Reviews

Cutting their dieth.

Hot in the city.

So, you fancy yourself a bit of death metal, do you? Well, what style suits you best? Traditional, technical, melodeath, progressive? How about a bit of thrash thrown in? Or, how about something completely…

First comes dawn. The triumph of light over darkness.

Most people think of atmospheric sludge as a term used to describe a calmer type of sludge metal. But what happens when that atmosphere consists of a ton of vitriol pouring down on you?

As the gothic shadow dims, more aggression reveals itself.

Kalmah had a triumphant return last month after a lengthy 5-year wait, only to be immediately upstaged by Scar Symmetry’s comeback after 9 years.

This Godflesh review is coming from a strange place. Ordinarily their music is simultaneously numbing and punishing. However, after a day of staring at spreadsheets, having the dentist go medieval on my…

I’ve spoken before about my trepidation when bands release self-titled records late into their career. Based on my theory for self-titled albums in the Lamb Of God reviews, Kalmah isn’t the start of a…

There’s enough cookie-cutter death metal available in Europe and the US to keep those searching for it satisfied virtually forever. Therefore, it’s perhaps not surprising that in the instances where a…

A lot of screamo bands have been returning lately to offer a more mature and mellow take on their sound, and that's what Jeromes Dream did on their comeback album back in 2019. So imagine my shock…

Canada, and Québec in particular, has quite the reputation in technical death metal; the scene even has its own Wikipedia category. Pronostic is a name that’s existed for a while, but due to relative inactivity…

Cosmic Chronicles: Act 1, The Ascension is the debut record from Kansas psychedelic/stoner metal band They Watch Us From The Moon. I assume it’s not too much of a surprise to learn that a band called They…

Comeback albums generally get a lot of attention because listeners are so starved for new material from a band, that the mere concept of a new album from said band can feel surreal. The real challenge…

Arkona’s follow-up to the amazing Khram from 2018, where they made a U-turn music-wise into something truly unexpected, has been a long time in the making. Their new album does not disappoint, and it makes…

Just what we need, another sandbox game.

I'll be at the Congregation for cunctation.

It just has that little bit more than a standard hard rock album.

Progressive and alternative metal are two genres that frequently overlap, as the likes of Karnivool, Tool and Wheel can attest to. However, both genres are rather broad umbrellas, and there are niches…

Sharpen your axe blades and ready your armour, my Dwarven brethren, for tomorrow we go to battle. For now though, let's just fill our tankards up with as much mead as we can possibly carry, and drink…

What happens when Melechesh and Deathspell Omega decide to opt for an orgy? Something like this, perhaps…

You know what, maybe I do like Andy Cairns' vocals when there's a shitload of effects on top of them.

Jumping into a band's discography for album number 16 as an outsider might be a bit of a challenge. Especially when you feel like you don't quite get it. Therapy? Therapy!

Good things come to those who wait: for fans of Saturnus this should hopefully be the case, as it has been eleven long years since the band put out a new album; either Axl Rose was in charge of scheduling,…

There's being experimental with your sound compositions, and then there's being straight-up off-key. On Sutra, Yakuza thread dangerously close to the second one.

If the freezing moon can curse humans, maybe it can curse plants as well. But Selenotrope is all but freezing.

Oh God, I have to acknowledge the existence of Tiktok.

Six years have now passed since Usnea presented us with their dark doomy, atmospheric Portals Into Futility. Now, will Bathed In Light follow the same route, or have those 6 years awoken any surprises?…

It pays off to stay true to yourself. Go ahead and celebrate your weirdness! Be bold. Be goofy. Be persistent. Be passionate. Be unpredictable. Be like Xysma!

The Acacia Strain can thrive in slower songs.

The Acacia Strain can thrive in faster songs.

Only 2 days ago, I referred to Omnerod’s latest record as “an amalgamation of everything that’s happened in heavy progressive music since the turn of the millennium”; the new Ring Of Gyges similarly feels…

Sometimes, coins have pretty identical sides.

A heavy metal album released by a label known for being the home of far out black and death metal bands? What did Sentient Ruin Laboratories see in Shadows in order to place them next to their extreme…

As scandalous as it is for a band called The Machine to be playing hippie psychedelic music instead of industrial or something similarly mechanical, it appears that they have a knack for it.

Consistency is an overlooked quality in music: the ability to know that, when a band's name adorns the cover of an album, that said album will be good. Legion Of The Damned are one of these bands,…

Omnerod’s eclectic prog sound has been exuberant right from the start, but time has added polish to their production and maturity to their songwriting. By album number 3, the Belgians have already evolved…

Who would have thought that ancient Sri Lankan traditions would hold an inspirational source for an atmospheric, depressive black metal album?

Add one spoonful of hard chugging black metal riffs. Then add heapings of icy screams and blend in just the right amount of clean backing vocals. Top it all off with a Karelian folk music flair and a story…

If epic-themed, speedy power metal is your sort of thing, then strap up and hold on tight, because Towers Of Gold will have you break-necking your way into the deepest realms of fantasy.

The Ocean may have just accomplished one of the greatest feats of foreshadowing in music; after releasing an album that finished on a surprisingly soft song called “Holocene”, they followed it up with…

Black metal has, by now, evolved so much and spread so globally (just this week, I heard a very decent black metal album from Sri Lanka) that it’s hard to venerate just one country in particular for its…

Najing is the self-titled debut effort from Italian instrumental post-metal trio Najing. Now, I’ve reviewed enough albums for Metal Storm to make my affinity for post-metal firmly evident, but, while I…

Sadly, Dissection are no longer with us, but through Thulcandra, the meloblack flame truly lives on. Hell, they even give Necrophobic a run for their money.

I first listened to Black Medium Current on the day of its release, and since then it has eluded me putting it into words. More than a month later, I'm still fighting its elusive form, but eventually…

Thou shalt turn Massachusetts into a swamp and evoke crushing sludge at the bottom of the ocean.

"Dear God, I wrote you, but you still ain't calling."

With 2017’s Les Chants Du Hasard, multi-instrumentalist Hazard experimented with black metal vocals and vibes within a purely orchestral setting. Hazard has now flipped the script with Hasard, as debut…

Curse Of Cain write about an alternative world in which the Biblical character Cain walks a parasite-ridden futuristic dystopian world. It turns out, in this parallel universe, electronic-heavy metalcore…

I know that I have pushing epic metal down your collective throats, Metal Stormers, during these first few months of 2023, but can you blame me with all these top-class releases that have been out recently?…

A Book About Itself was one of the shiniest hidden gems of the djent scene in recent years. Two years later, Karmanjakah return with a shorter yet comparably charming EP in the form of Ancient Skills.

Endless Skies, the sophomore effort from Corsican stoner metal trio Alconaut, is the latest album that I’ve claimed to review purely based on the artwork. I’ve had mixed success with this approach before;…

The saga of Ingloryhammer continues: a couple of years after his surprise departure, under circumstances that are rich in rumor and scant of information, vocalist Thomas Laszlo Winkler has done what he…

Looking for something experimentally mad, are we? Well, what about some delightfully sharp-edged progressive psychedelic doom rock brought to you by Hex A.D.?

Of The Sign of what? OF THE RIFF, OF COURSE!…

Metal and jazz aren’t the most natural partners, but there’s been sporadic attempts at metal-jazz fusions of some form of another dating back over 30 years now to the 90s tech-death scene, and followed…

If you've ever wondered what a metal storm during the apocalypse would sound like, you might want to check out the insane death metal machine called Ascended Dead.

Look, you probably heard a lot of dissonant death metal by now. Here's why you should still give Nightmarer its dues.

When you're listening to hardcore, how much do you want its tongue firmly planted in its cheek?

Do you feel like taking a break from extreme metal, or looking for something on the soft, folky, and slightly experimental side of things to lighten your mood? Then Fremmede Toner could perhaps suit your…

Groove metal started off as an offshoot from thrash metal, and a lot of its biggest names have been associated with either thrash or alternative metal. However, when I think of groovy metal genres, djent…

Quite often in reviews of extreme metal records, there’ll be a section in which I’ll highlight moments of levity, whether melodic or atmospheric, that positively stand out amidst the surrounding chaos.

A sentiment I find myself thinking quite frequently when writing reviews is ‘this is really well-rounded and mature for a debut album’; the existence of such thoughts implies the expectation that debut…

In my recent reviews of Ad Infinitum, I pondered whether Melissa Bonny’s new project The Dark Side Of The Moon would fill the void vacated by Ad Infinitum’s shift away from the style of their debut, Chapter…

Listen, I don't give a perfect score easily, but Martyrs is damn sure a worthy contender. This is black metal reimagined, repurposed and redesigned. Now, what is it that you love about black metal?

A debut EP from a band whose members go by elaborate pseudonyms (such as ‘They, Who May Not Be Perceived’) released on a reputable label such as 20 Buck Spin despite no prior music being released by the…

If your looking for some tasty riffing to headbang yourself senseless too, then look no further. Here's a splash of 80s retro heavy metal, with a dabble of power metal brought to you by five Burning…

Have you recently found yourself lost in the feeling of Nostalgia over '80s heavy metal? Well, you could dig out some bands of the past, or Enforce yourself to listen to some Nostalgia from 2023.

With its origins in Scandinavia, it's no wonder that black metal is associated with freezing environments. Yet, one-man project Aridus shows us that the scorching American desert can be just as bleak,…

The Great Star Above Provides us with an hour of mesmerizing atmosphere. An enjoyable, hypnotic journey for some; an exercise in attention retention for others.