Sonny's Forum Replies

Thanks for the reply Andi. It kind of confirms what I suspected which is that, like so much in the modern world, it has become nothing more than a convenient label, or a corporate logo. This allows for easy digestion and assimilation which then removes any need for crirical appraisal of the art form. How very apt that you mention Marvel movies as a comparison, the ultimate corporate hijacking of popular culture.

It's interesting that you quote Cradle of Filth as an example of genuine extreme metal because for me, they are anything but. Yes, they were influenced by extreme metal, but they are a band who are more about image and wear the tag like a T-shirt. Compared to a band like, say, Khanate, they are about as extreme as Britney Spears! This version is the "ripped jeans" of metal. ( Ripped jeans are one of my major bugbears. We used  to wear ripped jeans back in the day because we couldn't afford new ones - see also "patched denim". Now fools buy ready-ripped jeans for sometimes hundreds of pounds, without any awareness of the irony.)

With the introduction of melodic variants of previously extreme genres like black and death metal, can we still claim these genres to be extreme merely by definition? Personally, I don't think so.

Submissions for February:

Sadistik Exekution - "Cautness Darling Blood" (4:04) from "The Magus" (1991)
Coroner - "Reborn Through Hate" (4:52) from "R.I.P." (1987)
Slayer - "Kill Again" (4:56) from "Hell Awaits" (1985)
Exodus - "The Beatings Will Continue (Until Morale Improves)" (3:01) from Persona non grata (2021)
Aggressive Perfector - "Vengeful One" (4:15) from "Havoc at the Midnight Hour" (2019)
Iced Earth - "Pure Evil" (6:33) from "Night of the Stormrider" (1991) - I know this may be a controversial choice, but I think it's thrashy enough to merit inclusion, but if you don't Vinny, then it's fine if you don't feel able to include it.

Runtime: 27:41

Featuring drummer Dobber Beverly and guitarist Beau Beasley of grindcore act Insect Warfare and progressive metallers Oceans of Slumber, along with the latter's Mat V. Aleman, Malignant Altar prove that they are extremely capable musicians and songwriters who are able to master a variety of metal genres. Under the Malignant Altar guise they tackle the long-established genre of doomy old-school death metal that first reared it's foetid, ugly head around the turn of the nineties.

I've got to say this is right up my street, the filthy, old-school sound is exactly the right stench of death metal that I enjoy most of all. Whilst it is better produced than the old classics and sounds clearer and cleaner as a consequence, that doesn't detract much at all from the fact that these guys seem to know exactly what they are about in reproducing that cavernous 1990's sound. There is not much room for variety or innovation within this style of death metal, it's rules being set in stone at least a couple of decades ago now, so new bands like Malignant Altar are judged on how well their releases stand up to aforementioned classics from bands like Autopsy, Asphyx and Cianide. Realms of Exquisite Morbidity stands up very well indeed and rivals one of my modern OSDM favourites, Coffins' Buried Death, for sheer festering, evil-sounding, filthy, modern death metal, it's chugging riffs and crawling, menacing, doom-ridden sections exactly hitting my death metal bullseye. This predictability in OSDM can lead to the tracks starting to merge together into a bit of a blurry miasma, but Malignant Altar fully realise this and so keep the album to a concise 33 minutes, which is a bonus point in their favour.

Nice choice for a feature Ben, cheers for bringing it to my attention. 4/5

Punky black metal from the debut EP from US anti-fascists, Melissa.

Superb promo track from French, female-fronted, stoner doom outfit Deathbell that bodes really well for the full album due out 25th February.

I've been assumed to be a bot by RYM a number of times while putting together playlists in the past which I found really annoying. Lately I've been thinking that I'd rather not use a competitors site for the task anyway & are planning on trialing the prioritized use of our Latest Reviews page (filtered by the clan in question) & the Track Of The Day threads in each clan forum so as to guide my track selection in a way that most accurately highlights the listening habits of the site. I can easily see the dates of each rating on the Latest Reviews page which makes it easy to pick the ones that you've all been listening to within the month in question.

How would you pick up stuff that we have been re-listening to that we have rated previously, possibly even years before, Daniel?

Can I just give a mention to Be'lakor's Coherence.

For me, in addition to the Panopticon and Mare Cognitum albums, I would like to mention:

Kanonenfieber - Menschenmühle

Les Chants de Nihil - Le tyran et l'esthète

Paysage d'Hiver - Geister

Archgoat - Worship the Eternal Darkness

As Xephyr rightly says, it was another great year for black and blackened metal.

It was down for a few hours one day last week for maintenance but other than that as far as I'm aware it's OK. I've never had the issue, but apparently it is notorious for not responding or kicking you out if you are flicking from page to page too quickly as it thinks you are a bot. Maybe that is part of the issue Andi?

We're having our two bedroom apartment internally repainted on Thursday, Friday & Saturday. We'll be packing the kids into the car & heading south of Sydney for a few days while it's done. My wife is currently forcing me to make a decision between ten different shades of white. One of us is taking this decision far too seriously while the other couldn't give a flying fuck which shade we go for & is getting very annoyed with having to be involved. I'll let you guess which one I am.

We recently had a new kitchen fitted and I am having the same issue with shades of green. The In fact, I didn't even realise that there was that many shades of green! I'm completely with you on this one - it's really difficult to appear to be interested in the search for a perfect colour match when in reality you couldn't care less.

Hi Ben, do you think it would be at all possible to have a "wishlist" or "to check out" button or some such? At the moment if there are releases I want to check out but can't listen to right away, I have to go back to RYM and note them there. If there was a checkbox or button on the release page you could then filter on the releases page by "on wishlist" or similar and Ta-da! there they would be. It's just a suggestion, it's not important, but it would be nice.

Fear Factory - Aggression Continuum (2021)

In truth, I've not listened to a new Fear Factory album since 2001's Digimortal and of those that I have listened to, Demanufacture is the only one I ever return to much, so I am pretty unfamiliar with where the band headed thematically and musically during most of the 21st century. I understand that Burton C. Bell has now left the band, although he had recorded his vocal parts for Aggression Continuum before heading out the door. Shame, as Bell has a distinctive voice and his vocals are one of the most striking parts of FF's arsenal.

Well, it seems like I haven't missed a huge amount in the last two decades as Aggression Continuum does not sound strikingly dissimilar to the band's earlier albums such as the aforementioned Demanufacture and Digimortal. I guess they may just be trying to recreate their glory days but, in truth, this is Demanufacture-lite and after the passage of so many years we would be unrealistic expecting them to still spit out the same venom and aggression as on their earlier material. If even bands like Slayer struggle to pull it off, we can't expect FF to be able to either. Probably most disappointing is that it still sounds SO much like the earlier material that it doesn't feel like they've actually developed that much musically. I don't know what I was expecting, maybe something a little more progressive sounding or atmospheric, but this very much follows a formula established long ago, pitching itself somewhere between industrial and groove metal and if anything it now feels more entrenched in the groove metal camp, which would never especially endear itself to me personally.

There is also an instrumental version of the album available. Not sure that there's enough going on here to merit it, but if you want it, it's there.

Are Fear Factory making a bid to write the theme song for the next Bond movie with Recode from latest album Aggression Continuum. I swear it sounds like Chris Cornell's You Know My Name in places.

What is the actual cut-off date when the winners will be decided, Daniel? I ask so that I can make sure to get a few listens in for more of the albums and give them a reasonably informed rating.

I kept my list private for a few weeks, Vinny, then made it public with no issues. I too see duplicate entries on your list. Have you tried remaking it anew and seeing if the same happens again?

I did the same for my Fallen list and I have had no issues using Firefox Vinny.

I've previously posted my top 50 Fallen releases of the year list, so anything near the top of that would be a recommendation from me.

https://metal.academy/lists/single/150

Again, I apologise if you think I'm being difficult.

Sonny, the release of the year will simply be decided on the highest scoring release using our Site Ratings & whatever minimum rating cut-off seems to make sense. The shortlists I'm providing are not intended to tell everyone the only releases that are in contention. That's not the case at all. Metal Academy obviously only has a small number of regular contributors at this stage so the shortlists are intended to draw people's attention to the releases that are getting the most attention on social media & other metal-related websites. The Dvne release has been included in the shortlist because (despite the fact that it only has one rating on this site) it has been popular on other metal mediums e.g. it's been making a number of well-informed people's AOTY lists on Twitter where I spend a fair amount of time & has scored highly with a large number of ratings on competitor's sites.  The long & short of it is that I'm looking to minimize the chances of important releases slipping under the radar of our small group if at all possible. I'm not saying that these five releases are the only potential winners.

Ah, OK. It just seems like favouring the same releases that other sites have been championing just because they are championing them. With four of the five releases on the shortlist being sludge-related it also feels like we are pushing for that genre to be the ROTY because it's the genre of choice elsewhere. Don't get me wrong, the three I've heard are all great albums, but shouldn't the shortlist be a bit more varied? Perhaps one release per relevant genre?

Sorry, I don't wish to seem argumentative but it seems to be unfairly weighting certain releases because people who are not members of Metal Academy like them.

Hi everyone.

With only one month to go until we announce our release of 2021 for each clan (which will once again be based on our site ratings), Ben & I thought it'd be worth highlighting five key releases contending for each title in order to give everyone the chance to investigate some (or all) of them this month if you wish to. These were some of the more highly regarded releases in the doom, sludge, stoner, gothic, drone & Southern metal space last year:

Converge & Chelsea Wolfe - "Bloodmoon: I"  {US gothic post-sludge collaboration}

Worm - "Foreverglade"  {US doom/death}

Cult of Luna - "The Raging River" E.P.  {Swedish post-sludge}

Dvne - "Etemen Ænka"  {Scottish progressive sludge metal}

Amenra - "De doorn"  {Belgian post-sludge}

Dvne is currently sitting with 3.5 from one vote while Wolvennest is at 4.2 site rating with 3 votes, Hooded Menace is on 4.0 with 4 votes so I don't see how Dvne is a highly regarded release and those aren't. What is the criteria for the release of the year as I'm a little fuzzy on the deal?

My submissions for February are:

Dauþuz - Der Bergschmied IV: Zauberwerk (5:52) from "Vom Schwarzen Schmied" (2021)

Mystras - "The Fall of the Kingdom of Jerusalem" (14:26) from "Empires Vanquished and Dismantled" (2021)

Sorry Ben, it's a few seconds over 20 minutes but I'm sure no one will notice.

January 2022

1. Trouble - "The Skull" (from "The Skull", 1985) [submitted by Daniel]
2. Novembers Doom - "The Pale Haunt Departure" (from "The Pale Haunt Departure", 2005) [submitted by Ben]
3. Lake of Tears - "Ominous One" (from "Ominous", 2021)
4. Slomatics - "Futurian" (from "Estron", 2014) [submitted by Sonny]
5. OM - "Unitive Knowledge of the Godhead" (from "Pilgrimage", 2007)
6. Erdve - "Smala" (from "Savigaila", 2021) [submitted by Sonny]
7. Divide and Dissolve - "Oblique" (from "Gas Lit", 2021) [submitted by Sonny]
8. Katatonia - "Without God" (from "Dance of December Souls", 1993) [submitted by Daniel]
9. Memento Mori - "The Monolith" (from "Rhymes of Lunacy", 1993)
10. Bongzilla - "Sundae Driver" (from "Weedsconsin", 2021)
11. Portrayal of Guilt - "Possession" (from "CHRISTFUCKER", 2021)
12. Gorge - "Nokomis" (from "Land Bridge" 2019)
13. Spaceslug - "Osiris" (from "Time Travel Dilemma", 2017)
14. Messa - "Da Tariki Tariqat" (from "Feast for Water", 2018) [submitted by Daniel]
15. Swallow the Sun - "This House Has No Home" (from "Moonflowers", 2021) [submitted by Ben]
16. Ilsa - "Nasty, Brutish" (from "Corpse Fortress", 2018) [submitted by Sonny]
17. Shape of Despair - "Reflection in Slow Time" (single, 2021) [submitted by Ben]
18. ISIS - "Celestial (The Tower)" (from Celestial , 2000) [submitted by Daniel]
19. Tyiptykon - "Aurorae" (from "Melana Chasmata", 2014) [submitted by Ben]
20. Spiritus Mortis - "The God Behind the God" (from "The God Behind the God", 2009) [submitted by Sonny]

A 1990 re-release of a 1984 EP by Nemesis:

Nemesis would eventually evolve into the band that would become Candlemass, featuring Leif Edling as well as original Candlemass drummer Mats Ekström and guitarist Christian Weberyd. Four of the five tracks, all except closer Goodbye which is an Angel Witch cover, were written by Edling and he handles vocals as well as his usual duties on bass. I think it's safe to say that this ep shows why Leif didn't perform vocals for Candlemass, his range being far too limited to handle the epic nature of Candlemass' songs and in truth he struggles even here. While this is as much heavy metal as traditional doom, there is certainly enough on show to see where Edling was going with his songwriting and is a recognisable early step on his road to almost single-handedly establishing the epic doom genre. There are some terrific Sabbathian riffs, check out the one on opener Black Messiah - it's a real killer and the whole track is amazing, eventually being reworked as Incarnation of Evil on the 1988's Ancient Dreams album with Messiah on vocals. I would really liked to have heard Messiah have a crack at the vocals on this rawer, less well-produced version though, because even with Edling struggling it's still a brilliant song and sounds a bit more immediate than the Incarnation of Evil version.
In God We Trust finds Edling in speed metal mode with a track that could have been penned by Venom, except for the doomy middle section maybe. Theme of the Guardians has simple, but effective main riff that sounds like a staple of the then nascent trad doom genre and one that has been reworked and reinvented a hundred times since. The King Is Dead is arguably the most noticably a Leif Edling-written track, probably sounding the most like Candlemass with a great riff and sterling leadwork throughout from both Weberyd and Anders Wallin (who's contribution here seems to be the sum total of his recorded output). The Angel Witch cover is interesting I think in that it illustrates how Edling's songwriting was influenced by Kevin Heybourne.
In conclusion I found this to be an interesting release, particularly with it's importance in the early history of one of doom metal's most influential figures and even despite it's shortcomings, ie the poor production and weak vocals, it still contains some great tracks and should interest any adherent of early doom metal. As a footnote the 1990 release features a couple of 1984 Candlemass demos, Black Stone Wielder and Demon's Gate which show how quickly Edling and Candlemass were developing from the Nemesis tracks.

For me, The Infinite provided the most pleasant of surprises with a couple of absolute belters in Ne Obliviscaris' Portal of I and Altesia's Paragon Circus. The Lucid Planet album was another very good release that I enjoyed immensely.

The North's releases I was much more familiar with generally, but both Nehëmah's Requiem Tenebrae and Cultes des Ghoules' Henbane were superb and both new to me.

In The Pit, Grip Inc's Nemesis was the one that caught my attention of those I was unfamiliar with.

Helmet and Alice in Chains provided great enjoyment from The Gateway and I even discovered a Revolution album that I didn't hate - Trivium's In Waves.

So all in all it was quite a profitable year as far as interesting fresh stuff from the features was concerned.

I believe that was one of the "enhanced interrogation" techniques employed at Guantanamo Bay up until it's abolition by the Geneva Convention!

I listened to five of the playlists this month thanks to a free trial Spotify Premium account and being able to listen to them offline. Here's my thoughts:

The Fallen: as I put this together myself I'll not comment but Ben and Daniel's suggestions were great, especially the Ophis track which led me to my AOTY.

The Pit: High quality generally, but I stil struggle with the groove elements. 4/5

The North: Some great stuff here and three or four that didn't quite do it forme, but strong overall 4/5

The Horde: A mixed bag for me, unsurprisingly. Loved some, hated one. 3.5/5

The Guardians: Sorry, just too much power metal for my taste. Felt like I'd eaten a whole xmas cake by myself in one go! 2/5

A mixed bag for me as I would expect not being a member of The Horde. I really loved the Be’lakor track and wil be checking these guys out further. The Coffinrot and Suffering Hour tracks were also great. Always good to hear Morbid Angel and Asphyx but I still can't get too excited about Cannibal Corpse.

Are all Phyllomedusa's 260+ albums as bad as this track. That's a fucking huge pile of shit if that is the case!

I completely agree Daniel as far as latter day notoriety and sales go that Venom would have the edge. I was considering it more from the perspective of the time of the movement itself. 

To be honest, I'm not, and never have been, convinced that the NWOBHM should even be considered a genre. It was a localised scene / movement with a slew of bands that were influential on later acts but could be quite diverse musically. Maiden, Praying Mantis, Demon, Girlschool, Tank and Venom are all very different musically yet fall under the same banner. It is a complete misnomer too as few of the acts actually played heavy metal at all as you rightly pointed out 

Maybe as the premier metal website Metal Academy should drop NWOBHM as a genre.

What do you reckon?

Saxon for definite.

Then I would go for Diamond Head.

It's then a toss up for me between Angel Witch and Venom. Just because I have such fond memories of them I would go for Angel Witch and save Venom for speed metal. Venom were not actually much loved by the NWOBHM community and had the piss taken out of them quite a bit, being little more than a peripheral member of the NWOBHM and more of a regional phenomena in the North East, despite what media revisionists might tell you now. They were a little too extreme for 80/81 I suspect.

Anyway, I'm all for disbarring Def Leppard - I really dislike those motherfuckers.

If you want to use metrics such as record sales and recognition of an act outside of metal circles, then for NWOBHM you must consider Def Leppard (much as I dislike the band). They may not in hindsight have much to do with metal but, for better or worse,  they were very much part of the NWOBHM scene.

I've just checked Wikipaedia and their estimated record sales are 100 million - more than Genesis and David Bowie!

Wow, you guys put a lot of thought into reviewing to actually be able to have a "style". I tend to just try to put my thoughts down as coherently as I can with varying degrees of success. I don't try to overanalyse albums as I think people need to make up their own minds, but rather just try to give a flavour of the release so that maybe people can judge if it might be something they would enjoy or not. As I've said before, I have zero musical talent and know nothing of musical theory, but I do know how music makes me feel and I figure if I can communicate that to others then it may help them discover something new (and maybe entertain a little at the same time).

Also, with the site being relatively new, we still have a majority of releases with no reviews, so I figure it's better to say something about a release, even if it's only a paragraph or two, rather than nothing. Maybe this approach sometimes makes me sound like an asshole who hasn't got a clue what he's talking about, but frankly I don't care. Hopefully, at least my passion for the subject comes across if nothing else! Either way, it's what I do and will continue to for as long as the music moves me.

So, Dad passed away in hospital this afternoon. We all did manage to get to see him on Tuesday evening when it was obvious he had taken a turn for the worse, so that was a blessing. To be honest it's kind of a relief because he was in a lot of distress and was being fed a lot of medication towards the end.

And so life takes another turn...

A quick question, excuse my ignorance. Who or what is Loudwire and should I care?

If you only want to list the most popular four artists in any genre then surely there is no discussion - facts is facts and all you need are sales figures.

I think I am in a very small minority of people whose favourite Burzum album is the debut (especially the version that includes the Aske EP). I know that the three subsequent albums are actually more accomplished affairs and I certainly can't argue with people who like them better (except maybe Filosofem - that endless ambient track does my head in, to be honest) but I just really love the raw and rabid delivery of the debut.

Interesting. I regard "Filosofem" as the pinnacle of black metal & place it only behind "Reign In Blood" for metal overall.

Interesting that an album that is only just over 60% black metal is so highly considered by black metal fans. Sure, the black metal is really good but I just can't ignore that massive ambient snoozefest. In fact, on a more general point, I really don't get the huge amount of ambient stuff that you find on a lot of black metal albums, an awful lot of it is just fucking dull and sounds like those new age CDs sold in garden centres. There, I said it! Someone had to!

I think I am in a very small minority of people whose favourite Burzum album is the debut (especially the version that includes the Aske EP). I know that the three subsequent albums are actually more accomplished affairs and I certainly can't argue with people who like them better (except maybe Filosofem - that endless ambient track does my head in, to be honest) but I just really love the raw and rabid delivery of the debut.

I also prefer Battles in the North to virtually everything else Immortal did except Damned in Black. Is it true that they sped the recording up artificially though? I've never heard that before.

This month I went for The Guardians for a playlist outside of my three clans and I'm not going to lie, this one was a real struggle for me. My distaste for power metal didn't serve me at all well here and the first 45 minutes were painful. In fact the only tracks I really enjoyed were Rime of the Ancient Mariner (obviously) and the Shadowland track. There was another two or three that were OK - Accept, Metal Church and Kryptos.

I think I may reconsider going for The Guardians for my fourth clan as I don't think I'll fit in at all well.

I've been a big fan of Forndom for some time and bought the CD of Dauðra Dura back in 2016. I love the ritualistic ambient style, it's weirdly relaxing as well as being a little dark. One of my favourite dark / ritual ambient albums and I actually prefer this to the nordic folk of Wardruna or Heilung even though they are both excellent.

Swords and axes - the proper wall adornments for any real workplace! I have now managed to get myself ensconced in a shitty little office on my own at work, although I still spend half my time on the shop floor. This allows me to listen to my own music on headphones rather than have to suffer listening to fucking daytime radio all day as headphones aren't allowed on the shop floor - forklifts and all that, don't you know. Looking back to last year's posts I too vowed to listen to less new music and mostly failed, although I have gone from just over 240 new albums in 2020 to just over 140 in 2021. I wouldn't like to stop listening to new music anyway - there were so many great albums released in 2021 - Kanonenfieber, 1914, Ophis, Les Chants de Nihil, Nekromantheon, Skepticism, Body Void, Steel Bearing Hand, Yith, Flight of Sleipnir and many more that I have really enjoyed. Plus, with most of us now running monthly playlists, we gotta keep ahead of the game haven't we? It's just a matter of balance I suppose as there is quite a lot of older stuff I would like to revisit.

Pretty solid playlist this month. Some nice discoveries - I really dug the Scarecrow track, Korzus, High Command and Mortal Vision were great too. Obviously it's always good to hear the classics: Demolition Hammer, Xentrix, Messiah, Slayer and Mutilator are always welcome. I obviously didn't like the Prong track as much as the rest of you guys and the one-two of Carnivore and Bezerker tested my patience a little. Plenty to enjoy though and a great way to spend a couple of hours - nice one Vinny!

The way England are playing, it shouldn't be too much of a stretch for you Aussies to take the series.

Oh, in that case, the guitar playing is awesome too. Pity they went downhill after this though *ahem*.

I know it very well Sonny. In fact, I used to hang out in the same circles as Sadistik Exekution back in the day & knew them all personally. Bassist & band leader Dave Slave was actually my ex-girlfriend’s best friend & came round to my house for lunch every now & then. He gave me my copy of “The Magus” for free. Guitarist Kriss Hades was her ex-boyfriend & there was no love lost between us.

Ah, err.. Well that's a bit awkward! I still like the album, although obviously the guitar playing is crap!

Seriously though, I was very impressed by this, it seems quite technical and varied, despite the poor production (although I love this kind of ratty production job on extreme metal anyway).

Kudos for hanging out with dudes who can produce such cool music.

Picked up this after seeing it mentioned on the RYM official metal board (it is good for something then!) I don't know if you're familiar with these fellow Aussies Daniel, but no one has rated any of their stuff yet. Think you may dig their raw deaththrash. Vinny, you may want to get onto this as well.

Thanks for the answers guys. One thing that  leaps out at me that we all seem to have in common is the fact we are the introspective types. Do you guys ever seem to get comments along the lines of "You think too damn much" like I do? Like Vinny I see metal very much as ""mine" and it doesn't bother me at all that no one around me has the same taste (my wife is a sixties/seventies rock fan - Pink Floyd, Roxy Music, Yes etc, although she does love Wardruna, but hates metal).

Another interesting thing is that despite people hating extreme metal because of it's supposed aggression and inferred violence, I get the feeling that you guys are not at all violent people (I know I'm not). I'd rather listen to violent and aggressive music than actually be a violent and aggressive person. The rejection of commercialism is another very sound reason - I hate the rampant commercialisation of virtually everything - I never eat at McDonalds or other mass market fast food joints, I never wear clothes that make me look like a walking advert for some sportswear company and I hate Hollywood movies. Good luck to all those marketing motherfuckers getting more people to buy Autopsy, Esoteric or Blasphemy albums!

After checking out Cretin's Stranger for this month's Horde feature, I said that I should probably check out more grindcore as I have rated the limited number of albums I've listened to in the genre quite high. So in search for more of the same, I picked out Insect Warfare's World Extermination. Now, I was completely into it from the outset, but that's not really the point of this post. I was listening to it for the third time whilst taking the dog round the block this evening and I got to thinking "Why do I feel drawn to this kind of extreme music? Grindcore and war metal are not really the kinds of music (almost) sixty year olds go for, nor do the vast majority of younger people for that matter, so what's up with that?" The only viable and honest answer I could give myself was that these kinds of short, chaotic bursts of nihilism are, in fact, reflections of what it's sometimes like inside my head. I can hear a grindcore track or a war metal track and recognise and relate immediately to that chaos as if it was a musical reflection of my incoherent, but silent, mental railing at the world.

So what I'd like to know from any other grindcore, war metal or any other super-extreme metal fan is "Why do you think you listen to it?" Be as honest as you can in your answer as I am genuinely interested because for 99.9% of the population it is just an unholy fucking racket so I'd like to know what attracts us extreme metal fans to the music we love but almost everyone else hates.

Life is a bit tough in my home right now. My wife was three months pregnant with my third daughter when we found out that the baby had died due to a chromosome issue last Wednesday. She had to have surgery to remove the foetus the following day & has been an emotional wreck ever since.

So very sorry for your loss Daniel. Thoughts go out to you and your family at such a difficult time. Life seems very cruel sometimes.

My apartment was hit by a freak tempest/cyclone on Sunday afternoon. It killed someone a couple of blocks down from us & we were without power, internet or phone reception for at least 36 hours. The streets are strewn with trees & pieces of roofing at the moment. It was the scariest weather experience I've ever had by a significant margin. Fucking Armageddon shit!

Unfortunately for us all, as long as the current crop of greedy, corrupt arseholes parading themselves as the leaders of the world are in charge of the battle against climate change then we're all going to have to get used to this type of freak weather event which will probably get even worse as time goes on. Don't know about any of you, but I don't believe our leaders have the will to do what is required and that's worrying for all of us.

Thanks guys. Sadly there's only really one realistic outcome for this situation, but that is all part of life isn't it?

Unfortunately my 86-year old dad is very ill and has been hospitalised (not covid-related) and it looks unlikely that he'll be going back home as he can no longer take care of himself. To be honest, it's been inevitable for a while, but the NHS has just implemented new covid measures and we're not even allowed to go and see him, so that's a real bummer. 

Could you add Bretus' latest album, Magharia please Ben.

Oh, and Count Raven's The Sixth Storm that was also released this year.