Imperial Triumphant - Goldstar
Review by X-Ray Rod

9.0

For many bands, writing long songs is a challenge. However, an even greater one is to condescene your complex songwriting into shorter air-tight compositions. Avantgarde death metalheads Imperial Triumphant have done the latter, and the result is nothing short of outstanding.

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Tómarúm - Beyond Obsidian Euphoria
Review by musclassia

 

Tómarúm realized the promise of their first recordings with a blistering debut album in 2022; Ash In Realms Of Stone Icons was a full-pelt onslaught of progressive black metal, although it did leave some room for the band to implement variety in tone on future efforts. The band seem to have realized that, as Beyond Obsidian Euphoria exhibits maturity on that front.

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Allegaeon - The Ossuary Lens
Review by musclassia

8.0

Faced with a dilemma following the departure of Riley McShane, Allegaeon revisited their past by bringing original vocalist Ezra Haynes back into the fold. However, while the band may be approaching The Ossuary Lens with one eye looking back at the past, there’s forward momentum on display here as well.

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Deafheaven - Lonely People With Power
Review by musclassia

8.5

While it wasn’t a stylistic move appreciated by the purists, Deafheaven’s stark move with Infinite Granite away from the blackgaze genre that they popularized went down sufficiently positively within the wider music scene that there was no urgency for them to return to their former sound. Yet, with the very next album, they release perhaps the heaviest, most intense record of their career, and make clear to both themselves and listeners that there was unfinished business to attend to.

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Avantasia - Here Be Dragons
Review by ScreamingSteelUS

6.8

The phrase “here be dragons”, in the imaginative traditions of medieval cartography, denotes the perils of unexplored realms, warning of mysterious frontiers fraught with fantastical dangers. It’s an enchanting term of art, not incongruous with Avantasia’s mythic aesthetic, but the album it describes is, to the contrary, a familiar lap around the homestead.

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Year Of The Cobra - Year Of The Cobra
Review by Doc G.

8.1

It’s kind of wild to think about how much stuff that sucks shares origins with stuff that rules. Like how Terry Pratchett and Adolf Hitler technically came from the same species. Or how the musical scene that gifted us with Badmotorfinger is the same scene that is largely responsible for the musical diarrhea that was the post-grunge movement.

Luckily, Year of the Cobra are here to remind us of the good times.

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Tower - Let There Be Dark
Review by AndyMetalFreak

8.4

From the Tower, a voice shouted down: Let There Be Dark! Suddenly, a dark heavy metal album of the highest quality was unleashed.

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SpiritWorld - Helldorado
Review by AndyMetalFreak

7.8

What lies in Helldorado certainly isn't treasure, it's a SpiritWorld south of heaven and west of hell, full of zombified cowboys who unleash some of the most exhilarating hardcore/crossover thrash you'll hear.

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