I love surprises, mainly good ones. And ones involving symphonic black metal bands I’ve never heard of before, who turn out to fucking brilliant, are even better. Opus Irae hails from Germany, and Into The Endless Night is their debut album. It was mixed and mastered by Dan Swano, who needs no introduction, and the artwork is […]

Back in 2020, along with fellow revered 90s Black Metal acts Naglfar and ..And Oceans, Sweden’s Mörk Gryning returned after a long hiatus to deliver Hinsides vrede, and it was, like their peers, a killer return to the fray. delivering a perfect 90s throwback to…. themselves? and of course, the other two bands mentioned above. […]

Man, back in the late 90s and early 00s Germany’s Folk/Celtic-themed melo-death act Suidakra was one my absolute favorite bands. Early albums Auld Lang Syne and Lays From Afar were my jam. And even with some ups (Caledonia, Book of Dowth, The Arcanum) and downs (Command to Charge, Realms of Odoric, Cimbric Yarns), some of […]

The last time I ran across German black metal act Chaos Invocation, I wasn’t particularly kind to them. I reviewed their 2009 Debut, In Bloodline with the Snake, and hailed it ‘predictable, generic’ and with an utterly forgettable first half. Oof. What a dick. So why did I grab the promo for the band’s 5th […]

Sweden’s Wretched Fate has released 2 fine albums of Swedish-styled death metal, with their debut Fleshletting, back in 2019, and their 2023 follow-up, Carnal Heresy. Both put them near the top of the conversation as one of the bright newcomers in the genre. To remind us they are still a major player in the genre, […]

So Canada’s Trollwar is a new act to me, but they recently got on my radar, when I discovered that Matt Sippola from fellow epic Canadians, Atavistia provided some orchestration/choirs and clean vocals for Trollwar’s latest EP. Based on the band’s discography (2 full lengths and an array of EPs/Singles, which I immediately purchased after […]

We all know Jonny Pettersson (or Rogga Johanssen 2.0, as I like to call him) from his current and former work in multiple bands, including the now-defunct Henry Kane, Wombbath, Rotpit, Heads for the Dead, Gods Forsaken, Massacre, and others. While he is more known for Swedish-styled death metal projects, he has branched out (as heard on the […]

Nowadays, deathcore for me is like porn; what used to turn me on doesn’t work anymore. Whereas good old-fashioned, man-on-woman and a BJ or belly finish scene did the trick, now, I need a 40-person gang bang, a goat, goggles, Disney cosplay, and a hairdryer to even get remotely hard. And as for deathcore, a […]

While Jeremy Wagner was on hiatus from Broken Hope back in 2002 (before they got back together), he, along with Broken Hope drummer Mike Miczek, started Earthburner, named after a Broken Hope song from Grotesque Blessings, to pass the time. However, Broken Hope reformed and released some more albums, but Earthburner was always sort of lurking […]

I rather enjoyed the 2022 debut album, Depravity from these Belgian lads as it meshed At The Gates and The Black Dahlia Murder-styled razor-sharp melo-death, and threw in some orchestration/keyboards here and there, which as regular readers know, gives me a major boner. So here is a 6 song EP to follow up Depravity, and […]

Symphony Of Heaven is a Christian melodic black/death metal band from Indiana, that used to be on Rottweiler Records. But with their 3rd album has forged out alone like… that one guy…. that went … out to the wilderness? In the bible maybe? I’m trying here, that theology isn’t really my jam. What IS my […]

A Finnish supergroup of sorts (former and ex-members of …And Oceans, Black Beast, Rapture, Scorgrain), The Mist From the Mountains released a superb debut back in 2022, that made my year-end list with its excellent take on the classic, folky second wave black metal sound, culling heavily from the likes of Borknagar, the first Ulver […]

The cover art on Obsidian Mantra‘s 3rd album, As We All Will, may not scream “DEATH METAL!!!!”, instead having more of an Opeth-ian progressive metal vibe. However fair reader, as the old saying goes, ‘never judge a book by its cover’. As We All Will is VERY much a death metal album. A death metal […]

Italy’s Dwarven-themed Power metal stalwarts, Wind Rose is back with album number 7, following up 2022’s excellent Warfront, which in my opinion was the best thing they have released. I’ve been a fan of the band since 2017s Stonehymn, where they really locked into the whole Dwarven metal persona, costumes, and themes.  Since then, they […]

I’ve been waiting for this one for a while. A while back one of the other esteemed staff here, Steve K, tagged me on a video for the song “Deconstruction” and I was hooked, purchasing/ downloading the band’s various songs and EPs. So, who is The Weeping Gate? Well, they hail from Little Rock, Arkansas. They […]

Japan’s envy has been at it for 32 years now,  and have over 20 releases (albums, splits, EPs/etc) to their credit. Their last album, The Fallen Crimson made my year-end list in 2020 in part to some utterly gorgeous female vocals enhancing the already mesmerizing, soaring post-rock/metal. Now, four years later, we get Eunoia (a […]

Vafurlogi is an old/new Icelandic black metal band fronted by Þórir Garðarsson notably of Svartidauði and Sinmara. The project has percolated for over 20 years, with some of the songs being written over that period, songs that didn’t belong in Svartidauði’s more chaotic discography, as Vafurlogi is far more rooted in classic, early late 90s […]

I’m a big WWI buff. I’ve even been to Ypres trenches, Sanctuary Wood and laid a wreath at the Menin gate in Belgium.  And in my review of the most recent God Dethroned album, The Judas Paradox, I lamented the fact that God Dethroned was no longer focused on WWI, a subject I of course […]

I’m not familiar with Germany’s Servant, having not heard the band’s prior two albums. Still, I’m always down for some ‘melodic-yet-furious black metal’ (per the promotional email). Especially as I dig a lot of the music that AOP Records puts out, especially the likes of Firtan, Waldgeflüster, Groza, Finsterforst, and Harakiri for the Sky. So I […]

We don’t do interviews very much any more here. I mean how many times do you need to hear some megastar like Karl Sanders or Corpsegrinder say “yeah this album is better than the last one” or “this album was a very ‘personal’ one’?

That said , if I ever get the chance to promote one of the ‘small guys’ or even better a ‘local’ small guy, whose music I really enjoy, I often try and do it, especially if it means meeting the said band in person.

One such example of both is Vile Revelation, hailing from Columbia , Missouri.

Though I reviewed the debut, Voidgazer, from this discordant death metal Texas duo back in 2021, I missed the follow-up, in 2022, Demiurge. What I do remember about the debut though was, while the churning Incantation-y murk was good stuff, the duo was really at their best when delivering more lumbering, grooving controlled riffs. And […]

For a while there in the early/00s, Nails was one of the flagship bands of what I call the “Southern Lord” sound. Bands like Nails, Trap Them, All Pigs Must Die, Black Breath, Dead In the Dirt, playing a filthy form of Swedish Death metal-hued d-beat, crust, grindcore/hardcore. And I’m confident in saying popular new bands […]

God Dethroned is back with album number 12, and at this point, it’s difficult to keep rewriting the same review as Henri Satler and whoever is in his band (yet another different drummer here) are so god damn consistent at this point in their career it’s silly. After a trio of albums about WWI, Satler […]

I’ve been on a huge Lord of the Rings/ Tolkien kick recently and have been seeking out some music to satiate my need, enter Swedish duo Morcaint. Mornië Utúlië is the follow-up to last year’s Ellesar EP, and the duo of Ulvtyr and main composer Heruhim certainly know their way around Tolkein-themed atmospheric and melancholic […]

August 23rd 20024 saw both Fleshgod Apocalypse and Nile release new albums. That’s the music equivalent if Deadpool  & Wolverine and Alien Romulus had been released on the same day. I love both but one has to be listened to and reviewed first,  and be seen first. Well, hopefully, you already read my review of […]