Updates - reviews
Reviews
Panzerfaust - The Suns Of Perdition - Chapter IV: To Shadow Zion
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This album contains the final sounds of a doomed world, at the terminus of all paradises lost. At Shadow Zion. Read more ›› |
Reviews
Sergeant Thunderhoof - The Ghost Of Badon Hill
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In ten years, Sergeant Thunderhoof have grown quite a bit, from a noisy, nasally stoner band doing the half-Sabbath/half-Sleep routine into a versatile practitioner of atmospheric, folkloric, and epic variants on the style. The Ghost Of Badon Hill is represented as “a true conceptual piece”, their most ambitious work yet, and I’d say that’s an accurate advertisement. Read more ›› |
Reviews
Thy Catafalque - XII: A Gyönyörű Álmok Ezután Jönnek
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With such a breadth of ideas and influences in the songwriting of Thy Catafalque, there’s room to orient different albums towards distinct vibes, whether it be the playfulness of Naiv or extremity of Alföld; 2021’s Vadak did a good job of spanning the whole range of the project’s scope, and XII: A Gyönyörű Álmok Ezután Jönnek is similar in its intentions. Read more ›› |
Reviews
Isor - Schwärze
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Schwärze means blackness, and Isor is a dark ambient project; let's see where this leads us. Read more ›› |
Reviews
Time Lurker - Emprise
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The Time Lurker had been loitering in the shadows for quite some time, only to now emerge with a daring Emprise that might take even more time to get into. Read more ›› |
Reviews
Sanctuarium - Melted And Decomposed
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Venturing down the cavernous death doom rabbit hole proves to be a rewarding endeavor. Read more ›› |
Reviews
Veilburner - The Duality Of Decapitation And Wisdom
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Don't invite me to the function if this isn't the vibe. Read more ›› |
Reviews
Spider God - Possess The Devil
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After tarnishing black metal's kvltness with pop covers, Spider God set their sights on another of black metal's arch enemies: metalcore! Read more ›› |
Reviews
Moriya - The Black Nail Tantra
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After releasing a debut album with a kaleidoscopic cover, Moriya have opted for monochrome artwork this time around; thankfully, this doesn’t represent a similar trend in their music. Read more ›› |
Reviews
As I Lay Dying - Through Storms Ahead
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As I Lay Dying is... well... Dying. Read more ›› |
Reviews
Linkin Park - From Zero
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The return of perhaps the biggest rock band this side of the millennium: can they build on their legacy? Read more ›› |
Reviews
Massacre - Necrolution
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You won't fool the children of the necrolution. Read more ›› |
Reviews
The Foreshadowing - New Wave Order
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The gothic doom masters The Foreshadowing return after a lengthy absence with a record that's just as strong as where they left off. Read more ›› |
Reviews
Ordinul Negru - Dodekatemoria
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Join the black order on a dark, gripping, and sometimes unsettling astrological voyage. where you might just discover the true meaning behind the Dodekatemoria. Read more ›› |
Reviews
Ixion - Evolution
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I know I’m a bit of an enigma wrapped in a riddle wrapped in a, uh, something else. Inscrutable. But I’m getting to make myself vulnerable here and open up with a tiny glimpse into me. I like doom metal and I like beer. IPAs, in particular. Shocking, I know. And, generally speaking, my tastes in Doom and IPAs are fairly similar – I lean towards the heavier ones, especially the dank kind. Evolution, by IXION is more of a lighter Session Doom Pale Ale. I’ve been listening to the band since Collin was feeling lazy and bumped To The Void my way for a review back in ’11. I really enjoyed their brand of cosmic atmospheric doom and have followed them along their journey. For Evolution the doom is left further and further in the rear-view mirror as the band, well, continue to evolve their sound. The cosmic-atmospheric vibe takes more of the stage, blending growled vocals with plenty of clean, doomriffing passages countered by atmospheric lingering keys and synth melodies. At times it sounds like To The Void and at other times it maintains the same melancholic mood, but the music sounds more like something off Depeche Mode’s Black Celebration or Music For The Masses (Both of which are fantastic albums, btw). Other times some components sound like they were plucked from Tom Baker-era Doctor Who. All of this fits well with the three-act theme of the album. Extinction – Adios, muchachos, humanity’s time has come and it’s 1347 all over again. Restriction – Rise of the Machines. Robots! Androids!. Finally Regeneration – a/k/a my preferred ending to the Mass Effect saga. Synthesis. Transferring our consciousness into new biotechnological bodies. The music morphs from closer to their traditional flavor of doom to a little more Whovian before merging together a bit as we advance along the plot. And it all sounds terrific. With the weather here being a shade above freezing as of late, grey skies, it’s been the perfect sonic accompaniment to my strolls around my new settings. Perfect music for a COld gray day. It’s a hard album for me to write about in the sense it’s more cerebral rather than visceral. Visceral means lots of evocative, descriptive language, whereas trying coalesce thoughts into words with a release like this is a far more nebulous task. And I don’t think my words are quite up to their music. If you’re open to some atmo doompeche mode, block off some time some gray, lazy afternoon and try Breaking The Code on Bandcamp. Read more ›› |
Reviews
Trollcave - Adoration Of The Abyssal Trespasser
