "let the band do what they want" than they'd lead you to believe. This is inevitably going to be the case with this new EP from Schammasch.

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Wormwood - Ghostlands - Wounds From A Bleeding Earth
Review by nikarg

9.5

It is a common experience that some albums need time to sink in and grow on you, sounding better and better after every listen. On other occasions comes an album that gets you hooked from the very beginning and the more you spin it, the more you are left flabbergasted by the sheer brilliance of it. Ghostlands - Wounds From A Bleeding Earth belongs to the latter kind.

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Descend Into Despair - Synaptic Veil
Review by Apothecary

7.5

Funeral doom really seems to have two main denominations, the dark, evil, and abysmal kind, and a "lighter," more melodic brand that focuses on conjuring the melancholic vibes from a different angle. In recent years there's been more of an emergence of the latter type, from the likes of Bell Witch, Below The Sun, Chrch, and others. Others such as the Romanian Descend Into Despair.

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Battle Hag - Tongue Of The Earth
Review by ScreamingSteelUS

7.5

The monastic intonations and ethereal, Middle Eastern guitar leads that introduce Battle Hag's debut are so auspicious that I wondered if they weren't preparing to overstep their advertised sludge/stoner boundaries. That proves not to be the case for the most part, as Tongue Of The Earth is avowedly stoner doom, but there are a few more touches of personality from time to time - and in any case there's something to be said for just doing one thing really well.

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Warbringer - Woe To The Vanquished
Review by nikarg

6.8

Warbringer, one of the most prominent representatives of the last decade's thrash resurgence, is back with a new album, four long years after the more experimental and definitely underrated IV: Empires Collapse. The band's latest output, Woe To The Vanquished, doesn't sound much like its predecessor, being more straightforward and risk-free.

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Vallenfyre - Fear Those Who Fear Him
Review by nikarg

8.0

Long story short: Vallenfyre were formed back in 2010 by Greg Mackintosh (Paradise Lost) as an outlet to actively deal with the death of his father, with Hamish Glencross (ex-My Dying Bride) as co-founding member. The band has already released two acclaimed albums and Fear Those Who Fear Him is their highly anticipated successor, so let's dive into Vallenfyre's bottomless pit and listen to the music.

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Overkill - The Grinding Wheel
Review by nikarg

8.3

Overkill is back! In fact this is the 18th album in a career that is now nearing four decades, meaning that this band has been around for more years than most of the people reading this review have been walking on this planet. The New Jersey thrashers made an impressive comeback in 2010 with Ironbound and since then they have sworn to leave us speechless every time they put out something new. The band is clearly going through its second prime and The Grinding Wheel is here to prove it.

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Fargo Rock City: A Heavy Metal Odyssey In Rural Nörth Daköta [book]
Review by ScreamingSteelUS

 

Chuck Klosterman's semiautobiographical account of glam metal history and his own youthful experiences with it is now 16 years old, meaning that not only is the book right smack in the target demographic for these bands, but we are now farther removed from the book's advent than it was from the distant years of L.A.-based hedonism it chronicled on its publication. You must be thinking that Metal Storm is wildly behind the times when it comes...

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