If you follow this site and my writings (you’re not the only one as I’m kind of a big deal), you might be asking yourself why a folk metal album is getting the review treatment from me. Instead, you should immediately be thinking the subject of this review is entirely worth your attention. It’s been […]

Maine’s Falls of Rauros improved greatly from their 2011 debut, The Light That Dwells in Rotten Wood, to 2014s Believe in No Coming Shore, which made my 2014 year end list.  And now with album number four, I feel these guys have absolutely reached elite status, as  Vigilance Perennial, isn’t just going to be on my […]

After telling us about his Kentucky roots with 2012s Kentucky, and then his move to Minnesota with last years Roads to the North, Austin Lunn appears to have settled down and is down dealing with the most fitting season for his style of organic, naturalistic and atmospheric black metal- Autumn. And I gather autumn in […]

Atmospheric black metal is perfectly fine as a descriptor, but what it should really be called is headphones black metal. Strap on a pair of your best reality-blockers, close your eyes, and get lost in a blizzard of sound and fury. Mare Cognitum released a perfect experience with Phobos Monolith, my #1 pick for 2014. […]

Bindrune with past and present bands/releases has really found a superb niche within a particular style with its folky, natural black metal acts like Panoptcion, Nechochwen, Obsequiae (though no longer on Bindrune) , Waldgefluster , Infera Bruo, Ahamkara, Falls or Rauros and such, so it seems that Washington State’s Alda and Bindrune is a match made in heaven. Clearly […]

Believe in No Coming Shore is the third full-length album from Cascadian black metal act Falls of Rauros, now into their tenth year since their conception. Through these years their sound has remained fundamentally unchanged, and perhaps for the better; their brand of rural, introspective atmospheric black metal has always been very endearing to me. […]

Panopticon and Bindrune Recordings is a match made in heaven. A label that has released some truly special atmospheric, organic and naturalistic metal (Falls of Rauros, Nechochwen, Blood of the Black Owl, Obsequiae) finally releasing a more accessible and wider CD release of Austin Lunn’s 5th album under the Panopticon banner, a project that personifies organic, atmospheric and naturalistic. […]

Kentucky folk metal act , Panopticon announced via  their Facebook page that the band was now a member of the Bindrune Recordings stable. Lone member Austin Lunn further stated: “Well, here it is. The announcement I was promising. Change is inevitable and if we resist it, sometimes it can be painful. I have parted ways […]

Stepping deeply into the endless chasm of spiritual enlightenment and partaking on a journey to discover one’s true meaning comes the latest album from Seattle’s Blood of the Black Owl. Light the Fires! is an adventurous creation of music and one that begs the listener to look deeply into spirituality, lift one’s spirits, and hopefully […]

Released the same time as the killer debut from label mates Obsiquiae, the third album from Maine’s Falls of Rauros was a bit overshadowed, which is a shame as it adds yet another quality album to the genre of woodsy, misty, organic black metal or ‘grey’ metal as I like to call it. The cover […]

Obsequiae, a duo black and bold Crafting melodies from cent’ries of old The mists of time unfurl and flicker past And echoed rasps begin their – Eh, enough of that. Writing a review in iambic pentameter is damn near impossible. These guys do a much better job with the medieval slant on their craft. Minneapolis’ […]

FoR have always been a well honed and eclectic American black metal band, but as they have progressed, their art has taken on an even more impressive and beautiful atmosphere as their songs developed and writing style grown to carry the listener deep into the woods with classical and folk elements. The bands first full-length […]

Metal is full of bands that cull from culture, history and heritage. From the obvious pagan Viking bands of Scandinavia and Eastern Europe to the Saxon throes of Wodensthrone and Forefather, the Middle Eastern themes of Nile and Orphaned Land, Greek metallers Rotting Christ and even Aztec based metal like Mictlantecuhtli. But if ever there […]

And so the fittingly titled last album from Chet Scott (aided by Daniel Ellis Harrod and James Woodhead), closes the chapter on what has been one of the more interesting and introspective metal projects of the last few years with a deeply personal and almost completely ambient album. Where as Scott’s last two albums, the debut […]

Fans of depressive, atmospheric black metal have a lot to be happy about in 2009. So far we’ve seen fantastic releases from all the greats – Blut Aus Nord, Drudkh, Wolves in the Throne Room, as well as shoegaze/black metal newcomers like Fen, Altar of Plagues and Svarti Loghin. And now here comes this stunning […]

I really, really wanted to like this; an experimental black metal duo from New Hampshire, from a cult label with a history of solid releases? Cobalt anyone? Even more so after reading lots of positive press including our own Scott Alisoglu and a Nathan T. Birk interview of the band in Metal Maniacs that gushed […]

Chet Scott’s 2006 self titled debut was an excellent doomy, ambient, almost stoner take on depressive Pacific Northwest, one man black metal, giving the scene an injection of creativity that strayed from typical depressive Wrest and Malefic worship. And the follow up, while taking the same elements, delivers an even more tribal, ritualistic, organic and […]

While the Pacific Northwest has become renowned for its many one man, suicidal black metal projects, the scene is quickly becoming little more than Xasthur/Leviathan cloning with little or no deviation from the template laid down by Wrest and Malefic and I’ve been waiting for a person/band to add a little something different to the […]