Sonny's Reviews
Contaminated are a death metal crew from Melbourne who have been around for more than a decade now, but who have only just got around to releasing their sophomore, following a full seven years after their debut, Final Man. The man behind the band is Lachlan McPherson who, amongst a number of other projects, is also behind grinders Rawhead, with Contaminated (like Rawhead) originally beginning life as one of his solo projects before being expanded into a full band after the release of his Pestilential Decay demo in 2014.
The band's debut was a cavernous-sounding, raw kind of affair and they have certainly taken huge strides production-wise with Celebratory Beheading. The sound is cleaner and clearer and although I would often see that as a downward step, I think it better fits what the band are trying to get across. The focus here is less on creating a foetid atmosphere than dealing out an object lesson in bruatality, less the lumbering menace of a threat unseen than the more immediate threat of a fist in the face. I guess that Lachy has brought across some of the inherent brutality from Rawhead's grinding, on which he had been concentrating in recent years, which has contributed to making Celebratory Beheading a much more aggressive and violent-sounding album than it's predecessor.
The individual tracks are quite dense, mainly due to a quite heavily distorted guitar sound and a powerful, pummelling drum performance from skinsman Christoph Winkler who is a member of several grindcore outfits such as Internal Rot and Incinerated, where he deals out blastbeats for fun. Vocals-wise, Lachy's bellowing is exceedingly aggressive and he often sounds like he could strip paint off your walls, if not actually tearing them down completely. It's not all hypercharged velocity, however and the band do like to shift down and hit a slower groove from time to time, to add some telling contrast to the more explicit violence of the hi-speed blasting, giving the listener time to gather themselves in preparation for the next blitzkrieg.
Ultimately, this is an album of no-nonsense, raucous death metal, with deathgrind leanings that makes no pretention to being anything other than that and successfully delivers on it's premise of out and out aural violence. Approach it as such and there is much to get your teeth into here.
Genres: Death Metal
Format: Album
Year: 2024
I was impressed by these french industrial sludge-meisters' 2021 album, Pantocrator, and although their Privation album from last year somehow passed me by, I have been looking foward to this one for a while now. Riff-wise and with the general instrumentation, this bears a significant Fear Factory influence, with some pretty immense and sludgy machine-like riffing and harsh distortion that often sounds like the sound of escaping steam buried down within the mix. The tinniness of the programmed snares adds another layer to the dystopian, Blade Runner-esque atmosphere the band is (successfully) striving for. Within this evocative, machine-dominated atmosphere intrudes the only-too-human, angered vocals of singer Matthias Jungbluth whose hardcore-style delivery gives the album a sludge metal twist with his railing against the world the band have so vividly created lays bare the alienation of his soul. I don't think any language is better than French at sounding pissed-off and Matthias here sounds really pissed-off.
The Fear Factory comparison is more pronounced here, I think, because the band have sought to add more melodic hooks into their overall sound, rather than doubling-down on the alienating atmosphere of Pantocrator. Now this is an approach I would probably normally be sceptical about, but I think it still works here and the band manage to retain the atmosphere of their alienating machine-like rhythms, even though they sometimes give the listener more of a handhold into the album. Is it as good as Pantocrator? Probably not, I guess time will tell, but it is still worth the mere thirty minutes of your time you would need to spare to lend it your ear.
Genres: Industrial Metal Sludge Metal Post-Metal
Format: Album
Year: 2024
Come to this expecting another Spectrum of Death and you will certainly go away disappointed. I have long ago learnt to approach new releases by long-mothballed bands with a certain degree of cynicism, so I went into this with zero expectations.
Morbid Saint now contains three of the members from their Spectrum of Death days with vocalist Pat Lind and guitarist Jim Fergades rejoining the only ever-present member, guitarist Jay Visser, bassist Bob Zabel and drummer DJ Bagemehl. Swallowed by Hell is a very different proposition from Spectrum of Death, with the raw aggression of youth being replaced by production values several magnitudes higher and the songwriting and musicianship of long-serving professionals. This results in an album that is perfectly satisfactory and that has some decent riffs and a high level of professionalism, but that simply fails to engage on a second and more important level with the listener, that of the passionate performer appealing to the passionate listener. I believe that, as a metal fan, inside me I still have the passion and fire that once burned so brightly for all to see, but which age and the trials of live have dulled to the point where it can be very difficult to summon it to the surface once more and a certain detached cynicism often wins out over my more passionate tendencies. That is exactly how I think Swallowed by Hell has manifested, with the band believing they still have that fire and zest they exhibited so profoundly more than three decades ago, whilst secretly finding it increasingly challenging to bring it to the fore. So that leaves us with an album that is perfectly fine when considered in isolation, with some decent riffs, nice solos, a rhythm unit determined to batter us into submission and an angry and aggressive-sounding vocal performance. But we (and maybe even the band) know that it is, in reality, a facsimile of what the band were once capable of, a bit like a grizzled old bare-knuckled boxer who could still give the average Joe a heart-stopping wallop, but who would be turned into a bloody mess by younger and hungrier bucks looking to make a name for themselves.
All things considered, this could certainly be a lot worse and is by no means a disaster, but as I often wonder when faced with obviously inferior product from any certain band is why would I listen to this in preference to the classic? And the truth is, I don't know as I would, so whilst this would be fine for a few listens I don't feel it has any real staying power.
Genres: Thrash Metal
Format: Album
Year: 2024
I am a man of unsophisticated taste, particularly in music, as illustrated by my indifference to the dissonant and avant-garde, jazz in particular being anathema to me. In relation to this, for the longest time I considered technical death and thrash metal as also outside my comfort zone, but a dive into the earlier years of death metal resulted in the discovery that a certain level of technicality was indeed something I could enjoy, as epitomised by the Death and Atheist back catalogues. There is, however, a degree of technicality beyond which I switch off as it becomes more and more "jazzy" as per Gorguts and their ilk.
Anyway, this lengthy preamble to a review of Norway's Sovereign is relevant as they play a technical style of deaththrash that sits right slap-bang in the middle of my sweet spot for technical metal whereby the technical flourishes are sufficient to bring variety and interest without pushing into a more jazz-adjacent territory that I am more uncomfortable with. To be more precise, they play thrash metal with tech-death aspirations, influenced by mid-period Death albums and possibly by the current South American thrash metal, particularly that of Chilean bands like Ripper, Demoniac and Slaughtbbath.
Although this is the band's debut full-length, they are not newbies, with members, or ex-members, of Stormbeist and Execration and with Nekromantheon's live guitarist, Tommy Jacobsen taking on lead duties, a duty he discharges with impressive aplomb. His leads are incendiary and thrilling, with a high level of dextrous competency, sitting squarely on the right side of shredding, becoming neither flaccid nor self-indulgent and reminding me a little of how James Murphy's work lifted Death's Spiritual Healing, which is meant as high praise indeed - check out the final minute of Nebular Waves for a stellar example. They may not be the tightest band to play technical deaththrash, but they are sufficiently skilled that a slight looseness makes them sound more passionate than the stifling necessity of technical perfection often allows for. They have some solid riffs with energetic songwriting that incorporates the technical flourishes to add colour to the tracks rather than becoming the whole raison d'être. This is definitely an approach I wholeheartedly endorse and it has resulted the band coming up with an album that just sounds better with each repeated listen and which is one of a select few brand new thrash albums not from South America that I will happily keep returning to.
Genres: Death Metal Thrash Metal
Format: Album
Year: 2024
Ah, Cuba, the home of the world's finest cigars, Twentieth century revolutionaries and the first, although in all probability not the last, potential flashpoint to nuclear armageddon. It is also the original home of Dakkar, the man behind black metal project Narbeleth, although he now calls Galicia in Spain home. It may just be my ignorance showing here, but I never heard of much of a metal scene in Cuba, yet it makes perfect sense for a band like Narbeleth, black metal being pretty much an outsider's style of metal, I would imagine Dakkar being very much an outsider in the Caribbean place of his birth.
Musically, Narbeleth are very much an old-school black metal act, with recognisable and memorable tremolo riffing in the style of luminaries such as Immortal and Satyricon, with a cover of the latter's "The King of the Shadowthrone" even closing out the album. The production isn't as raw as we would have expected from the band's influencers thirty years ago, but the modern production values don't rob the music of any of it's icy aggression and is such that it enables all the constituent parts to be heard clearly. Dakkar has a real ear for a frosty-sounding riff, with his true talent coming in knowing exactly when to throttle back the tempo and when to put his foot down, as it were. This transition between full-on blasting and a more mid-paced tempo provides a lot of the impetus and dynamism in his songwriting and is wielded exceedingly deftly. He also possesses one of those frost-rimed voices that has you imagining visible clouds of icy breath issuing from his lips as he shrieks his occult-heavy lyrics into the night sky.
I would also be remiss of me not to mention the second band member, Vindok, and his supporting role on drums, which he fulfills perfectly, providing a precise battery which injects added impetus to the faster sections and adds depth to the slower tempo parts. Nothing showy, but well-judged and effective black metal skinsmanship. All things considered, I found this to be an immensely enjoyable trip back to the 1990's black metal heyday, with a bit of a modern twist in the higher production values, but that manages to remain authentic-sounding and illustrating perfectly that you don't need to have grown up in the frozen forests of Scandinavia to be able to produce trve black metal frostiness.
Genres: Black Metal
Format: Album
Year: 2024
I am unfamiliar with Ribspreader, but am acquainted with main man Rogga Johansson, particularly through one of his other bands, his death doom outfit, The 11th Hour. It seems that Rogga has acquired a reputation for producing predictable and uninspiring death metal, but as I am unfamiliar with the vast majority of his output, I will consider Reap Humanity on it's own merits.
With the band hailing from Sweden, I was fully expecting an Entombed / Dismember sounding album and whilst it isn't as heavily distorted as many of the band's compatriots, it does retain that Swedish wall-of-sound production that results in the riffs sounding exceedingly dense and doesn't depart hugely from the long-established template of Swedeath. As far as the riffs go, it is fair to say that there is nothing here that truly stands out as exceptional, yet by the same token there is nothing particularly terrible either. I do like Rogga's vocals, they have that gruff, caustic edge to them that sounds quite vitriolic and threatening, although at times they seem to get muscled out of the way by the riffing which sees them taking a bit of a back seat, where personally I would have liked to hear them pushed more to the fore.
The leads are handled by guitarist Taylor Nordberg and are well executed, although once more there isn't anything particularly outstanding to behold and you can pretty much predict the way the solos will play out. Drummer Jeramie Kling, who is also a member of Inhuman Condition with Obituary and former Death bassist Terry Butler, also puts in a creditable performance behind the kit with a lively exhibition of powerful death metal skinsmanship that helps to turbo charge the velocity of the riffing.
Overall, I would have to agree that the criticism of the band is valid and Ribspreader bring little to nothing new to the table, having turned in a solid, meat-and-potatoes-flavoured album of pretty standard Swedish death metal that is perfectly fine. The drumming and vocals were the big takeaways for me, but I suspect more seasoned fans of death metal than I will be largely unimpressed.
Genres: Death Metal
Format: Album
Year: 2024
Inquisition have a distinctive sound, that's for sure, which is principally defined by Dagon's unique vocal style. His is less the role of traditional vocalist and more of narrator. With his virtually spoken-word, croaking approach he comes across like some twisted hobgoblin, perched atop a mossy boulder and expounding his cosmic satanic philosophies to any passing ear. Obviously this aspect of the duo's sound is as divisive as it is unique, although as I have become more familiar with it, it has become more of a welcome departure from the norm and less a source of irritation. In fact, on the couple of brief occasions when he resorts to clean vocals, Dagon's voice sounds even more weird and quirky than when delivering his usual croaks (Secrets from the Wizard Forest of Forbidden Knowledge, for example).
There isn't any real noticeable departure from their earlier material here, along with the vocals the duo have retained the lo-fi aesthetics and the swarming, buzzing guitar tone of their earlier work, along with the cosmic, satanist themes that they have explored throughout their nine full-length releases. The duo introduce some synth-driven overlays onto a couple of the tracks which I don't think particularly bring much worthwhile, sounding misplaced and robbing a track like "Memories Within an Empty Castle in Ruins" of it's momentum in my opinion.
I suppose Inquisition could be accused of repeatedly ploughing the same blackened furrow, thus making each subsequent release less and less relevant, but I think that their sound is sufficiently singular as to justify their approach, seeing as very few acts sound similar. It isn't like they are endlessly regurgitating tropes copied from someone else's work, but it is more a case of sticking with a unique-sounding formula and using it to explore the themes they find personally interesting. I suspect I would have enjoyed this more without the synths, but I was still swept along by it's distinctive, blasphemous atmosphere and it's memorable riffs, such as that on "Infinity is the Aeon of Satan", which even, dare I say it, bordered on the "catchy". If you are already familiar with the Colombians then I don't hear much that could change your mind about them, if you don't like them now then this won't convert you and vice-versa. For me, I would say to them "Lay off the synths" then all would be AOK.
Genres: Black Metal
Format: Album
Year: 2024
Well, this is a real trip down memory lane, I must admit. I feel a bit unfair, reducing Saxon's latest offering to a mere nostalgia trip, but for me, that is definitely what it is - and in more ways than one. I can scarce believe that it is almost 45 years since I first encountered Saxon, supporting Motörhead on their 1979 Bomber tour, when both they and me were far more fresh-faced and less battle-scarred than now with entire futures ahead of us. Well, on the evidence of Hell, Fire and Damnation, the years have been kinder to the Yorkshiremen than to me and they are still seemingly able to call upon that youthful energy with some cracking classic heavy metal riffs, shred-like guitar solos and Biff shrugging off the years, his ability to belt-out the lyrics with siren-like power seemingly undiminished by time.
I was heavily into the NWOBHM scene at the time and Saxon were a huge part of that, but as the scene waned and those young bloods from the Bay Area revolutionised the metal sound, bands like Saxon suddenly seemed old hat and unable to compete with the heightened aggression and excitement that thrash metal brought to the table. So they, like many of their contemporaries, faded from my life, the gulf between us only being made wider by my discovery of even more extreme forms of metal in later years and Saxon faded into nothing but a distant memory. At least, that is until my attention was drawn to the band's 2018 album Thunderbolt which was a shot in the arm of modern-sounding, old-school heavy metal and opened my eyes to the fact that Biff and co still had what it takes to deliver a high-powered, vibrant and, above all, relevant heavy metal album. Admittedly I haven't kept up with Saxon's releases in the meantime, so six years and one pandemic on from Thunderbolt what have we got? Well, this is a step or two down from that top-level beauty and it does have a couple of clunkers on it, Madame Guillotine being the most egregious example, it just feels flat and a bit contrived, ending up somewhat less than thrilling to my ears, but a track like There's Something in Roswell is guilty of excessive clunkiness too. The opening Brian Blessed-voiced intro didn't help either. I like Brian well enough, but he is very difficult to listen to with a straight face and it is exacerbated by the fact that he is the voice of floor cleaner ads on TV here in the UK!
That said, the title track, which is the first proper track, is a glorious slice of triumphant, fist-pumping metal that takes all the pomp and circumstance of power metal and pares it down to what is important and leaves a shimmering core that rivals the band's heyday. Elsewhere Fire and Steel and closer Supercharger fair rattle along, reminiscent of the proto speed metal of Judas Priest's Exciter or multiple tracks on Painkiller. Kubla Khan and the Merchant of Venice, 1066 and Witches of Salem mine the historical themes so beloved of Steve Harris and have a similat grandiose feel to some of the tracks Harris penned for Maiden's last album, Senjutsu.
I mentioned earlier that this is nostalgic for more than one reason and the lyrics to Fire and Steel are an example of it, being a paeon to the hulking , smoke- and fire-spewing steelworks of England's disappeared industrial landscape. I myself live only a handful of miles from the site where one such industrial behemoth was once sited (now the headquarters of an online gambling company) where it was such a dominating presence over the city I inhabit. Elsewhere, on Pirates of the Airwaves the rose-tinted spectacles of nostalgia are used to examine the days of pirate radio when we used to try nightly to tune our radios to the unpredictable broadcasts of Radio Luxembourg in the hope of catching some decent rock music, which was unheard of on the legal radio stations and Supercharger brings back memories of a string of high-powered motorcycles and cars I spent all my cash on in my late teens and early twenties.
So, for me, this is a solid enough slab of trad metal with some tasty riffs, cool lead work, a frontman with a distinctive and undiminished vocal delivery but it is most notable for it's ability to propel me back forty-plus years and leave me with a wide, if somewhat wistful, smile on my face.
Genres: Heavy Metal
Format: Album
Year: 2024
Malist is a solo project of Moscow's Ovfrost (Nick Kholodov) and isn't a project that I have followed too closely, but I did enjoy his 2020 album, To Mantle the Rising Sun, which was a well-done and enjoyable slice of melodic black metal. I have missed the two intervening albums, but here we are now with his latest, Of Scorched Earth. Whilst he is still ploughing the fertile melodic black metal furrow, there seems to be a greater influence from atmo-black that gives the tracks a more sweeping, grandiose quality. One trope in particular Ovfrost employs on multiple occasions here, is a calm, quieter core to tracks, with acoustic guitar strumming and a keyboard overlay, be it organ or piano, that acts as the still eye of the storm that contrasts with the heavy riffing and generally more frantic pace of the tracks either side of the still spot.
The songwriting indulges a fair bit of melodicism for a black metal album, yet I think it still retains enough of black metal's intensity and inherent savagery to satisfy all but the most demanding of BM kvltists. I suppose there are those who will bemoan it's clean production, pauses in intensity and melodic phrases, but there are more than enough passages where he lets himself off the leash, letting rip some frantic, black metal battery. For what it's worth, I would score this down a bit from the earlier To Mantle the Rising Sun, but it is nevertheless an interesting enough expression of melodic and atmospheric black metal, that has it's roots planted firmly here in the modern day and not back in the savagery of the 1990s.
Genres: Black Metal
Format: Album
Year: 2024
Norwegian thrashers Sepulcher are back with their first release since 2018's well-received Panoptic Horror album. Veins of the Void is a sixteen-minute EP, featuring three tracks, Derealization, Cryogenic Sleep and the title track. The production has the band's usual pseudo-lo-fi feel - it isn't actually truly lo-fi, it is as if they deliberately want to give their sound a garage band aesthetic, whilst still using a modern recording set up. I'm not an expert on the genre, but I guess Sepulcher could well be tagged as a stenchcore band with this crusty production and the thrash, death and trad metal genre fusing on show.
Opener Derealization starts off with a looming, sludgy feel with a quite infectious riff before alternating between fast bursts of deathly aggression and lethargic slower-paced moroseness. Middle track Cryogenic Sleep is the shortest track here, running for a touch over two and a half minutes, and is a slice of adrenalised crossover thrash with an energetic fast tempo and a bouncy, punky riff to it. In truth that is the only track with any significant thrash content. The title track closes out the EP and has a deliberate, sludge-like pacing with a chunky riff, a quite groovy drum track, a weird guitar melody and Andreas Fosse Salbu venting his frustrations at all and sundry with his pissed-off, shouted vocals.
Whilst no classic, this is reasonably interesting and with a fair bit of it running at a slower tempo than usual I'm not sure if this EP is signalling a change in direction for Sepulcher, or if they are just clearing the decks ready for the next full-length.
Genres: Thrash Metal
Format: EP
Year: 2024
For sure there are a couple of things I liked about Objects Without Pain, the guitar tone is nicely pitched and best of all the drums sound amazing. I could listen to an isolated drum track of this quite happily and would prefer to over the finished thing. Unfortunately I couldn't take to it other than that. The songwriting is too spasmodic for me, it veers far too much into mathcore, djenty type territory for my preference and although I really like the tone of the album, the actual songwriting leaves me cold. But the absolute killer for me is the vocals. I would be the first to admit that I probably put too much weight onto vocals but I think I am quite tolerant of some very divisive vocalists, Silencer, Cirith Ungol, King Diamond or Demilich for example, but if I take against a singer then it is like a movie with Adam Sandler in it and no matter how good the rest of the production, it still has Adam Sandler in it! Such is the case with Demian Johnston, his vocals amount to little more than shouting at the top of his voice and just come over like some angry child berating his parents for some perceived injustice and which I find wearisome in the extreme. I don't have an issue with shouted vocals per se, but these are just irritating and off-putting to me to the degree where, by the second half of the album, my mind is wandering and I have pretty much tuned out. I seem to be a minority of one and good luck to those who derived far more enjoyment from it than I was able to muster, but this just isn't one for me I'm afraid.
Genres: Sludge Metal
Format: Album
Year: 2023
Hauntologist are a post-black metal duo from Kraków comprising Mgła drummer, Darkside, and multi-instrumentalist, The Fall (Michał Stępień), Mgła bassist and backing vocalist for live performances. Hollow is the duo's debut full-length and seems to have been met with mixed reactions, a lot which seems to be based upon people's attitude towards Mgła and how much this does or doesn't sound like them. I don't mind Mgła at all, but I have only heard Exercises in Futility which I enjoyed, but not as much as many others did I suspect and so I'm going to buck the trend and take Hollow on it's own merit, not by it's comparison to another project.
I found this to be pretty interesting and hugely entertaining to boot, which may not be enough for some who need their world to be turned upside down by every release, but is more than enough for me. I often find post-metally BM to be a bit of a bore, to be honest, and went into this with a little bit of trepidation, but it kept me rapt pretty much throughout with some nice twists and turns, the three-quarters of an hour runtime seeming much shorter, which is always a good sign. Fast, intense passages of blasting atmospheric black metal are complemented by contemplative and melancholy airs that temper the furiousness of the black metal sections with more reflective atmospheres. There is a certain harshness to the production, coupled with The Fall's ascerbic vocals and icy-sounding tremolo guitar lines that gives the overall aesthetic an inherent frostiness. Darkside's drumming is top knotch throughout whether it's his withering blastbeats or skillful fills that are to the forefront at any one time. The faster sections aren't just composed of layers of indistinguishable tremolo riffing either, but rather The Fall focusses on producing cool and memorable riffs rather than just continuously swamping us with "atmosphere". Elsewhere there are the folky acoustic guitar and clean vocals of the title track and the gothic, post-punk vibe of Gardermoen but these sit well within the overall structure of the album and aren't at all distracting or obtrusive, giving the album a freshness of perspective. The album closes out with a gently self-reflective spoken word piece that leaves the listener slightly wrong-footed and provoking them to reconsider what they have heard during the previous three-quarters of an hour.
Overall this is a fine album of modern atmospheric black metal that draws on the tropes of post-metal and introduces influence from other, non-metal genres whilst still acknowledging the power of the riff in metal. It isn't very challenging to listen to and is, in fact, very easy on the ears, but I don't view that as an issue personally. The length is just about right and keeps things focussed with no tendency towards self-indulgence that may have blighted a lengthier runtime.
Genres: Black Metal Post-Metal
Format: Album
Year: 2024
According to RYM I have listened to over 1500 doom metal releases, so I think I can be forgiven for feeling a little jaded when approaching most new doom releases, particularly those coming out at the start of the year when, for some reason, the quality isn't always the greatest and especially by little-known acts who have been plugging away to little or no acclaim for years. Parisian four-piece, Mourning Dawn, are exactly one such act and their new album, the oddly titled The Foam of Despair, tagged as a Doom / DSBM hybrid, didn't exactly have me trembling with anticipation either. So, by the time opening track, Tomber du temps, came to an end, I was pleasantly surprised to find myself with a big stupid grin on my face as I was completely won over and enchanted by the preceeding ten minutes of downtuned bliss. Actually the original tags were a bit off the mark, The Foam of Despair is not black metal by any stretch and whilst it is rooted in doom metal it is really an album which should come under the atmospheric sludge umbrella and one which is given a freshness by pulling in additional influences from the likes of gothic and industrial metal.
That opener that so grabbed my attention has some really infectious riffing coupled with Laurent's howling vocals and a post-metal structure that plants it firmly in the atmo-sludge arena. What elevates it though, is some really nice soaring guitar soloing and spoken word interjections (an effective trope the band use several times throughout the album) that impart a melancholy air, with the cherry on the top being a reflective-sounding sax solo that closes out the track, bringing to mind some of the great work from Belgium's Messa.
Although Tomber du temps is the best track on the album, it is by no means downhill from here on in. Second track, Blue Pain, features a guest appearance by our old friend Déhà (who also mixed and mastered the album - how does he find time to sleep) who lends the track his desperate-sounding howls to provide a bit of a twist to what is otherwise a slab of Paradise Lost-inspired gothic metal. Borrowed Skin, the album's longest track, delves into the atmo-sludge playbook with a layered build to it and featuring some fine percussion work from drummer Nicolas Joyeux, the track's emotional tides rising and falling from becalmed quiet to looming and towering anguished waves, the only niggle here being the rather abrupt fade-out at the track's ending (which is also the case elsewhere with Suzerain).
Apex has a plodding chug to it that gives me an industrial metal vibe, albeit not as obviously as on closer Midnight Sun which goes full-on industrial with Nicolas Joyeux once more featuring with some imposing-sounding metallic percussion hammering away like Vulcan's Forge itself. Elsewhere Suzerain has a nice bass-heavy chugging throb with, once more, those solemn spoken word vocals and The Color of Waves is a depressive and desperate-sounding slice of post-metal atmospheric building.
The production is crisp with all the band members' contributions being readily distinguishable and allowing their inherent technical ability to shine through. However, the biggest plaudits go out to these frenchmen for their mature and interesting songwriting that encompasses multiple genres and forges them into a coherent and flowing whole, providing a compelling listen for fans of atmospheric and emotionally-charged metal and has made this my first must-hear album of 2024.
Genres: Doom Metal Sludge Metal Post-Metal
Format: Album
Year: 2024
Sardonic Witchery is a solo project of Portugal's King Demogorgon (Ricardo Mota) who used to be one half of black metal duo Infernal Kingdom. After a, frankly awful, intro, King drops the hammer on some reasonable blasting black metal with riffs that sometimes fly close enough to traditional metal that they almost come over as black 'n' roll. He has quite an acerbically harsh, roaring style of singing that comes across more as angry than evil at least until Merciless Warrior of Steel when he just sounds hokey as he tries to pull off some kind of Tom G Warrior-like "death grunts".
The production of the album is good, with the bass lines being nicely presented and boosting the riffs well, although the snares are pushed forward and get a little bit annoying after a while. There's not really a whole lot more to say, this is a decent enough piece of black metal that is best when it's blasting hardest, but which is also prone to fly close to black 'n' roll grooviness with trad metal influence shining through and some inherent cheesiness. As such it treads familiar ground, albeit mostly with professional aplomb. There aren't really enough stand-out moments that will keep you wanting to respin this, with the duo of Barbaric Bastards of Mass Destruction and Horizon's End being the section that meritted most attention from me and had me wishing the quality of those two tracks was reproduced throughout the album's almost forty minutes rather than being confined to a mere ten. So, ultimately I guess, it will end up on the pile of releases of the year marked "solid if somewhat unremarkable black metal" - and I am sure it won't be the last.
Genres: Black Metal
Format: Album
Year: 2024
Another quality outfit from the Chilean metal scene, death metal four-piece, Deconsekrated, have now unleashed their debut album upon the world. They aren't reinventing the wheel here, or really doing anything that hasn't been done hundreds of time before, but it is skillfully executed and full of vitality and energy, with the occasional breakdown into a more considered death doom pacing providing tempo variation. Vocalist Gûl Evokator has a harsh barking growl that gives the vocals a convincing howling abyss-demon quality that sits very well within an old-school-influenced death metal context. Alongside that there are a couple of ritualistic-sounding ambient, chanted parts in the intro, "Invocation" and the first part of the album's longest track, "Litany of the Blasphemous". Mostly though, it must be said, this is pummelling, no frills, blasphemous death metal, a style of DM that I am very much at home with and can appreciate for it's lack of pretension and focus on providing neck-wrenching blasts to inspire even the most reticent of moshpits.
The production is spot-on with the riffs sounding beefy and precise, aided by the muscular rhythm section of bassist Fides Naash and drummer Rigor Mortis (something tells me these guys may be using pseudonyms) who sounds at times like he is pounding on the inside of the listener's own skull! Guitarist Agorh Skullptor unleashes the odd short, Slayeresque solo, but nothing indulgent or ill-fitting to distract from the impending battery. There are plenty of lines to be drawn to OSDM classics like Mental Funeral, or Diabolical Conquest, but with a more modern production which may not deliver the full cavernous experience, but does sharpen up the riffs and provide a sharpness to the sound that gives it a focus away from a deathly, foetid atmosphere and more onto musical precision. The strength of chilean metal is that it shows a reverence for metal's former glories whilst unafraid to adopt a modern approach and production that ensures that the material has relevance. And so 2024 kicks off in solid style with the chilean scene showing exactly why it is growing in reputation within the metal world.
Genres: Death Metal
Format: Album
Year: 2024
Árstíðir Lifsins have become one of my favourite pagan black metal bands over the last few years, mainly due to the quality of their two Saga á tveim tungum (Story in Two Languages) albums and their ability to craft sweeping nordic epics that stir the blood and lift the soul. Their latest release, Hermalausaz, supposedly an EP, consists of two lengthy tracks, Ýrr and Þistill, with a total runtime of over forty minutes, which once again illustrates the Icelanders' ability to compose saga-like epics as befits their own cultural heritage. The lyrics are written in Old Norse poetic form, as were the sagas of old and are, as is revealed on the EP's Bandcamp page, "inspired by the runic inscription of the western Norwegian Eggja rune stone", which is a rune-carved grave-covering from around 650-700 CE, the runes upon which tell the tale of a shipwreck caused by a mighty sea-creature and the journey of the lost to the land of the dead.
The instrumentation is first and foremost powerful and epic-sounding black metal, with quite a thick bottom end over which the tremolo riffing can sweep and soar and featuring a variety of vocal styles from throaty, shrieking howls to harmonised, baritone nordic chants. The pummelling double kick drums and punishing blastbeats of Árni Bergur Zoëga's drumming propel the tracks along with an intense fury borne of raw, old-school black metal. However, interspersed within this sweeping, metallic maelstrom are folk-inspired, mournful-sounding acoustic sections, that are mercifully bereft of the inherent cheesiness often associated with folk metal, but rather serve as tonal contrasts, representing the rising and falling of the narrative threads within the tales and allowing moments of respite from the black metal intensity. Other times a slower, melodic theme will take over, often with a piano or keyboard accompaniment, to introduce a different narrative thread and further variety within these epics' tonal pallette.
I see Árstíðir Lifsins very much as the torch-bearers for a narrative style of black metal championed by Enslaved on their early releases such as Vikingligr veldi's "Lifandi lif undir hamri" and Eld's "793 (Slaget om Lindisfarne)", although those were more stripped-back than Hermalausaz' powerful-sounding production, there is still a direct line of epic-storytelling running from one to the other. With only three members and only two being instrumentalists, the music Árstíðir Lifsins' put out is testament to the technical proficiency and adaptability of the band members, sounding like a veritable horde of norse heroes on a musical rampage through some poorly-defended coastal enclave. A massively underappreciated band with a glorious and epic vision of what they are about and the music they want to produce, I hope they ultimately get the praise they deserve.
Genres: Black Metal
Format: EP
Year: 2023
Richmond three-piece, Lair, are back with their sophomore, four plague-ridden years after the self-titled debut. They play bereft and pissed-off sounding sludgy doom metal that sounds very much like a band with an axe to grind about many things, but particularly the bleakness and futility of existence, so if you come into this with a sunny disposition, then don't expect to leave it feeling the same!
First off, it does plug into the post-pandemic, confused and bereaved mental space very well, giving vent to a hopelessness and desperation borne of things out of one's control as expressed in heavy, towering and slothful riffs, primitive-sounding drum beats and a vocalist who's throat-wrecking howls to the sky are the epitome of bleakness. So, if that doesn't float your boat then you are definitely looking up the wrong alley here, but for those who worship at the altar of acts like Eyehategod, Acid Bath or Toadliquor, then come on in my red-eyed friend and pull up a chair. OK, so the vocals do become a bit samey and you find yourself wishing for a change in delivery or inflection and the riffs aren't the most inventive, but this type of sludgy doom is more about the overall aesthetic than individual moments, the repetitiveness seeking to add layer upon layer of despondency upon the listener to achieve that atmosphere of alienation, desperation and anger, that anger being the prime ingredient of good sludge metal I would suggest. Even saying that, this isn't completely monolithic, with an instrumental breather in Something’s at the Door, it's gentler sound setting up the faster, almost death metal of (To Step Into) A Noose of One’s Own. Although normal service is soon resumed and they get back onto the dreary, doom-laden and sludge-filled treadmill for the final three tracks.
The Hidden Shiv is a fairly solid slab-o'-sludge that ticks a lot of the right boxes and, in all fairness, is growing on me the more I listen to it, but I wouldn't speak of it in the same tones as the earlier-mentioned sludge flag-bearers. But that said, they have come on a fair bit since I last checked them out via their 2018 EP "In Exile" and they are definitely moving in the right direction.
Genres: Doom Metal Sludge Metal
Format: Album
Year: 2024
Sunn O))) were formed in 1998 by Goatsnake's Greg Anderson and Stephen O'Malley, who was looking to form a new outfit after the splitting-up of Burning Witch, their name intended as a pun on Earth's moniker as the drone pioneers were huge influences on Anderson and O'Malley. The Grimmrobe demos were released in 2000 as the band's debut release, with the duo's worship of all things Earth resulting in the album containing a track called "Dylan Carson" after the Earth mainman. The sound on Grimmrobe Demos is heavily based upon that explored by Carlson on Earth's debut, the seminal "Earth 2: Special Low Frequency Version" with super-slow tempos, heavily distorted and downtuned guitar tones and feedback, all designed to present a monolithically towering sound with which to swamp the listener. Drums are entirely absent as there is no percussion required here, the tempo being so slow and crawling as to render any sort of timekeeping irelevant. Even for Sunn O))) there is little variety offered here, these are unflinchingly slow and crushing primal soundscapes, with zero evidence of the experimentation the duo were to introduce on some of their later releases. This is the music of nature, the music of tides, the music of tectonic plate movements and I imagine, in my more fanciful flights of fancy, that this is what it would sound like if you could get close enough to a star to hear those awe-inspiring cosmic furnaces burning off their plasmic fuel.
I have touched on elsewhere how busy experimental and technical metal often causes me difficulties because of the challenges I often experience with sensory overload, well Sunn O))) are a perfect antidote to that for me, these bassy and monolithically repetitive aural experiences enveloping like a comforting blanket, providing a calming and meditative experience that I don't often find elsewhere. I get it that these guys really aren't for everyone, or even most people, but they are amongst some of the best at what they do and personally I would hate to live in a world where Sunn O))) didn't exist.
Genres: Drone Metal
Format: Album
Year: 2000
I cannot lay any claim to being a source of much knowledge when it comes to death metal, having come to it quite late on. I turned away from metal during the nineties and was listening to hardly any, let alone the burgeoning death metal scene, at the time of the release of Neuropath's two demos in '95 and '96 that make up the contents of this compilation. Luckily for us all, we have the inside track on this release from the horse's mouth, so to speak, in the shape of Academy co-creator Daniel, lead guitarist and songwriter with the Sydney brutal DM pathfinders. From the CD liner notes and the interview with Hessian Firm, it is apparent that Daniel and vocalist Mark see the evolution between the earlier demo, Nefarious Vivisection, and the later, Desert of Excruciation, as a quantum leap in both technical and songwriting abilities. I certainly would not disagree with this assessment as the technical skills on show are obviously much improved and the songwriting has matured with an increased emphasis on technicality and complexity that is testament to the hard work and dedication that the guys put into the band during what amounts to just a few months between the recording of the two demos.
Now I don't know if Daniel and the rest of the band may consider this blasphemous, but I must sheepishly admit that I like the tracks from Nefarious Vivisection a bit more than the Desert of Excruciation material. I guess it has become apparent that I am a bit of a caveman when it comes to my taste in metal, the more technical, avant-garde, experimental stuff often leaves me cold and I would much rather have something relentlessly brutal and bludgeoning than any number of time-changes and finger-knotting guitar leads and to this end Nefarious Vivisection fills my criteria perfectly. The filthy-sounding riffs stick in my head better than the more complex stuff of the DoE tracks, Masticated Cadaver and the closer here, Rectal Palpitation, being the favourites that stick with me most. Then the clincher is the absolutely fucking brutal vocals supplied by Mark that are some of the best death metal vocals I have ever heard, rivalling Reifert, Vincent, Chuck and even Demilich's Antti Boman.
I really love digging through early metal demos and, sure, there are a lot of poorly-recorded shit out there, but sometimes you find a genuine pearl or two and I would suggest that is exactly what we have here, a rugged, uncut death metal diamond.
Genres: Death Metal
Format: Compilation
Year: 2023
Cirith Ungol were originally formed in 1971 and split in 1992 after releasing a string of reasonably well-received albums. They reformed in 2015 like so many other legacy bands, but unlike a lot of those their first album after reforming, 2020's Forever Black was actually pretty good. Three years later the guys are back with another offering, having once more defied the odds and turning in a terrific album that is even better than Forever Black and stacks up pretty well against the band's '80's "classics", King of the Dead and One Foot in Hell which is good going for a band that is over fifty years old.
Dark Parade is chock full of hooky riffs that stick in the memory and give us old metalheads some decent headbanging action, often switching down gear to a more considered, almost trad doom, pacing to give our aging neck muscles some respite. The riffs aren't all there is to DP though, there is plenty of nifty and often extended soloing that should satisfy the most demanding of six-string enthusiasts, in a couple of places reminding me a bit of Blackmore's brilliant soloing during Rainbow's Stargazer, especially on second track Relentless and the later Sacrifice. The Blackmore reference isn't the only Deep Purple related influence though, the fast section of the album's epic Sailor on the Seas of Fate, with it's soaring keyboard overlay takes me back to the days of Highway Star and Burn.
Of course you can't talk about Cirith Ungol without addressing the elephant in the room that is Tim Baker's vocals, his screeching style not being to everyone's taste. Personally I have got used to him and now even view him as having a distinctive and unique style that works really well on it's own terms. But even if you aren't the biggest Baker fan, I think you would find his singing less irritating here, maybe age has mellowed his voice to a degree and rendered it less grating.
All in all this is a really good trad metal album that flaunts it's roots whilst still sounding modern and vital, which is quite a feat for a band four-fifths of whom are well into their sixties (yes even older than me). Gives me great hope than metal blood never fades!
Genres: Heavy Metal
Format: Album
Year: 2023
First off, I have to say that this is an enjoyable slab of metal but, in truth, it isn't really any more than that and I'm not sure I can get onboard with all the hype that has been behind this release. I think people are playing up the black metal content because, beyond the shrieking vocal style I don't think there is too much by way of black metal here. What it is is high-octane speed, thrash and good old heavy metal with a shit-ton of energy and vibrancy that exploits an assosciation with black metal by utilising black metal vocals, allowing an out-of-fashion musical style some relevancy within the modern metal scene.
Obviously James McBain, the sole muso behind Hellripper, is one hell of a talented guy and he can write riffs and hooks seemingly effortlessly as he glorifies fist-pumping metal hedonism, to which end his soloing is energetic and over-the-top. He certainly can't be accused of being boring or lacking ideas, but maybe therein lies the rub. It feels ocasionally like a pick'n'mix metal comp of Eighties worshipping retro-metal bands where every track works really well in isolation, but when consumed all together it becomes a bit too much. The only truly consistent factor is James' shrieking black metal vocals which do work very well in most instances.
Like I said at the start this is enjoyable stuff and I feel like a bit of a curmudgeon for saying it, but I really can't feel it enough to get me reaching for those higher scores. Maybe it just doesn't chime 100% with what I look for in my metal listening nowadays but it can't be ignored and has rightly has earned much praise for it's creator.
Genres: Black Metal Speed Metal
Format: Album
Year: 2023
Taake mainman Hoest is an interesting and somewhat underappreciated contributor to the history of Norwegian black metal. Beginning the band in Bergen as Thule in 1993 he has been around that infamous scene since it's earliest days. Whilst undoubtedly taking his cues from those raw, primal black metal beginnings, he has always been an artist who treads his own path. He has never shied away from longer tracks, having several clocking in around ten mibutes, but here he goes all-in with the album's 42 minutes being taken up by just four tracks, with opener "Denne forblaaste ruin av en bro" and following track, "Utarmede gruver" running into each other and coming off as one long twenty-minute-plus epic.
The album is jam-packed with tremolo-picked riffs that are generally quite catchy and melodic, yet Takke's skill is in not making it sound at all like a melodic black metal album and believe me when I say that this is jam-packed with riffs then you had better believe it, the tracks switch from riff to riff like a hyperactive toddler in a Coca-Cola factory. Despite his riffs incorporating influences from everything from trad metal to post-punk, he still imbues them with enough true black metal rawness to leave no one in any doubt that this is indeed a norwegian black metal album. That aesthetic is more than ably reinforced by Hoest's searing, screeching vocals, that provide that quintessentially authentic nordic black metal vocal experience and leave you in no doubt as to what type of album you are listening to.
The opening diptych is followed by the album's shortest track, Gid sprakk vi, which is the most obviously black metal of the tracks here, it's icy blasting reaching reaching for us through the years from the time of Darkthrone's unholy trilogy and producing a shiver down the spine of real black metal afficianados. That blast of nostalgia is followed by the closer and the album's longest single track, Et uhyre av en kniv. This has a progressive feeling to it with an overarchingly melancholic atmosphere, sounding to me a bit like something you may have heard from Ihsahn early in his solo career.
In summation I would say that Hoest has pulled off quite the trick here, releasing an album that is atmospheric, melodic and progressive, but that wears the monochromatic clothes of blistering and raw true norwegian black metal, leaving the listener with a decidedly original experience. I don't suppose this will receive too much attention but it really should as I think it is a wonderously creative slice of modern black metal that appeals to me far more than the preponderance of unlistenable dissonant and avant-garde black metal that everyone seems to be championing nowadays.
Genres: Black Metal
Format: Album
Year: 2023
For me, Isole have been on a bit of a downward trajectory since their late-2000s high water mark and listening to Bliss of Solitude and latest release, Anesidora, back-to-back gives an illustation of why. The latter release feels stripped of any real emotional weight, with the band seemingly seeking a sound more palatable to the mainstream, stoner doom crowd.
So, enough of what went wrong and let us focus on what the band were doing well fifteen years ago, with Bliss of Solitude and it's follow-up Silent Ruins. After forming in 2004 the Swedes released a couple of solid doom metal albums in 2005's Forevermore and '06's Throne of Void, but it was with 2008's Bliss of Solitude that they found themselves nearing the summit of the doom metal mountain. Obviously they were influenced by Candlemass' bombastic style of epic doom metal, but that was certainly not the full extent of what Isole were about, that bombast being tempered by a sorrowful, emotionally resonant side like that being displayed by the likes of Patrick Walker's Warning. The result of this for a release like Bliss of Solitude is that it sounds at once romantically triumphant, but also heart-rending and mournful, like the emotions of the victors of a savage battle won at great cost.
The production is spot on and producer, drummer Jonas Lindström (also of Ereb Altor), have fashioned a perfect guitar sound, being at once huge and weighty whilst still possessing a sorrowful emotion that also keeps it quite personal-sounding. Additional weight is provided by the thundering basswork and Lindström's well-pitched drumming, which act as a perfect foundation for the emotionally-charged dirges of the riffs. The band employs dual guitarists / vocalists in Daniel Bryntse and Crister Olsson, their style of esoteric, layered clean vocals being another source of the album's essential melancholy, particularly on a slower, more inward-looking track like "Imprisoned in Sorrow" or "Dying".
There is a classiness to Isole's best work, of which this is definitely an example, to which not all doom bands are able to aspire. This isn't just about playing super-slow riffs, dragged-out to inordinate lengths, but it is about portraying sadness and sorrow in a relatable and humanly resonant way, being able to express negative emotion in a manner that hints at both redemption and hope without sounding trite or insincere. Bliss of Solitude is a classic slab of emotionally-charged doom metal that deserves a larger share of the praise that is heaped on lesser releases.
Genres: Doom Metal
Format: Album
Year: 2008
I really enjoyed Tomb Mold's previous album, 2019's Planetary Clairvoyance. TM have evolved their sound even further since that album, branching out in a more technical and progressive direction, even dabbling with the ever more fashionable sorties into jazz metal territory. Whilst I understand and respect the band's desire to evolve and challenge themselves in both songwriting and technical expertise, it doesn't necessarily mean that I am fully on board with it. I have never made any secret of my lack of enthusiasm for the more technical style of metal and as for jazz, it generally has very little to do with me and is something I tend to keep at arms length. That said, the basis of TM's sound is very much in line with my preference for old-school, cavernous death metal and as such enables me to give them the benefit of the doubt. As I am exposed to repeated runthroughs, The Enduring Spirit is beginning to win me over, using the OSDM sound as a handhold I am finally coming to grips with Tomb Mold's continuing refinement of their direction.
In truth most of the evolution on the album is not as jarring as I first thought and is limited to some technical flourishes in the riffing and overall guitar work with the songwriting moving in a more progressive direction rather than a technical one, the band never going full-on Gorguts, which I am thankful for. Will of Whispers is the track I struggle with the most as the smooth jazz-like tone it employs in places is so at odds with the band's death metal roots and my own personal preferences, especially when the growling vocals are performed over the jazz sections (from around the four-minute mark), that it just sounds "wrong" to my ears. More generally, though, the technicality adds some spice to the riffing and battery that is the band's core sound, the technical aspect of the riffing on Fate's Tangled Thread, for example, gives an extra kick to what is actually already a bit of a killer and the more expansive and adventurous soloing in the latter half of the track is most definitely a cool direction to take it in. Tomb Mold almost seem like what would have happened if Autopsy had followed Death's career trajectory.
I think that for me the major takeaway from The Enduring Spirit is that this is not an album that deserves a rush judgement, it reveals more with every listen and I am definitely thawing to what I think the band is trying to achieve here. Most importantly, it still retains the ability to kick ass, no matter what it's technical or progressive intentions and that will always carry a metal album a long way with me.
Genres: Death Metal Progressive Metal
Format: Album
Year: 2023
I had a few reservations about Fossilization's 2021 EP, He Whose Name Was Long Forgotten, going into it with the feeling that it was definitely something that should really appeal to me. It was from members of a band I really enjoy (Brazil's Jupiterian) and they were playing my favourite style of death metal, the cavernous old-school version, so it should have been a no brainer, yet I felt there was sadly something lacking. Maybe my expectations for a couple of members of Jupiterian were misplaced, anticipating a more doom-filled approach to their death metal that didn't really transpire.
So, two years on and I am going into their debut full-length with my eyes much more wide open and my expectations held in check. Initial impressions were that little has changed and I still felt a bit short-changed, yet... As exposure to it increased with additional playthroughs, I am beginning to overcome my reticence and am actually really starting to enjoy this M-F. Although there are a number of doomier moments during the runtime, this is far more effective when it is pummelling the loving shit out of you, such as during the faster sections of the title track or The Night Spoke the Tongue of Flames, where it feels like you have thrust your face in front of a sandblaster! The guitar sound is a real down and dirty old cavernous sound that has been dug up from some music production graveyard, ably boosted by thundering basslines and infernal blastbeats whilst Vakka's hoarse growling roars threaten to strip away your sanity with tales of demonic delight at the destruction of the world we know and the advent of hell on Earth.
The album is quite short, it's eight tracks only amounting to a 36 minute runtime, but this is to it's credit as it doesn't outstay it's welcome, which I think a longer album of this intensity would. The band wield a consummate savagery that evidences their South American lineage, no one quite does metal viciousness like the South Americans do they? Ultimately, through sheer adrenaline intensity and technical adroitness, the duo have won me over and I take back all my earlier misgivings.
Genres: Death Metal Doom Metal
Format: Album
Year: 2023
Dirge are an Indian sludge metal five-piece, formed by members of hardcore punk band Death By Fungi in 2014. After almost ten years, this self-titled effort is only their second release, but they must have been busy honing their craft over the last decade, because this is a very accomplished slab of atmospheric sludge metal that certainly flicks all the right switches, at least as far as I am concerned.
Playing up to the sludge metal tag, this has thick, smoke-wreathed, stonerized riffs that serve as one half of their dual attack, in combination with Tabish Khidir's taut, throat-shredding roar, this is an example of the cudgel and the blade wielded with impressive adroitness and clinical skill upon the listeners aural sensibilities. Don't let me give the impression that this is relentlessly aggressive however, no there is more to Dirge in the songwriting department than that. They are equally adept when luring the listener into a misleading sense of calmness with gentler, soothing sections before unleashing their pent-up anger once more, such as during Malignant where the hypocritical politicians and businessmen of the world stumble into their lyrical sights and feel the full weight of Dirge's spleen being vented upon them (not as it bothers the bastards much I don't suppose, but you can't knock the band for trying).
I did label this as atmospheric sludge, but I mean that more as a description than in relation to the actual genre. Dirge don't exactly adhere strictly to the post-metal convention of build-build-release, but rather use gentler sections as a counterpoint to the general agressiveness of most of the runtime and thus render their conventional sludge metal more atmospheric as a result. I certainly wouldn't lump them in with Cult of Luna or Neurosis, but a better comparison for me is Germany's Hexer. The production absolutely nails the requisite sound, imparting a huge amount of weight to proceedings that an album like this stands or falls upon. I don't know too many Indian metal acts I must admit, but of those I am familiar with, Dirge top the tree.
Genres: Sludge Metal Post-Metal
Format: Album
Year: 2023
Godthrymm were formed by vocalist and guitarist Hamish Glencross who, along with drummer Shaun Taylor-Steels, was a member of My Dying Bride for some of their most iconic albums. Unsurprising then that they sound heavily influenced by the Yorkshire gothic death doom pioneers. The lineup is completed with Sasquatch Bob Crolla on bass and Glencross' wife Catherine was brought in as keyboard player and full-time female singer in 2022, after guesting as vocalist on a couple of tracks on the debut.
Although the MDB influence is apparent, this is nothing like as sorrow-ridden and mournful-sounding as the seminal Peaceville acolytes. The riffs aren't universally crushing and although they do carry sufficient weight, there is also an intangible airiness concealed within them that allows the tracks to breathe rather than being stultifyingly uncompromising. This effect is also enhanced by the concentration on clean vocals, not just Catherine's female vocals, but also Hamish's cleans seem to soar rather than bear the listener down. The rhythm section of Bob's bass and Shaun's drumming also keep things driving forward and are relatively busy for a doom album, providing further variation within the overall doom aesthetic.
The album as a whole and the individual tracks themselves are longer than on Reflections and so allow for more development and atmosphere-building with the songwriting seeming to have received an upgrade in the interim between albums. Overall, I would say that this is an album that takes a classic doom metal template and weaves lighter melodies within the riffing whilst harnessing a gothic aesthetic to produce an album that still manages to remain quite heavy, whilst delivering a refreshing and expansive atmosphere. It may not appeal to everyone, but I think it provides something a little bit different whilst not departing enormously fom what doom metal afficianados would be justified in expecting.
Genres: Doom Metal
Format: Album
Year: 2023
Pigs x7 are a Geordie stoner band, their sound based around fuzzed-up Sabbathian riffs and a passing nod to 1970's hard rock. Pretty much par for the course I suppose and no, they don't break the mould of stonerized doom metal, but it is pretty enjoyable and more than passes the requirements of heaviness that we stoner doom disciples expect. I must admit that when I hear an album like this nowadays, I think that the band are probably more enjoyable in a live environment than on record, not because there is anything at all wrong with it, but because it is based around riffs that are 50 years old now and the lack of originality is less of an issue in a live setting.
I do find it hard to get over-enthused about a lot of stoner metal these days and Land of Sleeper doesn't do anything to change that attitude. I feel a bit bad about heaping such faint praise upon this, because there really is nothing wrong with it at all, and it does occasionally hint at a darker side, but there is just so much familiarity contained within the grooves of the album that it is hard to get overly excited about it, If you are new to stoner doom, or are just a stoner obsessive, however, then you may well enjoy this a lot more than I did and I hope there are plenty of you because these guys deserve it, unfortunately I'm just not feeling it.
Genres: Stoner Metal
Format: Album
Year: 2023
Chained to the Bottom of the Ocean are an anonymous, four-piece sludge metal crew from Massachusetts. Their name is apt as a metaphor for the crushing weight of their material, bearing the listener down as surely as those many, many metric tonnes of pressure exerted at the ocean's floor. That monicker is, of course, taken from a Thou song and that is hardly surprising as they sound remarkably like their obvious influence, yet they are proficient enough, both songwriting and performance-wise to stand on their own two feet and stand clear of the shadow of the Baton Rouge sludge masters.
The band have a devastatingly thick, distorted guitar tone that is very much based on Thou's signature sound, but as I absolutely love Thou's guitar tone, then that is just fine by me. The vocals are painful, ragged howls with their origins in both hardcore and black metal, that shred the ears with their shrieking roar and tear at the soul with their heartfelt desperation. It has to be admitted that this is quite simple metal, there are no fancy tricks, technical gymnastics or attempts to surprise the listener, but that is all to the good as far as I am concerned, because this is metal for those who want to engage with the music on an emotional and visceral level rather than an intellectual one. This is as visceral a sound as any high-intensity death metal or febrile black metal, it's just that this is bludgeoningly heavy rather than rapier sharp and will result in crushed limbs rather than savage flesh wounds and ultimately it is music so heavy it feels like it has some physical effect on reality itself.
Though I say that this is fairly simple in structure, that doesn't mean that it is monolithically dull or unimpressive. There is enough variation in tempo and tone to keep the mind engaged, often turning to a post-metal style of atmospheric tension building and release that gives the listener a well-deserved payoff by track's end. Ultimately, it must be admitted, if you have no love for Thou and their extended sludge metal outings, then Obsession Destruction will probably leave you cold, but for those of us who view this style of throbbing, crushing sludge as manna from heaven and who enjoy being swamped and overwhelmed by the listening experience, then this is 66 minutes of pure gold.
Genres: Sludge Metal
Format: Album
Year: 2023
Finnish duo Convocation inhabit that sector of the metal Venn diagram where the arcs of funeral and death doom overlap, which also happens to be one of my favourite shades of metal. For latest album, No Dawn for the Caliginous Night, they lean more towards the funeral doom side of things, ultimately taking a leaf out of the mighty Esoteric's book. One danger of funeral doom that these Finns avoid is in overcooking things and allowing tracks to drag along without much variation, producing arse-numbingly long albums in the process. Convocation rarely go beyond the 12 minute mark for individual tracks and their longest album is fifty minutes, this one clocking in at forty-eight. They also like to bring in some textural and tonal variation, whilst still maintaining the slow, funereal pacing from whence the genre derives it's name.
The production is excellent, allowing the heaving chords to provide a huge wall-of-sound which towers over and threatens to smother the listener with sheer sonic immensity and even though there is an undoubted crushing power to the tracks, there is much more to them than just that, with string accompaniment and vocal and guitar melodies providing a striking countepoint to the fundamrntal heaviness of the instrumentation. Opener, Graveless yet Dead, features Shape of Despair's Natalie Koskinen as second vocalist, whose soaring, angelic vocals provide perfect contrast to Marko Neuman's bellowing roars as he rails against his fate as a cursed, undying soul, fated to forever wander the Earth. The album features another couple of guest vocalists, Corpsessed's Niko Matilainen on second track, Atychiphobia, and Dying Fetus / Misery Index singer Jason Netherton guesting on closer, Procession (which also sees Ferum's Samantha Alessi providing a spoken narration).
The eye of the album's storm is the instrumental track Between Aether and Land which sits at the heart of the album and which has a less dense feel to it, being woven through with a nice melodic thread that makes it sound less despairing and hopeless than the opening twenty minutes, allowing a shaft of light or a glimpse of open countryside to infiltrate the ominous and despairing atmosphere of the remainder of the album. Naturally this is short-lived and Lepers and Derelicts hits with the full crushing force of a tsunami of hopelessness, sucking all air and positivity out of proceedings and feeling all the more forceful for it's contrast with the preceeding track, Marko Neuman's howling roars sounding increasingly desolate as he bellows the protagonists hatred of his own existence as a torturous demon, bedevilling mankind. On closer, Procession, Convocation really reveal their hand with a track that has a massive epic quality to it, with superb compositional and atmospheric flourishes, from guest Antti Poutanen's cello accompaniment to Samantha Alessi's narration and the melodic guitar work that threads it's way through those hefty, intimidatingly massive chords. Ultimately the track (and by extension, the album) sheds it's horrors and ends with a much more serene feeling as cello and picked guitar along with the closing narration seem to offer the consolation that eventually all horrors must pass.
With No Dawn.. Convocation have truly cemented their place as one of my absolute favourite funeral / death doom bands and I would claim this as a classic of the genre, making them fit to take up their place alongside genre greats like Esoteric and Evoken.
Genres: Doom Metal
Format: Album
Year: 2023
I was quite the fan of Hands of Orlac's debut album, even scoring myself a vinyl copy. Their split album with The Wandering Midget was pretty good too. However, I was intially a bit reticent about their new release. The production sounds washed-out and it robs it of any heft or weight to a degree, with Ginevra's vocals particularly sounding quite weak. The early tracks are a bit lukewarm songwriting-wise too, lacking any speacial kind of hook or particularly interesting idea and ultimately failing to grab my attention.
Things take an upward turn after the short instrumental title track at the midpoint, however, with Malenka sounding much more like the sort of thing I have come to expect from the Italians. Frostbite is a much more interesting track too, with the flute adding some nice variation and giving it more of a paganistic, Blood Ceremony vibe. The lengthy closer Ex Officio Domini (The Executioner of Rome) weighs in at just under fifteen minutes length and is a bit of a proggy, psychedelic doom epic where we get to hear some nice soloing at last.
Overall a step down from their earlier material for me, let down by weak production and two or three formulaic and uninteresting tracks early on. I am glad I persevered though, because the last three tracks are very good and make the album overall a worthwhile listen.
Genres: Doom Metal
Format: Album
Year: 2023
I have been a fan of Krista Van Guilder's turns in bands like Warhorse and Second Grave for some time now and was very contented with the direction of latest band Benthic Realm as indicated by their first couple of EPs released in 2017/18. However things had gone quiet on the BR front while the world battled the Covid-19 pandemic, but now they are back with their debut full-length, five years after their last EP hit the shelves. Well, the band have certainly not been sitting back and I've got to say up front, this is possibly my favourite release from bands Krista has been involved in.
The guitar sound is perfect for this style of doom metal, with a powerful, booming tone that imparts a huge amount of heft to the riffs. The bass and drums provide a rock solid foundation upon which these booming riffs are built, providing a dense, all-enveloping quality to the sound. Then over all this soars the heavenly vocals of Krista herself. These aren't the ephemeral, airy vocals associated with a lot of female singers in the doom metal scene, but powerful and authoritative with a gorgeous tone that perfectly complements the weight of the riffs with a strength of their own, providing both melody and power in equal measure.
The songwriting is very good also, being instantly relatable to any doom metal veteran fan, whilst still retaining a vibrancy and identity very much of their own. No, Benthic Realm don't throw away the doom metal rulebook, but they are so proficient as songwriters and performers that Vessel sounds anything but tired and derivative, feeling like a shot in the arm to a scene that often retreads old ground with solid, but indistinguishable releases. If you only listen to one female-fronted doom metal album this year then you could do much worse than grab a copy of Vessel.
Genres: Doom Metal
Format: Album
Year: 2023
Ocean of Grief are a Greek six-piece who play a melodic style of death doom that aims for a sombre, melancholy mood rather than attempting to crush the air from the listener's lungs or infecting them with the charnel odours of some deep, dark abyss. Pale Existence is the band's second full-length following 2018's debut, Nightfall's Lament, of which I was quite a fan. Pale Existence also marks the swansong of vocalist Charalabos Oikonomopoulos who has since been replaced by Shattered Hope's Nick Vlachakis.
What leaps out at you the most about Ocean of Grief is their melodic and soaring, yet mournful-sounding guitar lines that have a clear and clean air about them which contrast exceedingly well with the gruff growling vocals and the heavier riffs. The band concentrate on generating atmosphere and strive for a more nuanced approach than sheer weight to achieve their aims, which to a certain extent they achieve quite admirably. I won't pretend that this is my preferred style of death doom because I love that crushing, sulphurous style perpetuated by the likes of early Autopsy or Coffins, but Ocean of Grief's version of a lighter, more melancholy style holds an appeal for me over some of the more theatrical-leaning death doom practitioners who smother thair attempts at projecting mourning and melancholy in keyboards and overwrought vocal shenanigans. Less seems to be more where these Greeks are concerned.
Of course, the issue with a lot of metal that concentrates on atmosphere and of which Oceans of Grief are also guilty is that the riffs aren't especially memorable, although some are very good indeed, but I didn't really find any of them worming their way into my hindbrain and sticking with me long after the album has ceased playing. Imprisoned Between Worlds is my favourite here and is probably the track that comes closest to staying with me, helped of course by the fact that it is the heaviest of the album's seven tracks. For me this is an album that is a very strong example of a style that I quite enjoy, but don't really love, so it scores well, even though it doesn't especially set my world afire. I know that sounds like damning with faint praise a little, but it is definitely worth your time and someone more inclined to it's melodic nature may rate it very highly indeed.
Genres: Doom Metal
Format: Album
Year: 2023
MWC are a relatively recent three-piece from the home of stoner doom, Birmingham, UK. They play mega-fuzzy Sabbathian riffs and sound more than a little like Uncle Acid & The Deadbeats, even down to the use of multiple layered lead vocals. Despite being derivative, they are very accomplished and have some good songs, mixing slower, groovy and doomish tracks such as Diabolical Influence or the album's best track, The Witchfinder Comes, with shorter, quicker, stuff like Death Lurks at Every Turn. Five or ten years ago I would have really lapped this shit up, but I have grown a bit inured to the charms of stoner metal over recent years, so while I can appreciate this as a very professional slab of stonerized goodness, I can't go all in on it and award it a higher score. However, if you are an Uncle Acid fanatic then I would urge you to give this a listen.
Genres: Doom Metal Stoner Metal
Format: Album
Year: 2023
With my perpetual touting of "Watching From A Distance" as the greatest album of all-time (and don't bother debating me on this, your piteous cries of protest will fall on deaf ears), I suppose it's time to write a few lines about Warning's "other" album, their debut from 1999, The Strength to Dream. It is obvious that this is nowhere near as well-regarded as their classic and chances are that the majority of doomsters haven't even listened to it. This is not exactly without reason, as it is nowhere near as accomplished as the sophomore and is more of an example of a band learning their trade and honing both their technical and songwriting skills than it is a band emerging fully-formed and proficient.
One of the distinctive features of Watching From A Distance is the emotional and heartfelt vocal performance of Patrick Walker and that is a major factor in it being considered (certainly by me anyway) to be one of the most affecting metal albums ever committed to record. Yet here, a mere seven years earlier, Patrick's singing is, to put it kindly, not the best. The performance is weak and he really seems to be struggling to stay in tune at times. The difference between these two performances is striking and is testament to how hard Patrick must have worked on his singing between the two releases. Secondly, the production isn't particulary good for a doom metal release, being little better than decent demo quality, robbing the riffs of a lot of their depth and heft, leaving it lacking the crushing and smothering weight that great doom metal thrives on.
It's not all bad news though, drummer Stuart Springthorpe still sounds exceedingly authoritative throughout the album, with his fill-heavy style working just as well here as on the later release and there are some pretty decent Reverend Bizarre-like riffs, especially on my favourite track, How Can It Happen, which is a track I would really like to have heard re-recorded or maybe even played live, because I rate it very highly as a straight-up doom anthem. In fact, I think the whole album would sound massively different with the technical improvements and production of the later album, because this is actually a solid set of songs.
I think Strength To Dream would always have struggled to escape the shadow of it's more illustrious younger sibling, but the glaring deficiencies in both production and PW's vocal performance exacerbate the situation, leaving it gaining a reputation, with more than a little justification, as nothing more than a warm-up for the main event of Warning's career. It's worth a listen because you can hear the germ of what would later be a classic album, but it is also an object lesson in patience and illustrates that sometimes a band needs to work on perfecting their craft before committing to releasing their best material.
Genres: Doom Metal
Format: Album
Year: 1999
Aura Noir are one of those bands that everyone knows, but very few talk about. Formed by Aggressor and Apollyon, who were both active in the Norwegian black metal underground, they were later joined by Mayhem guitarist Rune Eriksen (aka Blasphemer), prior to the recording of this debut full-length, Black Thrash Attack. By 1996 thrash metal was a shambling corpse that hadn't even recognised it's own demise. It's champions were fallen - Metallica had decided the way forward was trying to add an increasingly lengthening string of zeroes to their bank accounts, Kreator were embracing mediocrity and even Slayer were flailing around to such an extent that recording an album of hardcore punk covers seemed like a good move to them. Into this turgid scene, Black Thrash Attack was thrust like an adrenaline shot to the heart of thrash metal's inert body, causing it to rear upwards with an almighty gasp as life entered it once more. Taking the sound of the burgeoning black metal scene and regressing it to it's earliest days as an offshoot of thrash, Aura Noir injected vitality and good old-fashioned excitement into the once proud beast, producing possibly the best thrash album, at that point in time, since Rust In Peace.
Black Thrash Attack takes the riffs of European legends like Kreator, Bathory and Celtic Frost and marries them to raw and rabid blasphemous black metal to produce a vicious and visceral version of blackened thrash that sounds like the missing link between first- and second-wave black metal, with Darkthrone's early rawness being a particular touchstone. The riffs are all thrash, but the vocals, aesthetic and production values are raw and savage black metal through and through.
Aggressor and Apollyon alternate songwriting duties, with Aggressor being responsible for writing the odd-numbered tracks and Apollyon the even. Somewhat symetrically, they each perform vocals, bass and drums to the other's tracks. This approach offers up the risk of an uneven sound to the album, but I think that if you didn't know about it, it wouldn't be that obvious. Between this and it's predecessor the duo had added future Mayhem guitarist Blasphemer to expand the lineup to a trio, which was an inspired move and certainly adds meat to the bones of the band's sound, his impressive riffing being one of the albums real strengths. Despite the crusty rawness of the production, the playing is terrific and is inordinately precise with the drumming in particular surprising me at how accomplished it sounds for multi-instrumentalists, with Aggressor especially impressing in that regard. Sure it's not Dave Lombardo or even Fenriz, but it is still energetic and exact, with some sublime blasting from time to time.
Let's face it, this isn't sophisticated music and probably won't impress the more cerebrally demanding metalhead, but for those of us who thrive on guts and aggression and who value adrenaline-fuelled headbanging over chin-stroking reflection then Aura Noir turned in a classic with their debut full-length. This is dirty, nasty and aggressive and pushes all the right buttons, breathing new life into the rotting corpse of late nineties' thrash metal.
Genres: Black Metal Thrash Metal
Format: Album
Year: 1996
Veteran doom metal vocalist Phil Swanson (Hour of 13, Seamount, Vestal Claret, Atlantean Codex amongst many others) returns with Briton Rites' sophomore album, a full decade after the release of the band's well-regarded debut, For Mircalla. Occulte Fantastique pretty much picks up where the debut left off with Phil's trademark trad doom anthems. The riffs are great for fans of old-school riff-merchants like Tony Iommi or Victor Griffin and Swanson has got a vocal style that is utterly perfect for trad doom, but be warned, the lyrics are incredibly hokey, Roger Corman-esque occult nonsense that may occasionally make you cringe. Deep and meaningful this isn't, but if you feel like a bit of old-time "doom-dancing" and some ridiculously tongue-in-cheek lyrics, then this may be just what the doctor ordered.
Genres: Doom Metal
Format: Album
Year: 2020
Sorta Magora is yet another project from our prolific old friend, Belgian multi-instrumentalist Déhà who, aside from the many releases he has put out under his own name, also issues material as Imber Luminis, Slow, Aurora Borealis, Yhdarl and Clouds to name but a few of the many aliases, side projects and bands he is involved with. Sorta Magora sees him team up with Slovakian vocalist Veronika Madžová, aka Dryáda, who contributed vocals to Imber Luminis' 2019 Same Old Silences album. To date, Nič, also released in 2019, is the only material released under the project's own banner.
The album takes the form of a single, forty-minute track that melds together those most comfortable of bedfellows, funeral doom and atmospheric black metal. I think these two styles of extreme metal are perfect complements to each other at the best of times, and here Déhà expertly weaves them together into a cohesive and encompassing piece that is overflowing with atmosphere and mood. Now, I have never been the biggest fan of ambient music, for some reason it usually, bar a few rare instances, fails to connect with me. Yet, whilst listening to Nič, I suddenly made that connection, despite the fact that this isn't an ambient release. The genius of it is that it uses the dual-barrelled extreme metal approach to achieve a very similar effect to the best that ambient music can offer. Within this single piece of music you can be bouyed-up by a heaving swell of sound, only to later be dragged down by the irresistible tug of murky undercurrents and smothered by a cloying tsunami of crushing, doom-laden chords. Of course, these changes don't occur quickly or jarringly, but are generally glacial in their transition from one to the other, as if luxuriating and revelling in their sheer physical presence and shedding or gaining energy in a deliberate and organic manner.
The swelling tsunami of instrumentation is complimented and contrasted effectively by Dryáda's furious howls of anguish that pour forth in an almost cathartic litany of distress. Déhà himself also contributes vocals, his being a deeper, more nether-demon sounding performance. The lyrics, written by Dryáda in her native Slovak, are dour and grim, heralding the final days of a dying world and the protagonist's longing for that ultimate darkness. This is a release whose music is shorn of hope and is relentlessly bleak, the music intended to be as overwhelming and irresistibly bleak as the final unavoidable fate of a world devoid even of light, let alone life and is a prime example of blackened funeral doom that deserves much more attention than it has so far received.
Genres: Black Metal Doom Metal
Format: Album
Year: 2019
Naked City's Leng Tch'e has a reputation for being one of the most disturbing and affecting metal releases of all time. Comprising a single 30+ minute drone metal track and taking it's title from the torturous chinese method of execution whereby the condemned slowly has parts of their body sliced off and with a cover consisting of a photo of a victim undergoing said execution method, I was certainly expecting a tough listen as I approached this for the first time.
The first half of the track is indeed a great slab of drone metal with massive chords drenched in feedback, sparse, yet ominous percussion and a generally disturbing atmosphere prevailing, setting us up for the reputedly horrifying second half which features the tortured screams of japanese vocalist Yamatsuka Eye and the wailing freeform saxophone of John Zorn. So when this supposedly blood-curdling, spine-tingling tsunami actually hit, I was completely blindesided by just how much of a disappointment it was. The actual howling and screaming of Yamatsuka Eye is less disturbing and more irritating, sounding like a hysterical B-movie scream queen, which completely destroyed all the good work done on the build-up until then. In fact, when Zorn's manic sax playing joins the fray, I couldn't help but think that it would have been much more effective to let the sax alone express the horror of the situation.
I honestly cannot see where Leng Tch'e has gained such a notorious reputation. I have heard much more disturbing vocalisations in extreme doom and drone from the likes of Khanate and Thorr's Hammer, even Burning Witch's Edgy 59 is more disturbing than what we have here. And you know what, that is a crying shame because without those annoying screams this would actually be fucking brilliant, but for me they make it almost unlistenable and not in a good way, whereas without them this would have edged very close to a 5/5 for me.
Genres: Drone Metal
Format: Album
Year: 1992
I have only really been interested in drone metal for about a decade now and only started exploring it in earnest two or three years ago, but it has become one of my favourite genres and a lot of my highest scores of recent times have gone to drone metal releases. I guess that because I am quite an anxious person by nature, I find the monolithic droning of this style of metal to be inherently calming. Bong are a new name to me, despite them having been around for close to twenty years now and hailing from these British Isles I call home. They are prolific releasers of material with nine studio albums, a plethora of splits and EPs and thirty-plus live albums.
Mana-Yood-Sushai is the four-piece's third album, released in 2012, and is a sublime mix of drone metal and psychedelia that gives it a heavy eastern, mystical flavour, a sound I really love to hear brought into the sphere of metal. The album consists of only two tracks with the 27 minutes of the first track, Dreams of Mana-Yood-Sushai, being the one that really hooked me in. One of the members of Bong is sitar player, Benjamin Freeth, and his jangling strings combine perfectly with the droning chords of guitarist Mike Vest on Dreams... that seems to conjures up vistas of setting suns over mystical eastern temples that I found to be an inordinately meditative and restful piece. The track also features bassist/vocalist Dave Terry with some really nice throat singing that further enhances the eastern flavour with it's ritualistic chanting style favoured by eastern mystics.
Second track, Trees, Grass and Stone, is just shy of twenty minutes in length and is an instrumental, making it a bit more jam-like than the opener with the percussion of drummer Mike Smith driving the track and taking a more prominent role. It is also a heavier-sounding track than Dreams... the droning chords carrying increased weight and settling over the listener like a heavy blanket. As is true of an awful lot of drone metal, it is most effective when listened to at higher volumes, at the point when the experience can become almost physical and it's simple structure can fully infiltrate the listener's senses and become a transcendental sensation.
So once more a new drone metal discovery has me reaching for my higher scores and takes it's place in my list of metal favourites.
Genres: Drone Metal
Format: Album
Year: 2012