Mangata Festival was not at all on my radar, until I found out that Ante-Inferno, Abduction, and Devastator were playing it, (originally The Infernal Sea too). Throw in Wolvencrown, who I’ve never seen before, and it certainly peaked my interest. Continue reading “Mangata Festival – Nottingham, 12/07/25 (Live Review)”
This is the debut album from Tayne, an industrial rock band from the UK.
Love contains 31 minutes of industrial rock/metal, taking a variety of influences and using them to create something quite charismatic. Tayne’s music is easy to enjoy if you like your tunes to consist of multiple component parts, all joined together with skilled vision. Continue reading “Tayne – Love (Review)”
Grief Ritual are hardcore band from the UK and this is their debut album.
Collapse features 40 minutes of raging hybrid hardcore. It’s fierce, unforgiving, and colossally heavy. Grief Ritual are here to punish the listener, so prepare yourself for a pummelling. Continue reading “Grief Ritual – Collapse (Review)”
This is the sixth album by UK hardcore band Polar.
It’s always a pleasure to catch up with Polar. Ever since 2016’s No Cure No Saviour I’ve been a big fan of the band’s hardcore/post-hardcore stylings. This album was followed in 2019 by the heavier Nova, and then in 2023 by Everywhere, Everything, which developed Polar’s more textured post-hardcore side. Now, uncharacteristically fast, we have Five Arrows, which brings us 38 minutes of new material. Continue reading “Polar – Five Arrows (Review)”
This is the debut album from Nicolas Cage Fighter, a metallic hardcore band from Australia.
The promo blurb states that Nicholas Cage Fighter combine “ruthless hardcore, late 90s metal and death metal influences”, which sets the scene nicely for the 37 minutes of material on The Bones That Grew from Pain.
Imagine a mixture of Hatebreed, Pantera, and the groovy aspect of bands like Thy Art Is Murder and Decapitated, and you’ll have a rough idea of where Nicolas Cage Fighter are coming from. They specialise is music that takes the metallic hardcore style from the 2000s and adds in more contemporary influences.
The music is full of energy and muscular heaviness. These songs are designed for the live arena, but are well-written enough to survive outside of their natural environment. Crushing breakdowns, heavy riffs, and roared vocals are the main order of business, and Nicolas Cage Fighter know their trade well. The songs are heavy, angry, are catchier than you might expect, and are just plain fun to listen to.
I like the inclusion of ambient, melodic, and atmospheric elements into the band’s brutal sound. These are only small enhancements to the songs and only appear at select moments, but they add value nonetheless. I also really like the singer’s vocals. They’re well-performed and varied enough to hold interest.
The Bones That Grew from Pain sits nicely next to recent records by Malevolence and Cage Fight. If you are looking for an album to hit the gym to, or just something to go and break stuff to, then this is for you.
A highly recommended slab of crushing heaviness.
This is the debut album from Cage Fight, a metal/hardcore band from the UK.
Featuring a guitarist from Tesseract and an ex-singer of Eths, Cage Fight are here to smash your face unceremoniously into the concrete, over and over again. Prepare yourself. Continue reading “Cage Fight – Cage Fight (Review)”
Wonderbox Metal 