Even in the wake of their reunion tours stretching back to 2009, the reality of a new studio album from Faith No More, the kings of genre-bending alt rock-metal, seemed highly unlikely. At the height of their powers Faith No More shared a strained relationship with each other, a prickly tension and volatile chemistry that […]

Norwegian Avant Garde Heavy Metal has been something of an evolution over the last twenty years.  In looking at Dodheimsgard’s 2015 release, A Umbra Omega we should first start with a trip back to 1996 and a double disc compilation called Blackened: The Black Metal Compilation.  Disc two of this compilation featured a song called,” […]

I might be picking in the wrong season here.  I’m growing a crop of doom/death when the weather consistently lures me towards faster riffs, heavy groove abandon or something that will have me speeding down the highway at 100 mph and swerving between lanes.  The Ukraine’s Torrens Conscientium are not exactly band, but you know […]

Grind is a specific kind of metal that describes, band by band, a single aspect of being, more so than any other kind of metal – or music. The bands that make grind tend to live for that aspect, create for it. Maruta is about tension; sailing riffs on the edge of the world and […]

Symphonics/orchestration and brutal death metal aren’t uncommon bedfellows, but it isn’t exactly a thriving, saturated genre, due to the obvious dichotomy the two style provide. Fleshgod Apocalypse certainly elevated it to critical acclaim and mastered the sound but before that the likes of arguable trendsetters Nocturnus as well as, Agiel, Scrambled Defuncts, Ovid’s Withering and a few […]

New LP To See Fall Release Via Battleground Records Following an entire decade without a new album, Phoenix-based melodic death metal kingpins, VEHEMENCE, return to full-time duty in 2015, having reactivated the band and completed their fourth full-length studio full-length, Forward Without Motion, which is now set for release this Autumn via Battleground Records. Their […]

In the years that I’ve spent on this earth, I’ve come to the conclusion of “everything in due time” or as I like to reword it, “I wasn’t meant to do that before I did”. Case in point: Tad. I never took the time out of my day to venture forth into Tad’s area of […]

I can usually tell of I am going to like or dislike an album after a few moments. A few skips from track to track, hear the vocals, the production etc. I can get a general idea pretty quick. Sure, there are anomalies, growers, late bloomers and stuff I’m just not feeling at that time in […]

The reigning kings of technical, historically-themed brutality, NILE, are currently in the studio wrapping up the mix of their upcoming album What Should Not Be Unearthed. Produced by NILE and mixed by Neil Kernon. The album will be released late summer via Nuclear Blast Records. Mastermind Karl Sanders states: “All of us in NILE are […]

So now France is finally joining the European masses like the Czech Republic (Brutally Deceased), Croatia, (Hezera), Italy (Undead Creep), Germany (Revel in Flesh), Poland (Ulcer), Greece (Wreckage) The Netherlands (Funeral Whore), Finland (Morbid Vomit) and even the US (Fatalist) getting in on the Boss HM2, Swedish death metal revival with the duo known as Skelethal. A […]

New Delhi trio Toxoid take an ain’t broke, don’t fix it approach to black metal on their debut album Aurora Satanae.  They avoid shoe gazin’, there are no pop elements, over the top orchestration is left for the London Symphony and you can kiss those clean vocals goodbye.  For those who like it right in […]

For 5 years and three previous albums now, Sweden’s Entrails, reactivated from the 90s has been arguably the forerunner and top band in the Swedish death metal revival. After two killer albums on FDA Rekotz/Dark Descent, they were elevated to the big leagues with 2013s Raging Death, on Metal Blade Records, and didn’t lose a […]

There are some United States Underground acts that can construct rituals of dark atmosphere. Look no further than Naas Alcameth founder of the void inducing beast that is Nightbringer who has created yet another side project of meticulous malebolgias of hellish landscapes which are presented for on the 2015 effort ,The Dreaming I. Naas Alcameth […]

To us mere mortals, ten years is a long time to wait between albums, yet I suppose if you’re a band of time-travelling space pirates, a decade is no time at all. That’s exactly how long it’s been since Sverd’s troupe of avant-garde lunatics unleashed their last magnificent opus, Sideshow Symphonies. So, what’s changed for […]

So this “extreme progressive metal’  movement is becoming I thing I see. The Great Discord, Black Crown Initiate, Ne Obliviscaris, France’s Maladie, and this long running Swedish act named after a subterranean lake in Antarctica are delivering metal that switches on a dime between prog metal, thrash, technical death metal, symphonic metal, power metal and everything else under the metal […]

I was not overly impressed with the 2012 debut Symbiosis, debut from this Florida tech death/deathcore act. There was nothing inherently wrong with it, it was just yet another faceless (no pun intended) modern tech death/deathcore record with little soul and all twiddle and breakdowns. The kind of stuff that Ive heard too many times […]

A slab of brute force melancholy from Poland, Oktor’s full-length debut after a string of mini-albums is a grandstand of kiloton riffs and lighter shading.  They straddle the fence of sadness without getting too weepy for their own good and bring some of the heaviest guitar work I’ve heard in the death/doom across the eight […]

I’m not usually one to get to reeled in by hype. Even more so for Sweden’s Tribulation, who left me unimpressed in 2009 with a pretty standard Swedish death metal release, The Horror, then their death metal got all proggy and developed with the rather hyped  The Formulas of Death, a transition that really didn’t […]

France’s Putrid Offal were one of France’s early death metal/grind bands with a number of obscure splits and demos between 1991 and 1994, but it’s taken them until 2015 to release a full length album, which essentially re-records most of the material from the bands 90s discography and adds a couple of covers for good measure. […]

Here’s an early 2015 release from Switzerland’s oddly named Dysrider ( formerly known as Trophallaxy, a symphonic power metal act) that has grown on me of late as it adds to the recent spat of various types of metal laced with epic symphonics and orchestration. It also recalls some of my favorite releases from the late 90s early […]

You may have noticed a small but notable crop of retro Swedeath bands progressing beyond their throwback stylings over the past few years. Necrovation was the first to make a significant paradigm shift with their 2012 self-titled full-length. Finland’s Vorum seemed poised to take the same leap after their 2013 debut, Poisoned Void, which felt […]

German grinders Mindflair have been around a helluva long-time.  Their dirty dozen, blast beat carnage dates back to 1994.  That’s a couple of lifetimes in grind years because only a few bands have managed to last for such a long period of time.  My only experience with these guys to date was with the ’02 […]

Tucked away in the midst of Dark Descent’s higher profile 2015 releases is this little gem from reformed 90s Netherlands act Eternal Solstice, who released 3 solid albums in the mid 90s. Founder, Ramon Soeterbroek and early member Mischa Hak (also of Sempiternal Deathreign back then) has recruited a couple of young bucks (notably ex Funeral Whore drummer Tim Roeper) […]

I’m not super familiar with the UK crust/D beat scene or this Durham based act who have been around since since 2006 with a number of splits and EPs under their bullet belt. But if debut full length Usurping the Throne of Disease is any indication I need to rectify both issues right away. Coming across […]

Primoridum is comprised of former members of shredding death metallers Heavy Lies the Crown.  If you’ve come for technical guitar permutations, forceful mid-tempo chunks, surprisingly melodic lead-work, ultra-clear bass licks and hyper-speed blast tactics, you’ll be in good hands.  This is a solid slab of punishment from these Indiana upstarts.  As ridiculously brutal as this […]