Unique Leader Records is on a definite upswing. Dating back to last year’s Rings of Saturn,  Pyrexia, Deeds of Flesh and Deprecated releases and opening up 2014 with Soreption’s killer  Engineering the Void (one of my contenders for album of the year), Alterbeast, and Iceland’s Beneath (review coming soon)  and this, the third album (though the first I have heard) from […]

Ever-increasing globalization has led to a decline of the development and endurance of regional sounds. The stylings of Bay Area thrash, Swedish death metal, and Norwegian black metal can come from anywhere now. Bucking that trend is the Québécois black metal scene, where a proud yet unpretentious style has evolved and remained unique to the […]

After almost 15 years in the reviewing game, there is very little that surprises me or leaves me speechless in today’s metal scene. Then along comes France’s Hardcore Anal Hydrogen and fucks everything up. I really don’t even know where to begin. Maybe that the band likes the likes of Napalm Death, Pryapisme and Mr Bungle? But […]

                      SUICIDE SILENCEwill release You Can’t Stop Me, their first album to feature new vocalist Eddie Hermida (ex- ALL SHALL PERISH) and their first since the tragic loss of singer Mitch Lucker, on July 11 (Europe), July 14 (UK) and July 15, 2014 (North America) via Nuclear Blast Entertainment. You Can’t […]

Excitement has been growing since WOLVES IN THE THRONE ROOM announced the unexpected release of Celestite, an instrumental, experimental companion record to 2011’s Celestial Lineage. Celestite sees the band take a deeper excursion into the crystalline synthesizer-driven domains that have long intrigued them. With the aid of producer Randall Dunn, the band unearthed a hidden soundscape that is only loosely […]

Coming seemingly out of nowhere, Germany’s Hangatyr has exploded into 2014 with a superb slab of Norse black metal that is as infectious as it is intense. Bristling with a sonic ferocity as it should in this genre of metal, Hangatyr also has crafted their music around swirling melodies and catchy, simplistic riffs. While the […]

Deathcore poster children Whitechapel are back with  album number five, a nice shiny clean logo, a contrived album title and cover and the waning hopes of a fading genre resting on their shoulders. How will they fare? To be honest you either like Whitechapel and deathcore or you don’t, and I’m not about to convince […]

Thanatos were the first extreme metal band to burst onto the scene, from the Netherlands, in 1984. As any band that has been around for so long they have had their highs and lows in the metal scene, seeing the band breaking up in 1992, then reforming 7 years later. I first heard the band in 1990/91 with their debut album, Emerging from the Netherworlds and I really enjoyed their blend of thrash metal with sprinklings of death metal. The band would then take their songwriting to another level on their 1992 album, Realm of Ecstasy, with even more memorable songs and the death/thrashiness still kicking asses all over the place. Their reformation album, Angelic Encounters, in 2000, is a phenomenal piece of music but the production, during that time period, hindered the drum sound quite a bit. That album saw more of an emergence of their old school death metal influences. 2004 saw the band expand on their brutality as well as having a pretty sick looking album cover, with Undead.Unholy.Divine. Justified Genocide, in 2009, saw Thanatos just getting better as the years ticked on by.

 USBM is an interesting animal. When placed next to it’s European counterparts it seems more savage, feral if you will. Like it feels like it has to prove something in order to be accepted. Sad but true, and while there are great American Black Metal bands, Helgardh is going to have to work to be […]

After storming out of the gate with their first two releases, Brutally Deceased‘s Grave worshiping Dead Lovers Guide and Chaos Inception’s excellent, Nile busting The Abrogation, Czech label Lavadome productions went quiet for a bit. However, they are back in business in 2014 with new releases from Chaos Inception and Destroying Divinity in the works […]

This tasty little Italian brutal death EP comes to us from two members of Vomit the Soul, Beheaded, Antropofagus, Septycal Gorge, and Putridity. To be honest, I had only heard Antropofagus before checking out this EP, but given that this has been a steady player for me all month, I will have to look into the others. […]

Sweden’s Sorcery is considered one of the more obscure founding fathers of the Swedish death metal sound.  This compilation was released 2 years ago, but towards the end of 2013 Hells Headbangers Records reissued this onto a deluxe 2 cd set, with a new cover and this includes all their demo material. Disc 1 contains:  […]

I’m usually not one to step outside of my usual metal fare of death metal black metal and their various sub genres. However, a little prog band from Vermont named after a Magic the Gathering card has really captured my attention with their self titled 2013 debut. It’s my understanding that the band started out […]

Bite Your Head Off, the debut album from Australian extreme metal troupe King Parrot, was released domestically back in 2012 amidst largely positive reactions. Now after deservedly landing a multiple record deal with Candlelight Records, and currently carving their path through a string of shows in North America, King Parrot are making significant waves and […]

Back in 2011, New York’s Pyrrhon released their debut album, An Excellent Servant But A Terrible Master on Selfmadegod Records. It was a noisy discordant death metal/grindcore record, but more importantly it featured a good friend and former co scribe from my metalreview.com days, Doug Moore. I had every intention of reviewing the album and also interviewing Doug for this site, but alas I never followed through. A full 3 years later and look at Pyrrhon now! All signed to Relapse Records and shit and releasing one of 2014’s early stellar releases on The Mother Of Virtues.

Those of the Cursed Light is the second album from this Spanish black metal act who have been around since 2006. . The first band that comes to your mind is obviously the unmistakable Dissection but then we haven’t heard any such bands of late, save for a couple of exceptions (Astrophobos), in this decade at least. Dissection itself hasn’t […]

Like the Embludgeonment album, this is another Frank Rini special, recommended to me way after the fact, but certainly worth my and your time. Hailing from Poland, Feto In Fetus is a death metal/grindcore band  and this is their second album, and its a scorching album that throws out some killer Belgian/European styled chunky death metal […]

Without going into an entire back story of Thomas (Warrior) Gabriel Fischer’s musical back story, I will save that for my forthcoming interview with him, it is undeniable the impact he has had on the metal community.  The Celtic Frost reformation album from 2006, Monotheist, is one of my all time favorite extreme metal albums […]

Ahoy there righteous dudes, babes, and all fans of Pirate Metal! It is my very great pleasure to tell you all that Alestorm’s 4th album, to be entitled “Sunset on the Golden Age” will be released by Napalm Records on August 1st 2014 in Europe (Aug 4th in the UK, Aug 5th in North America)! […]

From the ever improving Blast Head Records comes the second album from Virginia’a Human Infection and from the artwork and lyrics to the vocals, to the song writing and production everything has improved from the solid but forgetful debut, Infest to Ingest. Not that Curvatures In Time will be on an year end lists, but […]

Finland’s Demilich are considered a legendary band, yet only released 1 album, the 1993, Nespithe.  How can this be??  Well if you have lived under a rock your entire existence and never heard this album, you need to be dealt with.  This is a classic album in the sense that after its release it is […]

I really respect what The Ukraine’s Metal Scrap Records is doing. They recently celebrated 20 years of existence and they promote the shit out of home grown/local bands. The thing is, 95% of them are terrible. In their most recent slew of offerings albums by Navalm, Ram-page, Halberd and Vadikan made me literally cringe. However, […]

Kuolemanlaakso, a hell of a mouthful if you’re not Finnish, means Valley of Death. Tulijoutsen, their second full-length and third release, is a wholehearted, enjoyable slab of the slower side of extreme metal. Opener “Aarnivalkea” puts all of Kuolemanlaakso’s proverbial cards on the table – what is featured in this song is a fair summary […]

Last year when Lacerated Enemy Records were back in business, one of the smartest things Zdenek did was sign Arizona brutal slam death metal act, Necrambulant. The band unleashed Infernal Infectious Necro-Ambulatory Pandemic, their debut album, which contains 8 vile gore soaked secretions that can give any band a run for their money, when it comes to sheer heaviness. The music is well crafted with extremely memorable songs. Plus what more could you want than the absolutely disgusting toilet bowl brown effect vocals that will fill your ears with filth and pustulating sores? The answer is nothing, because, as I stated in my review, not too long ago, this album is one of the heaviest and best slam death metal albums I have heard in a long time and I’ve pretty much heard ‘em all.

This US band has been around for years and years and it has mostly released albums via its own label, Nightsky Productions I remember the founder Ron Vento struggling to promote their music on forums back in the day and tracking its progress, each album was largely an improvement over the earlier ones. They play […]