One of the best-kept secrets in extreme metal certainly has to be Austin, Texas’ Morgengrau, a quartet that plays a near-flawless brand of vintage death metal. Their debut album, Extrinsic Pathway was released in April via Blind God Records and to say it’s a hidden gem of crushing death would be an understatement.

Relapse Records is extremely proud to announce the signing of New York City avant-garde, technical death metal quartet PYRRHON (pronounced “peer-on”).  Formed in 2008, PYRRHON (Dylan DiLella – guitar, Erik Malave – bass, Alex Cohen – drums, Doug Moore – vocals) have released one EP (Fever Kingdoms – 2010) and one LP (An Excellent Servant But a Terrible Master – 2011) via The Path […]

As I have stated here many times, before part of the fun of this website reviewer gig is being able to expose folks to smaller, independent bands that they may never get a chance to be aware of. I mean sure, its nice to review the likes of Carcass and Gorguts, but we all know […]

With the release of Nations to Flames, it’s safe to say that New York’s A Storm of Light have hit their stride as a band. After a decent debut album And We Wept the Black Ocean Within and a not-as-good follow-up in Forgive Us Our Trespasses, the band finally came through with the solid As […]

The recent wave of crusty, punky, black metal has been both a blessing and a curse. While a lot of great acts have crept up from the mire in the past few years (notably: Martyrdod, Seeds in Barren Fields, Young and in the Way), there has still been a glut of uninspired Darkthrone clones releasing […]

My dealing with Wisconsin’s Halo of Flies records have mostly been Lightbearer/Fall of Efrafa or Protestant related with a few other crust /hardcore releases scattered in there. However, here is something a little off the beaten path but still is a perfect fit for the label- a female fronted, black-ish post rock/post hardcore band from […]

DODECAHEDRON is yet another home run of a recommendation from my boy Graham Landers at Deepsend Records. What drew me to the band was the bleak cover design, reminding me of a lot of the Finnish death metal bands that I love, with their designs. DODECAHEDRON are from the Netherlands playing a hybrid form of black metal, with some death metal influences, however this band creates some menacing atmosphere that reminded me a bit of Ulcerate and Mitochondrion, and I was hooked once I heard their debut self titled album, which was released last year.

The reaction to The Wild Hunt, the latest full-length release from Swedish black metal veterans Watain can be summed up in one word: this will be interesting. Without question, the old school/hardcore/lifelong Watain fans will largely cry out in anger that their beloved Anti-Cosmic Luciferianism heroes have sold out, never to return. The other faction, […]

Since the day that I first gave The Invisible Mountain its first spin in my Hi-Fi last year, Horseback have compelled and intrigued me to no end. I was blown away by the sheer audaciousness and ambition of that album – just four songs stretched across nearly forty minutes of music, each song underpinned with […]

Upon receiving this album for review from this Washington State band I was fearing either lo-fi, basement level one man black metal (due to the cover and the use of “ov”) or some more typically Pacific Northwest ‘cascadian’ black metal. I was wrong on both counts, as the second album from this duo is actually […]

I buy pretty much every new release Deepsend Records puts out and label owner Graham Landers is always giving me recommendations from his label & outside his label.  He knows me and he’s always on the money with his recommendations, which my wife appreciates, with all my cds coming in every week.  I never heard […]

Fattura Della Morte is a band not afraid to wear its influences on its sleeve. On their newest EP Ouranophobia (the fear of heaven), if I didn’t know they were from Australia, I’d assume they were from Louisiana. I’ve been aware of the band for a few years and even had a copy of their […]

The debut album from Vista Chino has arrived with minimal fuss, especially considering the pedigree of their key members. A Kyuss reunion of sorts, Peace features the killer line-up of John Garcia, Brant Bjork, Nick Oliveri (since replaced by Corrosion of Conformity’s Mike Dean) and relatively unknown guitarist Bruno Fevery. Following a bitter lawsuit waged […]

Chicago based Born of Osiris return with their fourth album, Tomorrow We Die Alive. I know there are strictly a lot of people on TOTD that do not like deathcore and BOO definitely still retain those influences on this, however they also incorporate djent styled industrial influences as well as full on death metal, with […]

Perversion is a death metal band hailing from Dubai in the United Arab Emirates and Pillars of the Enlightened is their debut full length album (they had an EP, The Origins of Horror, in 2008) which was originally self released in 2012, but has been picked up by the fine folks at Blast Head Records […]

“I wasn’t even supposed to be here today!” insisted Dante in Kevin Smith’s Clerks and being in the middle of a cold, breezy 10th Wanaja Festival on Friday, July 19th — held in the historic city of Hameenlinna, Finland — I thought the exact same thing. And, the weather wasn’t the only thing on my mind since the lineup made me question my own priorities as well. The metal bands could be counted with three fingers and all of those three would make an appearance on the second day. Yet, following my life patterns like the rats in that Paul Simon song, I still had asked if I could come. I didn’t hear back until just right before the festival’s D-Day when they said “Come on in”, so after shuffling my obligations around and trying to make it all work, here I was.

It’s taken all the way to September, but we have a late favorite for what very well could be the brutal/slam death album of the year. If you were disappointed in the last LP from USA slam death kings Devourment (as I definitely was), then Saprogenic are here to cure what ails you. They’ve put […]

Last year, Finish act Decaying released their third album, Encirclement, and it was a solid take on Bolt Thrower/Asphyx/Hail of Bullets styled, war themed European death metal. And so here is the follow up, The Last Days of War, and little has changed in the Decaying camp as they still wear the obvious influences on […]

GWAR, GWAR, GWAR… What would the world do without such a band? Regardless of what any detractors might feel or say about the Richmond, Virginia veterans, GWAR is easily one of the most important, most crucial bands in metal today. Check that: ever. Aside from putting on the best live show in the history of […]

Norway’s Devil made an impression on me in 2010 with their demo Magister Mundi Xum and rightly so. Injecting some rough hewn overtones of NWOBHM favorites Witchfinder General in to a bluesy old school doom sound was a perfect antidote to the hordes of image conscious hippies and their retro rock bullshit. Their debut album […]

Celebrate the return of fall with some metal and merch from Victory Records! Symphonic death metallers ERIMHA recently released their album Reign Through Immortality, and for those that like Dimmu Borgir and other bombastic, symphonic black/death metal, Erimha is a must listen and Victory Records wants 3 lucky TeethoftheDivine readers to get in on the action with a huge Erimha prize package and an added bonus prize!!!!

Though I usually don’t “do” compilation albums, this recent string of bands releasing their rare / hard to find / split / demo tracks on sets of CDs has been very enjoyable for me. Relapse is shortly releasing a 3CD set from Horseback (pre-ordered), Gilead Media has been slowly hinting at a 3CD set compiling […]

After a little bit of a misstep with the Netra release, Hypnotic Dirge is back on track with a handful of very solid releases (Odradek Room, Galaktik Cancer Squad, Lycanthia, Frigoris), the best of which is the second album from Massachusetts atmospheric black metal act Obsidian Tongue, and for those of you who are fans […]

If you’re a grind fan and haven’t hear of Squash Bowels well then… what the hell is wrong with you?!? The Poles have been blasting away since 1994, with a ton of splits and EPs and now Grindcoholism, their 6th full-length album. Despite their longevity, these guys haven’t quite reached the top tier of the […]

So here is only the second release from P2, a label co owned and run by one Paulo Paguntalan, guitarist and vocalist for Copremesis (whose debut Muay Thai Lady Boys still has some of the best cover art ever) and vocalist for Andromorphous Rexalia, so it should come as no surprise that the fledgling label’s […]