Starting with a classic Pinhead quote from the Hellraiser movies, you know exactly what your getting here: pure, unabashed old school death metal. With a guitar tone that mixes Stockholm’s buzz and Sinister’s razor sharp sound as well as dirty, chugging riffs and nary a blastbeat in sight, this is 1992 revisited.
Despite the obvious classic [...]

NFL Football and heavy metal music are inherently linked. From the rebellious souls of the sport’s fledgling athletes decades ago, to the rebellious spirits in heavy metal that terrified the general public, hard-hitting sports and music are bound to find each other. Both are beautiful and brutal simultaneously, and both are the extreme of sports [...]

I personally had no idea Bathory were doing a new album, let alone a two part double release (Part II is to be released early in 2003). When I initially got this album in the mail and tore into it with glee, I was full of youthful memories so you’ll have to excuse my initial [...]

Five years. It has been five years since I had new material from Spain’s atmospheric black metal band Asgaroth. Corpse paint and swords were already a thing of the past for Lord Lupus, Mythral and associates, now they have dropped the pseudonyms as well. Daniel and Chris were joined in 1998 by Oscar and by [...]

Here’s an interesting one, Polish death metal ala Behemoth and Lost Soul, mixed with Nocturnus-like futuristic “spacey” synths. The result isn’t all bad, which is mainly due to the merits of convincing death metal played under all the superfluous keyboards. The mix is a little odd but the synth/death mix never is as engaging or [...]

BloodRose, a new black metal band from Finland, have been playing together since 1994. In 2000 they changed from Hatework to BloodRose, and changed styles as well. Finland is well known for melodic black metal lacking in intensity and harshness. BloodRose is no exception. The vocals, as is often the case, have the requisite harsh [...]

Behemoth’s gradual transition from cult black metal to world-class death metal outfit is not characterized by one album, but through the maturation of four. Unlike many Polish bashers (Decapitated, Hate, etc.) where Vader is the primary inspirational source, Behemoth, mining the strengths of Morbid Angel, Slayer and recently Nile, forge a high-energy, strikingly confident style [...]

I dismissed Satyricon long ago. After listening to the first song on Volcano it became apparent I was too hasty. While they bear little resemblance to their glory days of nearly a decade ago, luckily they resemble even less the late 90’s version that turned me away. Satyricon seems to be one of those bands [...]

Canadian extreme war metal band Axis of Advance are back with their intense, violent black thrash death style. Once again incorporating all aspects of extreme music, with the subtlety of a shotgun blast to the brain. This is lightening fast black metal with thrash guitars and the precision instrumentation of death metal. Guitarist Wör and [...]

Quick. Name five current good recognized death metal bands from The Netherlands that excludes Pestilence and Gorefest. Well, Sinister, God Dethroned…er, Occult. Here was one of those little surprises that arrived in my mailbox, along with a huge dose of skepticism, mainly due to the band name and horrid cover. I.N.R.I. stands for Insane Non-Commercial [...]

My familiarity with Asgaard extends only back in time to 2001’s Ex Oriente Lux which I picked up on a whim, having never heard the band before. Before I get too deep into my opinions on the new disc, let me say I didn’t look to find their three previous recordings. Some background, then, is [...]

Antimatter is the new project of Duncan Patterson, ex of doom gods Anathema, along with some peers/pals/presumed studio whores. As you should know, Anathema’s mid-nineties output on Peaceville pretty much defined doom metal, bowing only to the once almighty My Dying Bride in terms of crossing melancholia with pure sludge riffuck.
Well, ol’ Dunc’s motto seems [...]

Recently I’ve been wading knee deep in mediocre death metal and to be honest with you, the constant pounding, blasting and gurgling was wearing thin. What I needed was a musical respite of sorts, something uplifting, glorious and stress free. I needed some Italian power metal!
While it would be easy to call Thy Majestie Rhapsody [...]

Council Of The Fallen is the blackened death metal project involving numerous high-profile names from the U.S. death metal scene. We have Sean Baxter (Broken Hope, Em Simfonia), drummer Derek Roddy (Malevolent Creation, Hate eternal, Divine Empire, Nile), and Kevin Quirion (Aurora Borealis) - all U.S. death metal veterans, so I was more than a [...]

Let me tell you something - The End Records has become a monster label in U.S. metal. Not content with Epoch of Unlight and Scholomance reigning American black metal, Green Carnation taking the doom scene by storm and Virgin Black bringing goth and darkwave to their collective knees, The End now gives you Winds, a surefire [...]

The revolving door continues for Finland’s Barathrum, with Pelceboop replacing Somnium, Abyssir replacing Beast Dominator, Trollhorn is gone but not replaced. That’s about 18 members in 12 years. Demonos Sova strikes again, and this time he figures we can count by now. Venomous does not announce itself as the seventh album. Other than that, not [...]

Here is a seven piece band from the Netherlands that is attempting to join Slovakia’s Thalarion and Seventh Moon as the top bands in the emotive doom/goth/death genre that uses female vocals to complement the male growl (the beauty and the beast effect). While this a decent album within that ever so cumbersome genre, Thalarion [...]

So, like most people, I have been in the dark about Zao the past several months. I’ve heard rumors of members leaving, old ones coming back, a possible break up and whatever else was on the Internet rumor mill. I was holding my breath in anticipation to see what would happen with this seminal metallic [...]

It wasn’t until I discovered the literal translation of the album’s title that the full depth of this album really hit me. After numerous listens, the darker, heavier approach had me a little stunned, and to be honest, a little disappointed. But after discovering Vansinnesvisor , means “Songs of Madness” (or “Lunacy”), it all came [...]

The Hellhammer machine grinds on. When Celtic Frost dissolved into a glam band their sound split into two components: Darkthrone and what would, a few years later, become Warhammer. Where Darkthrone was the evil atmospheres and grim attitude of ‘Frost, Warhammer, starting in 1994 resurrected the heavy rhythmic grinding doom. Since such an entity was [...]

God Was Created is the second album from Arizona’s Vehemence, and upon looking upon the typical death metal cover and spiky logo, I was bracing for another assault of U.S.-styled Immolation copycat blasting or Suffocation worship. Man, was I fucking wrong! Instead I was graced with quite possibly one of the best U.S. death metal [...]

Coming off the Cosmic Genesis release, I could not wait to expand my brain particles with Vintersorg’s latest, Visions from the Spiral Generator. From his work with Borknagar and Havayoth, to the folk project of Otyg, his cosmic lyrics, and his self-named project, is there a more humble metaller pushing the status quo to take [...]

Farthest From the Sun is a 4 track 51 minute affair done by Sauron, of Spain. This is the debut album from Apotheosis, and the booklet offers several hundred words on how great his computer generated demos are and a dozen words about this debut, which contains two promo songs reworked. Bragging about creating two [...]

“Anyone who isn’t dead or from another plane of existence, would do well to cover their ears, right about now.”
This superbly appropriate sample from the move “Dogma,” opens the song “Inhuman,” on Origin’s second album, Informis, Infinitas, Inhumanitas. Never has a sample been so fitting. I’ll be the first to tell you, I wasn’t impressed [...]

Bands like Agoraphobic Nosebleed make or break with me on their willingness and ability to inject a little flava into the whir. Listening to thirty-plus minutes of hypergurgle is no more innately interesting than listening to an electric fan. (I’m weirdly fascinated by the fact that we finally have bands whose music imitates the sounds [...]