Blurr Thrower – Les Avatars du Vide (Review)

Blurr Thrower - Les Avatars du VideBlurr Thrower is a one man atmospheric black metal band from France and this is his debut release.

Blurr Thrower’s music is heavily influenced by the Cascadian scene, which is no bad thing when the results are this good. Continue reading “Blurr Thrower – Les Avatars du Vide (Review)”

Barshasketh – Barshasketh (Review)

Barshasketh - BarshaskethBarshasketh are a black metal band from New Zealand/the UK and this is their fourth album.

My past encounters with Barshasketh have always been very positive, (see their split with Void Ritual and split with Outre), but this is my first exposure to a full length from the band.

Well, I enjoyed the band’s previous work that I’ve heard, but this is something else. Continue reading “Barshasketh – Barshasketh (Review)”

Soilwork – Verkligheten (Review)

Soilwork - VerklighetenThis is the eleventh album from Soilwork, a veteran Swedish metal band.

Soilwork’s eleventh album mixes melodic death metal with fat grooving riffs and a hard rock sensibility that sits at the heart of the band, allowing them to straddle the worlds of metal and rock quite effectively. Having said that, it should be clarified that the rock aspects of this album are mainly hidden underneath a firmly metal veneer; they inform, without overpowering. Continue reading “Soilwork – Verkligheten (Review)”

Cóndor – El Valle del Cóndor (Review)

Cóndor - El Valle del CóndorCóndor are a Colombian death/doom/heavy metal band and this is their fourth album.

Cóndor, (with members of Siete Lagunas), play a beguiling and personable mix of death metal and classic doom/heavy metal, at least musically. Vocally, we’re firmly in the territory of formidably daemonic harsh growls for most of the time, (we also get the occasional spoken word part and clean singing on the final song, the folky title track). Continue reading “Cóndor – El Valle del Cóndor (Review)”

Nailed to Obscurity – Black Frost (Review)

Nailed to Obscurity - Black FrostThis is the fourth album from Nailed to Obscurity, a melodic doom metal band from Germany.

Nailed to Obscurity play a modernised version of old-school death/doom. Black Frost contains 47 minutes of material that can be roughly characterised as a combination of old Katatonia mixed with elements of Paradise Lost, Insomnium, Opeth, Décembre Noir, and others. The band definitely let their own collective personalities shine through in the music, however. Continue reading “Nailed to Obscurity – Black Frost (Review)”

Yatra – Death Ritual (Review)

Yatra - Death RitualYatra are a doom band from the US and this is their debut album.

Now here we have an album that’s infused with darkness; it’s almost tangible, but in a warm, smoky way. Mixing ugly doom, riff-hungry stoner, blackened sludge, and harsh drone influences into 45 minutes of material, Death Ritual showcases the dark underbelly of doom metal. Continue reading “Yatra – Death Ritual (Review)”

Gross Misconduct – Equinox (Review)

Gross Misconduct - EquinoxGross Misconduct are a Canadian death metal band and this is their third album.

This is progressive death metal with a thrash influence. The band describe this album in the following way – “Imagine Cynic with a dollop of Death, a smattering of The Crown/Mastodon/Gojira and healthy doses of 1980s Metallica and Slayer.” I’ve simply regurgitated this here as it’s a better descriptor of how Equinox sounds than anything I could come up with. Continue reading “Gross Misconduct – Equinox (Review)”