This is Ultha’s second album. They are a black metal band from Germany.
Now this is quite the find. Mixing elements of Burzum, Emperor, Wolves in the Throne Room and Lycus, Ultha mix old and new black metal with some crushing doom influences to produce 63 minutes of bleak melancholy and dark allure. Continue reading “Ultha – Converging Sins (Review)”
Dreariness are an Italian black metal band. This is their second album.
Dreariness combine depressive black metal with elements of post-black metal and shoegaze. The result is an impressive album that boasts a lot more depth and atmosphere than the majority of their depressive peers. Continue reading “Dreariness – Fragments (Review)”
Zao are an American metalcore band and this is their eleventh album.
By this point Zao are pretty much a musical institution, despite this being their first album since 2009’s Awake?.
The Fear Is What Keeps Us Here is probably my favourite Zoe release. The utterly catchy chaotic savagery of it still blows me away to this day. The Well Intentioned Virus is Continue reading “Zao – The Well-Intentioned Virus (Review)”
This is the second album from Swedish black metallers Omnizide.
As the follow up to 2014’s very pleasing debut album Death Metal Holocaust, Nekroregime continues the band’s blackened assault on the senses, added to and infected by some good old-fashioned death metal influences here and there. Continue reading “Omnizide – Nekroregime (Review)”
Alkira are a thrash metal band from Australia and this is their second album.
You may recall Alkira from their 2014 debut album Juggernaut. This was a very enjoyable slab of aggressive thrash metal that I especially enjoyed as it seemed at the time that so much of thrash was doing the retro/ironic/humour/whatever version of the style, which is largely not for me; Alkira were, (and are), somewhat of a panacea for this. Continue reading “Alkira – Klotho (Review)”
Here we have a short split between death metallers Lago and Calm Hatchery, from the US and Poland, respectively.
Lago’s 2014 album Tyranny was an album that had a kind of darkly melodic brutality to it. It saw the band balance their style somewhere between the old-school and the new, to great effect. Continue reading “Lago/Calm Hatchery – Split (Review)”
Créatures is an avant-garde/experimental black metal one-man project from France and this is his debut album.
The vocals on this release are quite varied, shifting and morphing in line with the demands of the music. Apparently multiple guest vocalists contribute to the tracks, each having a different part to play in the narrative.
Sometimes we get a voice that’s full of commanding authority and blackened malice, sometimes even Continue reading “Créatures – Le Noir Village (Review)”
Call of the Void are a US hardcore/grindcore band and this is their latest EP.
Call of the Void operate from a mixture of hardcore, grind and sludge metal influences. This sees them taking all three, rolling them into a dense, dangerous ball and then throwing it as hard as they can at anyone close by.
It’s always good to hear the band. Continue reading “Call of the Void – AYFKM (Review)”
Distant Sun have returned with their latest full-length release Into the Nebula. If you’re not yet familiar with the band, I urge you to check them out as their combination of power and thrash metal is quite catchy and infectious. The band know how to write a decent tune and Into the Nebula is full of them.
So have a read of what guitarist/vocalist Alexey Markov has to say and get to know the band a bit better. They’re a band worth getting to know…
Hey! We’re a power/thrash metal band from Moscow, Russia, but our drummer Eric comes from Ukraine. This style used to be called “speed metal” 20 years ago, so we might be a bit late with our music. But we play it because we love it, and not because somebody else wants to hear it (although of course we are glad when someone likes it!). We have 3 releases: Sunless Citadel (5-song EP) from 2012, Dark Matter (2015). Our new 2016 full-length is called “Into the Nebula”. We also recorded more than 10 covers, some of them are available on your YouTube channel: http://www.youtube.com/c/distantsun Continue reading “Interview with Distant Sun”
The Promise of Plague are an industrial black metal band from the US. This is their debut release.
Featuring members of Fatal Step, Astrum, Empyrean Asunder and the mighty Abominant, here we have 16 minutes of raw black metal with industrial/modern influences that place it somewhere between the underground and a more accessible area; not quite polished and commercial, but potentially getting there. Continue reading “The Promise of Plague – Sleepwalking into Armageddon (Review)”
Wonderbox Metal 