When was the last time an album hit you with such emotion that you felt like it was casually going to rip your heart out and leave you with a gaping hole where your emotions used to live? I have a list of bands that have created music like that, and those are the ones […]

Those in the know and follow symphonic black metal, are aware that since their Piercing Through the Frozen Eternity EP in 2022, Finland’s Moonlight Sorcery has been touted as the next big thing in 90s-styled melodic/symphonic black metal. Some even saying they are going to be the next Dissection or Emperor, with a windy, grim, […]

Downfall of Nur, both the band name and this album, are inspired in full by the Nuragic civilization that existed on the island of Sardinia in the Mediterranean from the middle Bronze age, until its dissolution in the early Iron age.  The arc of this civilization is represented across the five lengthy tracks.  Immediately I’m […]

Kauan’s Aava Tuulen Maa received (and will continue to do so) so many spins in my player that it’s borderline ridiculous. The album simply drilled a straight phone line—through my thick bashed skull—into my psyche. With that in mind, and it always is, it was hard to angle myself when I put the group’s latest […]

The more open minded of you that rave about bands like Opeth and Katatonia seriously need to give Galgenfrist a few listens. To most brought up in the western music tradition this is a challenging listen, but one well worth the effort. This is not groundbreaking, after all this idea has been around several hundred […]

I first noticed this band several years ago, during a marathon research trip into the black metal underworld – a frustrating venture that touched on over a hundred bands, but produced little in the way of actual gems. Spite Extreme Wing was one of the exceptions – a sharp, angular black metal outfit from Italy that, […]

When I looked at the promo copy of the new album and saw the first track was “Black Terror Metal” I thought this was a compilation cd, I have a demo tape by that name. It turns out to be a re-recording of the classic song. Luciferin Valo is the 22nd Azaghal release in my […]

Thergothon is, for whatever it’s worth, almost universally credited with bringing true extremes into the happy-go-lucky world of doom metal; the slowest tempos, the deepest, most guttural vocals, and the most depressive and depressing atmosphere ever heard. With only one demo and one full-length album to ther credit before disbanding, the two-man project smashed the […]