Back in 2000, I was pretty disappointed to hear that Morten Veland was leaving Tristania after their brilliant second album, Beyond the Veil – an album I still consider to be one of the triumphs of the entire goth-metal genre. (I was, however, lucky enough to see the band in one of their few US […]

Ulver‘s made some great ambient and electronic albums since their big genre switch, but don’t you wish they’d also turned out another Bergtatt or Kveldssanger before leaving metal behind for good? (Or at least took a bass with them when they recorded Nattens Madrigal in that forest?) Well, now you can take a hike into those same misty, […]

Documentary by Aaron Aites and Audrey Ewell This 2009 feature documentary covers the lurid beginnings of the Norwegian black metal scene in the early 90s: the murders, the church burnings, and the media panic that accompanied them. Many of us are familiar with these stories, but this is the first time I’ve heard these accounts […]

If you’ve come here looking for sparkly emo vampires, then we have a review for you. The rest of you should already know that this is the second release from US black metal supergroup Twilight, and like the album title suggests, it is truly monumental. The first Twilight release in 2005 featured an amazing line-up […]

Lots of good Belgian stuff coming my way these days. Had some good Belgian chocolate the other day. Just found out that a restaurant that specializes in excellent Belgian brews and sour Flemish ales – not to mention the requisite mussels and fries – is opening about ten minutes from my house. And now here […]

Swedish progressive hardcore act Burst released two of my favorite albums of the decade, 2006’s Origo and 2008’s Lazarus Bird – both a mesmerizing smash-up of jagged, breathless hardcore and dreamy, ethereal post-rock. However, they broke up last summer, which I only recently found out. Huge bummer. Lucky me then, that Italy’s At the Soundawn […]

Give it up to German-based act Dioramic for breaking the trend of naming their post-hardcore/mathcore band with a three-or-four word phrase. Although I’m not entirely sure how the arty name they’ve chosen fits their sound ― perhaps a reference to the shifting perspective and composition you get from viewing a diorama from multiple angles? In […]

This Finnish band should have called themselves ‘Children of Ronin’. They blend symphonic power metal with death vocals and – here’s something new – classical Japanese music. It’s like Children of Bodom meets The Last Samurai, and their debut release, Thousand Swords, is one of the most fresh and exciting albums I’ve heard in awhile. […]

As a chronicler of the vast metal underworld, it is my charge – my burden – to delve deep into sonic realms which are shunned by most mortal ears. Over years of study, I have built up the fortitude, the facility – and, more and more, a growing fascination – with which to endure these […]

France’s Hypno5e recently stunned experimental metal fans with Des Deux l’une Est l’Autre, a shimmering, pulverizing, kaleidoscopic odyssey of BTBAM-styled insanity. Even with all the dynamics and sprawl packed into the album though, it seems they still have more to say – or at least, they wanted to say it in a different, softer voice. […]

With only 100 copies pressed, I never would have heard about Midnight Odyssey had it not been for TOTD-forum member timshel, who has a bloodhound’s knack for sniffing out obscure, arty avant-garde black metal gems. In this case, it’s a one-man ambient black metal project from Brisbane, Australia that blends the mysterious wanderings and tortured […]

These days, if you want to find out about a band – or a whole label’s roster – there are plenty of options. Websites, Myspace, streaming e-cards, YouTube, you name it. The days of picking up a compilation are pretty much over. So it was a pleasant surprise to receive Better Undead than Alive 2, […]

This is why I love this gig. Every month or so, I get a package of random CD promos. Sometimes I know of the bands or the label, but more often than not, it’s yet more mystery discs from the vast reaches of the metal underground. And once in awhile, you wind up with a […]

Sweden’s In Mourning made a grand entrance into the melodic death/doom arena with their 2008 debut Shrouded Divine. Their even blend of earthy, rumbling doom and agile progressive death drew a lot of comparisons to Finnish heavyweights like Rapture, Swallow the Sun and Insomnium, but they most resembled a more straightforward, less adventurous version of […]

Italy’s Absentia Lunae bills itself as warlike, hateful avant-garde black metal – yeah, that’s a mouthful, but it’s also pretty accurate. Warlike, definitely – especially with Belphegor’s Blastphemer turning in a blistering and surprisingly technical drum performance. Hateful? Absolutely. Vocalist Ildanach rants, sneers and screams as if he’s gripping and slamming the sides of a […]

Talk about black sheep. While the rest of their countrymates are content to make a clattery, blastbeating black metal racket, this Bergen, Norway-based act crunch out a mix of groovy doom and gravelly 90s Swedish death. Call it Entombed in ice. Although A Dark Burial is only Syrach’s third full-length in thirteen years (there was […]

When I checked out Urna’s 2006 release Sepulcrum, I was struck at how similar it sounded to Arcana Coelestia’s Ubi Secreta Colunt. Both featured a fusion of funeral doom and black ambient, of cosmic light bleeding through waves of crushing darkness. A quick trip to the Metal Archives cleared up my hunch – they’re both […]

Arcana Coelestia’s last release, Ubi Secreta Colunt, was one of my favorite discoveries of 2007 – the kind of gem that makes a few hours of web-surfing and shot-in-the-dark downloads worth all the effort. Essentially one long composition, its four tracks delivered an all-consuming experience that blended crushing funeral doom with astral post-rock grace. I […]

This new Finnish supergroup boasts members of Swallow the Sun, Amorphis, Moonsorrow, Kreator and October Falls. Given that line-up, you know Barren Earth is going to be awash in the lush, soaring melodies and crushing doom-death tones that make Finnish metal so recognizable. That’s convincing enough for me, but the addition of progressive-death structures and […]

With a name like Semen Datura, you’d expect something filthy, depraved and unpleasantly psychedelic. So I was surprised when opener “Fons et Origo” kicked off with the shimmering, punchy tones of Isis or Burst (and no, it had nothing to do with the mention of Origo – I didn’t have the songtitles in front of […]

After two excellent splits, UK-based pagan black metal outfit Wodensthrone has delivered one of the most impressive debut albums I’ve heard in years. Grand, savage, epic and beautiful, Loss has not only found itself high on my year-end list, but it’s also quickly become one of my favorite albums in the genre. Much of this has to do with the sweeping songcraft, but it’s the evocative, atmospheric nature of the music that really transports the listener. No surprise, given that these guys take their history, their heritage and their philosophy quite seriously. Read on and you might even learn a few things…

Just as you’re recovering from last year’s Teitanblood assault, here comes The Beast of the Apocalypse to scratch the scabs from your ears and let the blood trickle out anew. A Voice from the Four Horns of the Golden Altar proves once again that you don’t need to use reedy, tremolo guitars and thin production […]

An interesting fact about trolls: besides lurking under bridges, in forests and on message boards, they’re also able to change their form at will – usually to trick the humans they like to torment. I mention this only because Troll, the Norwegian black metal band started by Nagash (Covenant/The Kovenant, ex-Dimmu Borgir) in 1992, has […]

Ihsahn’s work has always been forward-thinking and progressive, but its roots have also been easily traceable to that of earlier masters. From the Wagnerian fury of Anthems-era Emperor to the baroque intricacies of Prometheus, The Adversary and angL, it’s obvious that Ihsahn has studied and absorbed classical music and theory in a way that few […]

Sometimes an evocative band name and a striking piece of cover art is all you need to guess at the music within. No, I’m not talking about your average goregrind album either – anyone can figure that sort of thing out. I’m talking about the more esoteric treasures out there, such as this peculiar release […]