I pose, that instead of purchasing carnations for your love on Valentine’s Day, Christmas, or whatever dumb bullshit humanoids in love celebrate, instead perhaps purchase Carnation. Give your love the gift that keeps on giving. The gift of blistering death metal. We last heard Belgian death metallers Carnation when they released a banger of Florida-style […]

My Dying Bride‘s 2020 album, The Ghosts of Orion, was an Ok release, not the best of the legendary UK doom act’s third act (yey growls!), but still a decent MDB release, with 3 or so really strong songs, which is always a good thing. So to keep us entertained during these covid times, the […]

“We are Power Trio band that plays Metal as close to the glorious early 80’s years, just pure Metal, without nowadays trends.” That’s the bio Colombia’s Witchtrap have written on their Instagram page, and… I mean, that’s job done, really! What the fuck do you need me for? Seriously though – this is just what […]

If one had asked me last year; “Hey, you stupid, fat piece of shit, who is your favorite death doom band,” I would have said “Insomnium…?” With a question mark at the end, asking almost incredulously. The reason behind that is I had very little experience. If you’ve followed my reviews, you’ll know death doom […]

I have been a fan of Russia’s brutal death metal masters, Ossuary Anex, since their Awakening debut album close to a decade ago.  They have morphed into a brutal slam death metal band into some more technical death metal realms throughout their other releases and on their new 3rd album Obscurantism Apogee Ossuary Anex bring […]

“Can the whole, be greater than the sum of it’s parts?” This is, essentially, the question we all ask any time it comes to judging the newest supergroup. Can a group of known, accomplished musicians and artists come together to create something new and even better than the work they’ve already known and been judged […]

There’s not a lot of info out there right now on Stormkeep (a D & D, Forgotten Realms thing apparently), but I knew as I saw the words ‘triumphant’,  ‘epic’ and ‘melodic’ as well as the renowned JRR Tolkein artist Ian Miller cover art (who also graces one of my favorite other EPs ever, Abigor’s […]

Atrae Bilis is promoted as technical death metal. Canadian technical death metal, to be specific. I didn’t know this, or at least had never thought about it before, but with that genre tag, they’re in great company. Gorguts, Cryptopsy, and more recently, Archspire fit that bill. As just mentioned, great company, even if I don’t […]

Wow! Has it really been five years since Sweden’s Draconian dropped a new album on us? Five years to the date as a matter of fact. Man, it really doesn’t seem like Sovran was released five years ago, then again this past year of 2020 has been quite the rollercoaster, seemingly lasting an eternity unto […]

Ohio’s TON have been around for close to 3 decades and part of the reason they have had their sound continue in a cohesive manner is the stable line-up.  Jeff Shepler on vocals/bass, Kevin Kraft on vocals/drums and Dan Gates on vocals/guitar have stayed the course to fight the good death metal fight.  When I […]

It happens every year; temperatures start cooling down, the leaves start changing colors, days start having an oddly not-at-all-unpleasant feeling of melancholic gloom as the world’s flora begins its decent towards decay – and inevitably my music rotation turns to that of a much doomier variety. Ghost Brigade and Sentenced are always big fall time […]

There are two veteran, bigger, supergroup -ish acts vying for this autumn’s top, high profile Swedish death metal release; the second effort from LIK (featuring Niklas Sundin of Katatonia)  and the sixth album from Demonical, featuring current and former members of Centinex, Grave and others). And the clear winner is Demonical. I really enjoyed 2018s […]

“Is this too much? Is this not enough? If I don’t cover up, Does that make it my fault?”  OOF. For some time now, Svalbard – led by vocalist, guitarist and lyricist Serena Cherry, have been proving time and time again that real life is far more horrifying and brutal than any fictitious song about […]

Theoretically, for this review, I feasibly should just be able to say ‘If you like Bolt Thrower, seriously, just get this’ and be done with it. It should be that simple, especially after 3 albums and a slew of singles/splits and eps. However I’ve been in communication with guitarist Anders Biazzi for a few years […]

The day I stop getting excited about new releases and debuts from bands, I have never heard, is the day I stop writing – I would assume.  Once I saw this new band, Consumption advertised as a mix of classic Swedish buzzsaw death metal and Carcass’, best album imo, Symphonies of Sickness, I was like, […]

When I decided to pick up the new album (his second overall) from The Devil’s Trade, I was looking for a bit of a change of pace. You know, the old “listening to nothing but heavy music” into which we metal reviewers sometimes find ourselves. It’s often a good idea to take a step back […]

I don’t think there is any argument when it comes to the upper pantheons of early/mid 90s doom ( the gothic/funeral doom style). The holy British trinity of My Dying Bride, Anathema and Paradise Lost are the clear top acts of the style and era- but what bout that slightly below elite, second tier- ( […]

Ohhhhhhhh, yessssss! The new Paul Bearer record. Wait, that’s not right. Pallbearer. There it is. There’s no Undertaker here. Although, this album may make you sit up like him when you hear it for the first time. So, this is another mainstream metal release that probably has received glowing reviews in Pitchfork as well as […]

Due to the stupid pandemic Carcass decided to hold off on releasing their follow-up to their excellent 2013 reunion album – Surgical Steel, until 2021.  Smart decision, since pretty much any albums released in 2020 are dead in the water due to no live shows/touring and 2021, at least in Europe, looks to start resuming […]

 I’m not sure how many bands are called Undead, but what I do know is that you’ll receive 46 entries if you search for it on Metal Archives. To be fair, only 14 of those are just called Undead. The others just include the phrase in their name. Those are just the ones listed, though. […]

Virginia’s Foretoken is the new technical, symphonic black/melodic death metal bans from Steve Redmond (guitars/orchestration) and Dan Cooley (vocals), who both serve in technical death metal band Cyaegha (whose debut Steps to Descent, I reviewed here way back in 2009). They are aided by drummer Hannes Grossman (Obscura, Necrophagist),  as well as a couple of […]

One of the greatest pleasures of growing older is the opportunity to get further and further away from the younger idiot you once were. Notice I say “opportunity” – this is by no means a given. The world is (VERY OBVIOUSLY!) filled with an overwhelming amount of assholes with absolutely no interest in taking a […]

Göden is the spiritual successor to Long Island NY’s death/doom band Winter.  Never did I envision this possible and Winter’s 1990 debut and only album Into Darkness is my favorite death/doom album of all time.  I have seen them live prior to their debut and after their debut was released in NY.  So damn heavy […]

The introduction for an album by a band called Rancid Taint Discharge writes itself, but I’m an incredibly serious reviewer. I don’t have time for such childish musings (pushes up glasses). What you’re going to get here is the well-read, researched point of a view of a wise, learned man. So, let’s get right into […]

Sweden’s Mörk Gryning  (‘dark dawn’) were in a bit of a grey area coming up in the late 90s early 00s Scandinavian melodic black metal scene. Never achieving the status of say Dissection or Naglfar or the underground gem status of say Catamenia or  Vinterland years later, but delivering 5 decent albums arguably peaking with […]