Anaïs Mitchell
Young Man In America

 May 1, 2012

Anaïs Mitchell’s 2010 epic, Hadestown, was possibly the most overlooked album in a decade. It remains the highest rated album of all time on Any Decent Music – a review aggregator in the MetaCritic vein (where, by the way, it’s not even listed). And yet, no love. Even indie-bible, Pitchfork.com, which churns out 25 reviews a week, missed it. Considering, though, that the album is a “folk opera,” re-telling the story of Orpheus and Eurydice as a commentary on the Great Depression, this is no surprise.  While undeniably beautiful, the album was every bit as dense and inaccessible as you might imagine. For that reason alone, I’m going to say that its successor, Young Man In America, might just be better. Mitchell’s ambition may have gained Hadestowncritical recognition as “perfect,” but it was simply too bizarre for public acceptance. In Young Man In America, on the other hand, it’s her subtlety that reigns.

For too long (about 2 weeks), I listened to this album as a purely musical expression, hardly taking the time to understand the content. But that is definitely no critique of the music; Mitchell’s songs are so beautifully crafted that they simply demand listening. Immediately, the title track and “Dyin Day” jump out at you, as near perfect folk songs. Each is simultaneously upbeat, powerful, and soothing, blending a fantastic array of perfectly plucked and pounded instruments. There isn’t a musically bland, or overly conventional song on the album. And, as a cherry on the sundae, none of those unconventional songs are even slightly daunting or inaccessible. They are all catchy without ever sacrificing complexity.

All of that said, theexceptional aspect of Young Man In America is clearly its content. Anaïs Mitchell is as impressive a social critic as they come, cutting to the heart of American life with the poignancy and precision of a Tocqueville or Twain. Young Man In America is not the concept album that Hadestownwas; rather, it’s – in her words – “a meditation on a theme.” Less cryptic than its predecessor, that theme is clear from the title: being a “young man in America.” Thankfully however, you needn’t shudder at the prospect of didactic political bullshit. No, in Young Man In America, Mitchell manages a commentary that is more a beautiful, if tragic, contemplation of American life than a party platform expose. 

“Oh mother shelter/A mother is a shelterer… //Your cities are a wilderland / Look upon your children,” she cries on the thumping opener, “Wilderland,” which, when google’d, returns this: “In the fiction of J. R. R. Tolkien, Rhovanion or Wilderland was a large region of northern Middle-earth” (Wikipedia). Simultaneously establishing America as a motherly protector and middle-ages-war-zone, Mitchell crafts a unique, yet familiar, canvas on which to paint her pictures. The first of these pictures, and the title track, traces the life of a ‘young man in America.’ Though her words seem antiquated, her themes still resonate. Blurring the arc of childhood with a tinge of nostalgia – “I come out like a cannonball / Come of age of alcohol” – she invokes an Arcade Fire-esque critique of modern adolescence. Another all too familiar narrative, her protagonist then bounces from his paternal rejection to dreams of fame to a descent into madness, settling ultimately as “Another wayward son / Waiting on oblivion.” This theme is clear throughout the album, perpetually painting a picture of fleeting ease in a turbulent world. The album is similarly caught up in the question of lineage. “He Did,” the album’s central contemplation of fatherhood, traces a strained father-son relationship to a tragically uneventful death, culminating in a set of questions: “But who gave you an axe to grind? / Who gave you a path to find? Who gave you a barn to build? / And an empty page… to fill?” Her ability to turn these situations on their head, making you question and often appreciate some of life’s givens, is where the album becomes truly powerful.

ForHadestown,Mitchell recruited folk heroes Greg Brown, Justin Vernon, and Ani DiFranco – among others – to play the myriad characters of her epic. For YMIA, however, she goes it alone, telling tales from all perspectives – predominantly male – in her singular squeaky voice. Though it may seem little more than an arrogant neglect of the effect of her voice, Mitchell is clearly aware of how best to use it. The consistency and curiosity of her voice gives her ever-shifting perspectives profound weight, removing Mitchell “the story-teller”from her stories, and granting her objectivity as a social critic. The first 8 songs are told from a man’s perspective, in a wide array of tones, culminating in “Annemarie,” a sad cry for the fleeting acceptance of a lover. On the next track, “Tailor,” the album pivots, with a young woman defining herself only in relation to her man. Again, we see Mitchell’s brilliant ability to balance every situation, striking a note in the heart of every listener. Truly a feat, few have ever managed to present such a complex, universally relatable tapestry in such a concise, calming entity. 

Written by Eric Riley

Poking around online while in the process of getting started here, I wanted to see what some other people were saying and if it matched how I feel. While the results were a bit sparse, the briefest review I found was also the most helpful; five short words, encapsulating not only the buzz surrounding Vérité but also a perfect summary of what Somewhere in Between offers.

“I can die happy now.”

With the exception of blockbuster movies and the Stanley Cup Finals, summer is the worst of the four seasons - it’s a thousand degrees, football is still months away, there are bugs everywhere - it’s awful. But, along with the exceptions above, there is one more key redeeming factor that comes to mind - pop music always hits a peak midyear.

Now with a trio of EPs on her resumé and a successful cover going viral, Vérité (born Kelsey Byrne) is here to not only show what she has to offer with her debut full-length, but prove that she can keep pace with the summer’s brightest starlets.

Coming quickly out of the gate, opener “When You’re Gone” creeps its way in, softly serenading “I don’t mind you leaving when the damage is done / And I don’t mind, I feel the same when you’re gone.” As this winds down, it leads into the album’s first single, “Phase Me Out,” a track with deep grooves and high summits; a perfect choice for a first-impression-maker, showing off Byrne’s strong vocal range and instrumental ability.

Where Somewhere In Between finds a lot of its success is in how well it delivers to-the-point pop. That’s not to say that the album doesn’t take chances (more on this later), but where artists may try adding extra bells and whistles (sometimes literally) to give a track that little bit extra, there’s stretches of compositional purity thanks to Byrne’s musical IQ.

On “Better,” Byrne lets her light vocals do the heavy lifting, joined by limited use of instruments and effects. Not only a highlight of her vocal ability, it showcases one of the simpler, more relatable set of lyrics on the album: “Maybe I fucked it up / maybe I let you down / Maybe I’m too far gone / maybe it’s simple that it’s over now / Maybe we’re just better off.”

Where there are great things to be said about simplicity, the same can be said about the moments where the album reaches for something more, mixing in something unexpected and creating something bigger. “Death of Me” flutters in soft and low, with Byrne singing of dreams and ghosts, and the tone placing us in the ether. Suddenly, as the chorus hits, the track is dipped beneath an electric filter, with a horn section blasting into the frame. It’s abrupt and borderline-intrusive, but even better, it works. Much like its predecessor, “Bout You” is also a bit different - darker, drearier than most of the rest of the record.

Following a pair of relatively straightforward opening tracks, the combination of “Death of Me” and “Bout You” in the 3-4 spots works wonders for Somewhere in Between, shaking up the pacing before it there’s ever a risk at growing stale or stagnant.

Though I just sent a decent bit of page pointing out the successes gained from sticking to script and alternately from taking chances, Somewhere In Between finds its best moments coming from a combination of the two. “Nothing” starts off feeling like a late-90’s/early-2000’s R&B/pop song, before abruptly dropping into a chorus that is dancehall perfection.

Following “Better,” “Need Nothing” combines soft vocals with heavy, mechanical styling to create a blend of diamonds and dirt. Lastly, the ethereal, ambient “Floor” is a standout - a beautiful goodbye track that lands in the middle ground of a breakup ballad and ‘80s gloom-pop. To be completely honest, it doesn’t matter how any of these tracks are performed, because the voice behind them delivers each and every one with the virtuosity and poise of a seasoned veteran.

This year has already seen some of the biggest names around release their latest albums, but with Somewhere in Between, we’re treated to the first from one of the freshest talents out there, and it may leave a few looking over their shoulders; Vérité is coming for the throne.

Release Date: June 23, 2017
Rating: 4.5/5.0
Check Out: “Nothing,” “Floor,” “Solutions”  
For Fans Of: Chaos Chaos, Lorde, Marina & the Diamonds

Tracklist:
1. When You’re Gone
2. Phase Me Out
3. Death of Me
4. Bout You
5. Better
6. Need Nothing
7. Saint
8. Solutions
9. Floor
10. Somewhere In Between
11. Nothing
12. Control
13. Freedom of Falling

Written by Eric Riley

Whatever the craft, whether you are a musician, a writer, an artist, actor, athlete, anything whatsoever (artistic or not, really), making a strong impact is something to be desired. And while impact is one thing, legacy and lasting value are what separate the sudden fads from the reveled and remembered.

Now in the process of building on the foundation that was their debut, 2014’s stellar Ars Moriendi, North Carolinian mini-community The Collection have returned with Listen to the River, a second exploration into the struggles and stumbles that lead us to where we’re heading.

Vocalist/lyricist David Wimbish describes the album as a way of “reexamining and reorienting” a sunken sense of faith, courage, and spirituality while, alongside ex-wife and vocalist/multi-instrumentalist Mira, “processing the divorce and recontextualizing the relationship.” With the collision of these two struggles, River’s songs were a way to approach both simultaneously. Within the first moment of the album, Wimbish croons “Oh, there was sorrow in every word / Oh, how it longed to be heard. / But for the first time, I am not speaking / I am just listening until I can hear you / On my own.”

Where the first single “You Taste Like Wine” keeps things joyous and bright with horns and keys dancing, followed by the snap-along “Mama,” we hear the first and few instances of upbeat tempos. Each track is worthy of praise (and I’ll try to remember to circle back to them) but what follows is the first true standout Listen to the River offers us.

The booming drums that lead into “Birds,” each beat louder and heavier than that which preceded it, build their way to something huge. The combination of the echoing percussion, ethereal backing instrumentals, and Wimbish’s tender-at-times vocals culminates in a chilling anthem of dealing with uncertainty. As it draws to a close, he bellows “They say ‘You ask too many questions / You start too many fires / You dream of resurrection / But you’re too scared to die.’ ” Initially perceived as a criticism, its effect changes when Wimbish no longer has to sing it alone, joined by the support of vocals behind him. By the time its last round is sung, this notion of disapproval and self-doubt transforms into one of potential and oneness and optimism.

A bit later, there’s a slight feeling of nostalgia for the group’s previous album. Ars Moriendi, featured a trio of songs titled “The Younger One,” “The Middle One,” and “The Doubtful One,” each One a four-to-five-minute storybook. Here, we are introduced to “The Older One,” who “finds light in the darkest of rooms, sun in the smallest of moons … taught movement can be safe.” Whether fictional character or autobiographical pseudonym, these moral dichotomies  presented by “The Older One” show the protagonist’s change, growth, and maturation.  

Much like The Younger and Middle Ones, a drop around halfway through breaks the song in two. The gentle fall and rebuild throughout the final hundred seconds or so are both placed and performed perfectly - muffled vocals fading away, making room for a soft, haunting piano exitlude. The change in direction is sudden, though not unexpected from The Collection. Where the final minute is nothing more than simple pianowork, the conclusion feels like the tapes kept rolling because there was just a bit more story to be told.

Listen to the River comes to a close with “The Listener,” and it is a perfect example of what makes The Collection such a special group. The song itself is, bear with me, admittedly lackluster at times. But with that said, by taking full advantage of their size and range and the weapons at their disposal, they buff and shine a simple piece of sea glass into a souvenir.

As mentioned before, this album was written as a way of processing and dealing. And with that comes questions. If there are meanings to be searched for or answers hoping to be found, “No Maps of the Past” contains the questions - “where did all of our time go?” “How did I used to hold you before you knew that you needed it?” “If everything always feels new, then what if nothing is?” It may seem hyperbolic to say each word is as important as the next, but in this instance, the song as a whole is more powerful than it would be dissected into lines. Throughout, the song maintains a perfect balance of strength and delicacy, shelter and vulnerability, wretch and reconciliation. In the end, it presents what the group set out to achieve - the creation of something, hoping to honor the past while accepting the present.

So, to circle back to my initial point, what do we have here - just a strong first impact or a lasting value?
For The Collection, it isn’t a this-or-that; the answer is just yes.
Three summers ago, Ars Moriendi hit my life like a lightning bolt. It was an album that sang to me every word that I couldn’t myself conjure.
And now, once again able to find the bright and the beautiful within the dark and despaired, Listen to the River is a testament in learning you can hold onto the past without it holding you down, and that you must allow yourself to let things go where they go, let things happen as they happen, let the currents carry you where they will.

Release Date: March 24th, 2017
Rating: 4.75/5
Run Time: ~45 minutes
Check Out: “No Maps of the Past,” “Birds,” “Mama”

Track listing:
1. ”Threshing Floor”
2. “You Taste Like Wine”
3. “Mama”
4. “Birds”
5. “No Maps of the Past”
6. “Siddhartha (My Light Was a Ghost)”
7. “Sing of the Moon”
8. “So Many People”
9. “The Older One”
10. “The Alchemy of Awe”
11. “The Listener”

Killer Be Killed-Reluctant Hero

The, possibly, most high-profile metal supergroup, Killer Be Killed, are back after a lengthy break following their self-titled 2014 debut with a rather similarly well-rounded sophomore effort. Sepultura founder and current Soulfly leader Max Cavalera, dynamic frontman of the late Dillinger Escape Plan and The Black Queen Greg Puciato (who just put out a fantastic solo album a month ago), Troy Sanders of Mastodon, and Converge drummer Ben Koller make for a rather promising and lineup.

Though it takes some time to break into its shoes, a few songs in to build some momentum, Reluctant Hero is a pretty boisterous display from the star-studded alliance, who really have no excuse to fail with their combined pedigrees in the album’s thorough combination of relatively straightforward thrash, groove metal, and sludge metal.

The multi-vocal attack serves some of the more dynamic trade-offs well, but with three of them singing, I think they could have gone a little harder on layered vocal harmonies and dizzying trade-offs.

Indeed, the album’s greatest weakness is perhaps how unambitious it feels for a project made by the joining of four metal giants, especially in comparison to their works with their respective main bands.

Despite feeling largely like a less-proggy, safe version of an early Mastodon album, Reluctant Hero delivers the no-nonsense thrashers and groovy bangers it needs to, and any complaints about it are mild and largely overshadowed by the exciting dynamic exchanged among the four superstars here.

7/10

Dark Buddha Rising-Mathreyata

Dark Buddha Rising, who paired up with Oranssi Pazuzu last year for the mind-warping Syntheosis under the name Waste of Space Orchestra, return to their own solo ventures, just as their fellow psychedelic black metal collaborators did earlier this year, in injecting a little bit of magic mushroom hallucinosis into black metal through spacy, freakish synth work.

While not quite as psychedelically wild as Oranssi Pazuzu’s transforming of more traditional black metal Mestarin Kynsi,Mathreyata follows a similar pattern of progression through heavy, dizzying atmospheres that build to fulfilling climaxes with a more ambient, droning, and meditative form of blackened post-metal that the band of course give a little dose of LSD to.

And the results are intriguing at the very least. I would highly recommend this to anyone who enjoys atmospheric black metal at its most meditative or Sunn O))) for the enveloping atmospheres their music can create.

8/10

Ghostemane-ANTI-ICON

As much as it may get metal’s puritans’ panties in a bunch, yes, musicians who create largely outside the realm of metal can also have some metal cred up their sleeve that we just don’t see too much. And Floridian rapper Ghostemane has plenty of prerequisites in metal to justify his presence in the scene and his wielding of the genre.

The 29-year-old got his start in the music world in local hardcore bands and has taken a ton of influence from nu metal and industrial metal, and that comes through in no uncertain manner on ANTI-ICON.

Bristling with an unregulated darkness, Ghostemane traverses ANTI-ICON with brooding, Manson-like, low-register moaning as well as amped up hardcore quick-spit rap verses about the most self-loathing depths of depression and the depravity of the most aggressive and sinister intrusive thoughts.

And sure, the edginess is pretty over-the-top across the whole album to the point of including an extended and rather isolated sample of someone choking severely that slightly repulse even a death metal fan, but there’s something so fresh, honest, and addicting about the unabashedly masochistic mesh of sounds here.

The consistency of the gritty industrial center and the punchy metallic hardcore accents across the album are mountainous evidence that this isn’t some naive, quirky side quest for Ghostemane. He knows his shit and he’s not messing around.

With no high-brow filter over the cup, Ghostemane’s pitch black brew on ANTI-ICON is an upfront and captivating illustration of a disturbed mind in its lowest of lows that puts brutal emotional honesty before poetic eloquence, and it makes you appreciate it for its willingness to be unattractive and unembarrassed.

8/10

October 2020

Six Feet Under-Nightmares of the Decomposed

I wrote a full-length review of this disaster of an album earlier in the month, and yeah, wow. Between the phoned-in performances from the instrumentalists who have proven themselves far above this joke of a band and the half-assed production this would have been a pretty crappy album even without Chris Barnes’ milk-aged vocals. But he’s here, and he’s managed to actually get worse too, gasping his way through the whole album and littering it with these ludicrous “high” squeals that would make Smeagol sound like a more competent death metal vocalist. It’s the worst thing I’ve heard all year, and what’s worse, I don’t think Six Feet Under is stopping.

1/10

With that out of the way, let’s cleanse the pallet right away with some really good shit.

Greg Puciato-Child Soldier: Creator of God

Ever reliable in his artistically integrity, explosive former Dillinger Escape Plan frontman, Greg Puciato, has been pretty sonically and artistically adventurous since the honorable dissolution of the iconic mathcore outfit, his most notable music project being the ethereal, synth-heavy The Black Queen. This year, however, Puciato has gone fully solo for a full-length project, and something told me to get ready for a wild ride, and boy was I right on that hunch. Borne out of an exponentiated process of songwriting that produced songs Puciato deemed unfitting for any of his current projects, what was planned as a small release to ship these songs out of the writing room eventually spiraled into a full-blown debut solo album clocking in at over an hour. A lot of solo projects play like clearly indulgent amateur hour sessions from an artist whose ego has been boosted pretty well from significant success from their main project, leading them to overconfidently try their hand at music they have no business trying it at. And it’s often approached under the understanding that it is a victory lap, more or less, and a satisfaction of creative impulses for the sake of it. Sometimes the resultant material is clearly inspired and showcases a side of an artist that certainly deserves some spotlight. Other times it feels like being trapped in an awkward situation with an acquaintance where they just show you all their newest pedals and production software and you’re just stuck there watching them fiddle around while you nod along and offer the occasional “wow, that’s pretty crazy” every now and then while they don’t pick up on the obvious cues that you are just waiting for them to finish playing with their toys. While Puciato was open about this album being borne from the very creatively borderless mindset that so often damns solo projects, Child Soldier: Creator of God is an actual realization of the type of grand, genre-spanning album that so many solo artists envision themselves making and set out to create, and it’s hardly a whimsical, amateurish crack at the styles within either. Puciato’s foray into sludge metal, industrial rock, harsh noise, darkwave, synthwave, and shoegaze, (1) makes for a hell of a dynamic and exciting track list, and (2) shows a much deeper than average respect for and relationship with the styles being played here. This isn’t some frontman thinking his charisma can carry him through a whole rap solo album; this is a well-rounded artist (also a hell of a frontman, no denying that) giving the most comprehensive look yet into his creative mind. The album leaps around in patches of different styles, strung together mostly by ambient connective tissue of various types, all with a great attention to detail paid to both texture and progression. We get early patches of smooth ambiance, but also aggressive industrial and sludge metal, eventually moving to more soothing and meditative synthy stuff around the middle, finishing with some serene, Have a Nice Life-esque shoegaze. But really there’s no way to sum up this album stylistically without breaking down every single song on here, and that would just ruin the fun and the experience. You really just have to experience it for yourself.

9/10

DevilDriver-Dealing with Demons I

Embarking on a conceptual double-album, Dez Fafara and DevilDriver’s first installment in the pair is a scoop of the, indeed, slightly above average, but unfortunately still plain and predictable modern groove metal they always offer up. I’ll give the band credit for keeping the pace up and clearly putting substantial energy into the performances on this album, while also trying to squeeze in a few shake-ups to their sound, like the clear Gojira-inspired riffage on the opening track. The album loses steam, unfortunately, as its punches lose their impact as it goes on.

6/10

Anaal Nathrakh-Endarkenment

While certainly cultivating a unique sound, Anaal Nathrakh’s unholy fusion of nasty modern blackened grindcore with sweeter metalcore and melodic death metal elements has its mixed results. And while that might at first sound like a relatively critical assessment of the Brits’ eleventh album, I’d say that there is actually a lot to enjoy and take in for at least the interesting mix of styles, most of which are hits rather than misses as well.

7/10

Enslaved-Utgard

Having been a fan of a good amount of their recent output, especially 2015’s In Times, I came out of Utgard moderately disappointed with how infrequently Enslaved galvanized their potent brand of Viking folky, progressive black metal effectively; the few moments the band do channel their strengths cohesively and purposefully left me wanting more rather than savoring those moments.

6/10

In Cauda Venenum-G.O.H.E.

It’s hard to, and indeed seems kind of in just to, sum up a heaping prog metal serving like G.O.H.E., comprised of two 22-minute halves, in a capsule review, but that is kind of the format my current busy circumstances have forced me into. French outfit In Cauda Venenum made a self-titled debut in similar two-long-track fashion back in 2015, and the band’s gothic and somewhat theatrical brand of atmospheric post-black-metal is continued on their sophomore effort here, drawing the obvious comparisons to Opeth and Katatonia, as well as Der Weg Einer Freiheit, Numenorean, and Sólstafir, and apart from the more frequent sample usage and extra drawn-out songs, there really isn’t that much to differentiate In Cauda Venenum stylistically. The band’s second album, unfortunately, resembles so many others in the field with big aspirations and the same inadequate means of getting there.

5/10

Apparition-Granular Transformation

A much more bite-sized early two-track offering, Apparition’s debut EP offers a more promising glimpse into a heady, atmospheric, yet still visceral manipulation of modern death metal that I would be curious to hear in a more long-form format. In a genre as extreme as death metal in recent years has been, finding artists effective at working with negative space can be difficult, but the two songs on Granular Transformation showcase a formidable dexterity from Apparition that I think can take them places.

6/10

Molasses-Through the Hollow

While indeed marred by some rough performances on songs with sometimes more desert to cross than water to make it there, there’s an undeniable occult hypnotism about the Dio-era-esque doom metal hollow that Molasses ritualize their way through.

7/10

Death Angel-Under Pressure

While certainly an odd choice on the surface, Death Angel’s acoustic EP and cover of the famous Queen song actually comes out pretty alright. The acoustic version of Act III’s “A Room with a View” comes off with the energy of something like Rush whenever they went acoustic, and the original acoustic cut, “Faded Remains” isn’t too bad either. The acoustic format did not, however, mask the drabness of “Revelation Song” from last year’s overall disappointment, Humanicide.

6/10

Necrophobic-Dawn of the Damned

The Swedes’ melodic brand of blackened death metal is nothing if not thorough on the quintet’s ninth full-length, Dawn of the Damned, covering all the ground that their fans expect their style to cover and doing so with more compositional and performative stamina than their average contemporary. While the band’s broader compositional approach is akin to the beating of a dead horse, I can’t deny it produces some tasty motifs in the process.

7/10

Bloodbather-Silence

After coming onto the blossoming metallic hardcore scene in 2018 with a standard, but potent enough 14-minute EP, Pressure, Bloodbather are back with another 14 minutes of similar, yet less promising material, doing little to set themselves apart from or on the same level of the likes of Jesus Piece, Vein, Knocked Loose, or Harm’s Way.

5/10

Infera Bruo-Rites of the Nameless

The Bostonians’ fourth full-length is, at the very least, a rather well-executed forty minutes of modern black metal a la Craft or Watain, but beneath the seams the band’s progressive tendencies twist what would otherwise be a fresh, but standard, slab of black metal into a more head-turning offering of the usual shrieks and blast beats.

7/10

Touché Amoré-Lament

While somewhat shaky in their compositional exploration in their fifth LP, the firmness of their emotive post-hardcore foundation allows for Touché Amoré to build upwards relatively steadily without losing that raw vulnerability that has made them so captivating to begin with.

7/10

Gargoyl-Gargoyl

This is the self-titled debut from Bostonian four-piece Gargoyl; a novel blend of dirty nineties grunge and gothic prog metal, Gargoyl come through with one of the more impressive genre fusions of the year, meeting the lofty sufficiency for dexterity with excessive vocal harmonies in a manner so uncanny that would make habe to Layne Stayley proud. While there is the expected room for improvement on the compositional end that many debut projects come with, Gargoyl have laid the groundwork for themselves fantastically and started off on a good foot.

7/10

Crippled Black Phoenix-Ellengæst

Through creative gothic flair and full-bodied guest vocal contributions that bolster the somber atmosphere beyond the typical post-metal album, the UK band’s most recent offering of “endtime ballads”, despite its few low points that undo its otherwise immersive atmosphere, serves as one of the more engaging releases under the broader post-metal umbrella of the past year.

7/10

Wayfarer-A Romance with Violence

The Denver-based quartet follow up 2018’s strong emotive case for the potential for evoking cathartic power of the atmospheric black metal which has so saturated the American scene to the point of numbness, their Americana-tinged third LP, World’s Blood, unfortunately, with a fourth LP whose compositional homogeneity and mere few intermittent bursts of enthralling atmospheric instrumentation more represent, rather than advocate the merit of, the saturation of the American atmospheric black metal scene.

6/10

Armored Saint-Punching the Sky

Though I think the structural homogeneity and John Bush’s similarly limited vocal delivery holds it back, with crunchy bangers like “Do Wrong to None” and “My Jurisdiction” alongside more tempered tracks the clearly grunge-influenced “Lone Wolf”, Bush and company provide a relatively stylistically diverse traditional heavy metal album for an age that could use more contemporary representation of classic styles (beyond the entire stoner metal genre LARPing as Black Sabbath too).

7/10

Spirit Adrift-Enlightened in Eternity

But it’s not just the old guard representing their era of classic heavy metal robustly; a year and a half after their energetically melodic third album, Divided by Darkness, which took a triumphant melodic approach to classic heavy metal and doom metal similar to that of Khemmis on their excellent third album, Spirit Adrift ease up a bit on the hyper-soulful approach to guitar melody that had led me (and others I’m sure) to draw the comparison to Khemmis, and instead dive deeper into the headspace of the genre’s earliest progenitors to achieve that unabashedly glorious rallying cry that is evoked by the very front cover of Enlightened in Eternity. While I am personally pretty partial to the very vulnerable and heartfelt melodic approach that characterized Divided by Darkness, the effectiveness with which Spirit Adrift are able to wield the sometimes Maiden-esque, sometimes Testament-esque sounds of the 80’s on this album is undeniably impressive.

8/10

Fever 333-Wrong Generation

Providing the correction to this generation’s answer to Rage Against the Machine (after Prophets of Rage’s insufficient attempted revival) Fever 333 follow up last year’s debut of heavy, fired-up and modern take on rapcore with another 14 minutes of righteous anti-racist hardcore anger that’s attuned to the issues to a level that I wish more artists would at least express in their art. While the EP is 18 minutes long, the last two songs, “The Last Time” and “Supremacy”, don’t match the sonic energy of the first six tracks. The somber piano-led snippet-length ballad, “The Last Time”, should have been the conclusion of the album, but the closing track, “Supremacy”, while as conscious as the tracks before it, is basically a late-stage formulaic Linkin Park track that flatters neither of the two bands. Despite botching the landing though, Wrong Generation is a ripping batch of songs that well represent the current unrest and provide a positive hypothetical idea of what it might be like if Rage Against the Machine were in their prime and active today.

7/10

Mörk Gryning-Hinsides Vrede

The Swedes return from their 15-year disillusioned absence from the studio with a concise and clearly renewed enthusiasm for the energetic black metal that they put forth on Hinsides Vrede. Dynamically bolstered by folk-metal compositional tendencies and more than a dash of that famed Gothenburg melodicism (I know they’re from Stockholm and in fact their melodic approach often does heaven to that of their close neighbors from Uppsala, Watain), Mörk Gryning’s seamless return to music finds them jumping into the modern black metal scene’s advanced compositional rubric with relative ease.

7/10

Zeal & Ardor-Wake of a Nation

Having covered their output since their debut and being a big fan of Manuel Gagneux’ project, it pains me to say, especially given the noble pretext and occasional momentary flashes of sobering messaging, that this six-song mini release really doesn’t capture the unique sonic pallet that has made Zeal & Ardor such an interesting act to listen to for the past few years in the most flattering light. The title track is possibly the least of the offenders here, but all the songs here function by taking a little snippet of sound that samples Zeal & Ardor’s broader stylistic range, and drawing it out across these short, but all too minimally composed tracks in such a way that they lose their momentum very quickly. Like I said, I wholeheartedly appreciate, sympathize with, and support what Manuel Gagneux is doing to lend his band’s platform to the addressing of the dire issue of today’s racism through musical means with this project, and when its social motivation is at the forefront, it’s at its most potent, but musically, unfortunately, it’s just desperately underwritten in a way that doesn’t fairly represent how accomplished Zeal & Ardor really are with their sound.

5/10

Sevendust-Blood & Stone

The flashes of crushing grooves reminiscent of their earlier work on Blood & Stone that highlight how well Sevendust can harness nu/alternative metal to execute pummeling attacks with the right crunchy guitar tone, unfortunately, don’t come frequently enough on their twelfth LP to mirage the exhaustion that has come of the band’s writing process after such frequent, unrelenting output and the all too apparent desperate need for a recalibrating, refreshing break, which they certainly deserve for their tenacity.

5/10

Undeath-Lesions of a Different Kind

In one of those cases where the ridiculously gratuitous album cover actually represents the album’s sound quite well, Rochester, New York five-piece, Undeath mince neither words nor sounds on their debut LP in their 100% upfront, no-nonsense, and wonderfully nasty delivery of death metal. Eschewing even the slightest sense of snobbery or pretense for aimless ambition, the band simply compile the genre’s tried and true elements of bellowing growls, filthy riffs, mean-ass down-tuned chugging, and blood-pumping double-bass with blast beats into an addictive slab of raw, uncured death metal that serves as a testament to the merit of not overthinking shit.

8/10

Griffon-Ὸ Θεός Ὸ Βασιλεύς

On their sophomore LP, Parisian quintet Griffon channel the world innovative ethos that has become rather prominent in their scene into a somewhat short, but definitely sweet offering of modestly ambitious black metal that captures much more effectively than most albums of similar style and lesser imagination, the divine grandeur that the genre so often tries and fails to embody.

8/10

Bring Me the Horizon-Post-Human: Survival Horror

After taking the hard left into current pop music trends very transparently on their controversial, which was at least partially intentional on their part, and ultimately really patchy, but not wholly awful, 2019 album, amo, Oli Sykes and co. walk it back substantially for this smaller release here, back to That’s the Spirit, even Sempiternal, a prospect that might get a lot of the band’s more long-time, metalcore-centric fans excited, but I would suggest those fans temper their expectations of Post-Human: Survival Horror. The band reunite with the anthemic metalcore/deathcore that put them on the map for a good chunk of this album, and the intro track, “Dear Diary,”, might even give some false hope of the prodigal sons returning home. But songs like the cookie-cutter single, “Teardrops”, provide strong evidence that, while the band have re-embraced their old aesthetic, they have not kicked the pop vocal or compositional habits. And the project really does run out of energy in its final third because of this compositional homogeneity. I do want to highlight the song, “Kingslayer”, which features a very in-form Babymetal (I loved their album last year), because their fun, not-so-serious approach to the crossing of J-pop and metal music in their feature on this track among the other songs around it provides a contrast to the more formulaic, disinterested radio pop swagger that Bring Me the Horizon have been trying to jam into their sound that could perhaps inform Bring Me the Horizon’s artistic approach to integrating pop music if they really are so hellbent on doing so. Ultimately though, as much as they want to move into newer territory, this trajectory-revising release shows just how much more solid Bring Me the Horizon are in their metalcore territory than they were on amo. It had its predictable hiccups, but this thing wasn’t too bad.

7/10

Pallbearer-Forgotten Days

With the slow, sludgy, down-tuned riffing of the menacing opening title track and the similar chug of “Vengeance & Ruination” being the sole exceptions, the remainder of Pallbearer’s fouth full-length largely sees them operating in the same niche they have in their three previous albums. And while this could invoke accusations of playing it safe, the brimming heartfelt sorrow and resistance to succumbing to despair across Forgotten Days is enough to wave that away, as Pallbearer showcase just how emotive doom metal can be.

8/10

Bleeding Out-Lifelong Death Fantasy

The very new act and fresh Profound Lore signing, Bleeding Out, certainly display more dynamic capability than your average local grindcore scene’s biggest names here on their 18-minute debut for the label, but as of now it is still just a glimpse of potential for more effective future implementation. It’s a good start, though, and I’ll be looking forward to a more long-form project from these guys.

6/10

Evildead-United States of Anarchy

Every year we get the resurrection of some long-inactive old-school band who seem to have found that missing spark at last; we’ve seen the return of smaller bands to the studio like Angel Witch or Sorcerer and long-awaited revivals of iconic acts like Possessed. This year, Los Angeles’ Evildead has seen fit to make their commentary on the massive ongoing sociopolitical upheaval. Despite my love for the 80’s thrash scene they were born out of, the combination of the utterly lame band name, logo, and covers for either their ‘89 or ‘91 albums never really made me want to check them out, but seeing the horridly cheesy and incoherent cover of United States of Anarchy (I mean how much more on-the-nose can you get), my morbid curiosity got the best of me. Maybe I’d be wrong to have judged them by their cover, plenty of my favorite 80’s albums have particularly goofy cover art. So what do we get from Evildead in 2020 with this fucking album? Well, it’s not as poorly performed as the past few Anvil albums I’ve had to review have been, but Jesus the lyricism is similarly cheesy 5th-grade-level stuff and smacks of silly political incoherence that essentially boils down to “enlightened centrism” with mix of that good ol’ Illuminati-conspiracy-theory belief that no political thrash album is apparently complete without. I mean there’s just basic acknowledgment of the prominent problems of the day and the fact that both major political parties are bad and that corruption is rampant all throughout DC, but Evildead not only barely scratch the surface, they apply the same level cynicism to the “both sides” they criticize with no substantiation to their criticism despite that mindset being a big reason for our being where we are right now, mixed in with the occasional conspiracy-paranoia about the shadowy underworld running everything, so no real solutions or even proper addressing of these problems. Like, the same level of criticism is levied at right-wingers and communists, like communists are at all why this country has gone to shit. And the generic Anthrax/Megadeth type of thrash instrumentation, while rumbly and mixed well to highlight its bass heaviness, doesn’t exactly make it easy to get past the commentary deficiencies on here.

4/10

Emma Ruth Rundle&Thou-May Our Chambers Be Full

Rounding off their year (at least I think), with a long-teased collaboration with Emma Ruth Rundle, Thou finally present their massive sludge-doom sound in a much more flattering light than the previous cover albums this year did. Thou’s original material continues to highlight just why their relatively stiff sound is much more cut out for that, original material, than for trying to bend beyond its flexibility to tribute grunge songs. And while Thou being back in their more effective department, Emma Ruth Rundle’s contributions, beyond just her gorgeous and ethereally haunting vocals, to the album’s atmosphere, dynamic, and structuring really take the collaboration to the next level. Not to say that Thou are completely overshadowed and relegated to the background on this record or that they don’t contribute to a fair share of the legwork here; the workload is shared pretty equally, and both collaborators have their moments of prominence, but Emma Ruth Rundle’s ever-present gothic/folky influence really directs the music in a way that plays to Thou’s strengths in a way I’m not sure they would have been able to on their own. It’s great work from both of them, and I’d be eager to hear Thou find more collaborations like this in the future that push them into doing more interesting things with their crushing doom sound, as opposed to the rather tepid collaborations with The Body.

8/10

Auðn-Vökudraumsins Fangi

Sadly, three albums in, Auðn have only barely exceeded the bare minimum for naturalistic atmospheric black metal, with no signs of significant improvement to be found. The Icelandic band earn points for their earnest delivery, but they never seem to fully make it out of the rut that the genre’s many contemporary acts have dug.

5/10

Botanist-Photosynthesis

The black metal traditionalists might have had to accept that the floodgates to bright ambience and serene shoegaze in the genre have been opened and that there’s no going back now, but even as an avid Deafheaven fan, I’m sometimes momentarily surprised at just how heavenly some black metal has gotten lately, and this new album from Botanist is one of those albums. And while it sometimes slips into some of the current wave’s typical ruts, the sheer blindingly illuminating aura of this album when it reaches those high points (and it does so frequently) is enough to pull it out from those gutters and high into the cosmos. Yeah, another splendid offering of nature worship from Botanist.

8/10

Mr. Bungle-The Raging Wrath of the Easter Bunny Demo

Making their return after over a decade, Mike Patton recruits both Dave Lombardo and Scott Ian for the long-awaited fourth Mr. Bungle album, which is titled in homage to the first Mr. Bungle demo which it is comprised largely of much clearer re-recordings of. Ever impressive, Mike Patton balances aggression and eccentricity like a tightrope walker on this project too, while his bandmates do the same with thrash metal’s natural adrenaline rush while pushing the genre into new compositional and stylistic territory without sacrificing that crucial whiplash. It’s a great time, and definitely one of the year’s best thrash albums.

8/10

Carcass-Despicable

While they’ve been much less prolific since their reboot than they were prior, Liverpool’s melodic death metal pioneers simply continue to demonstrate their excellence in this seemingly effortless four-track appetizer to next year’s Torn Arteries. Anyone familiar with the band’s brutal form of melodic death metal will certainly be pleased with the four quite sufficiently pulverizing cuts here; those who may only be familiar with some of the band’s many less muscular imitators might be surprised, and pleasantly so, with the Englanders’ ability to lay on the infectious guitar melody without sacrificing an ounce of force.

8/10

Zeal & Ardor-Wake of a Nation

Having covered their output since their debut and being a big fan of Manuel Gagneux’ project, it pains me to say, especially given the noble pretext and occasional momentary flashes of sobering messaging, that this six-song mini release really doesn’t capture the unique sonic pallet that has made Zeal & Ardor such an interesting act to listen to for the past few years in the most flattering light.

The title track is possibly the least egregious of the offenders here, but all the songs here function similarly by taking a little snippet of sound that samples Zeal & Ardor’s broader stylistic range, and drawing it out across these short, but all too minimally composed tracks in such a way that they lose their momentum very quickly, never to regain it until a defibrillation attempt by the next song.

Like I said, I wholeheartedly appreciate, sympathize with, and support what Manuel Gagneux is doing to lend his band’s platform to the addressing of the dire issue of today’s racism through musical means with this project, and when its social motivation is at the forefront, it’s at its most potent, but musically, unfortunately, Wake of a Nation is just desperately underwritten in a way that doesn’t fairly represent how accomplished Zeal & Ardor really are with their sound.

5/10

Greg Puciato-Child Soldier: Creator of God

Ever reliable in his artistically integrity, explosive former Dillinger Escape Plan frontman, Greg Puciato, has been pretty sonically and artistically adventurous since the honorable dissolution of the iconic mathcore outfit, his most notable music project being the ethereal, synth-heavy The Black Queen.

This year, however, Puciato has gone fully solo for a full-length project, and something told me to get ready for a wild ride, and boy was I right on that hunch. Borne out of an exponentiated process of songwriting that produced songs Puciato deemed unfitting for any of his current projects, what was planned as a small release to ship these songs out of the writing room eventually spiraled into a full-blown debut solo album clocking in at over an hour.

A lot of solo projects play like clearly indulgent amateur hour sessions from an artist whose ego has been boosted pretty well from significant success from their main project, leading them to overconfidently try their hand at music they have no business trying it at. And it’s often approached under the understanding that it is a victory lap, more or less, and a satisfaction of creative impulses for the sake of it. Sometimes the resultant material is clearly inspired and showcases a side of an artist that certainly deserves some spotlight. Other times it feels like being trapped in an awkward situation with an acquaintance where they just show you all their newest pedals and production software and you’re just stuck there watching them fiddle around while you nod along and offer the occasional “wow, that’s pretty crazy” every now and then while they don’t pick up on the obvious cues that you are just waiting for them to finish playing with their toys.

While Puciato was open about this album being borne from the very creatively borderless mindset that so often damns solo projects, Child Soldier: Creator of God is an actual realization of the type of grand, genre-spanning album that so many solo artists envision themselves making and set out to create, and it’s hardly a whimsical, amateurish crack at the styles within either. Puciato’s foray into sludge metal, industrial rock, harsh noise, darkwave, synthwave, and shoegaze, (1) makes for a hell of a dynamic and exciting track list, and (2) shows a much deeper than average respect for and relationship with the styles being played here.

This isn’t some frontman thinking his charisma can carry him through a whole rap solo album; this is a well-rounded artist (also a hell of a frontman, no denying that) giving the most comprehensive look yet into his creative mind. The album leaps around in patches of different styles, strung together mostly by ambient connective tissue of various types, all with a great attention to detail paid to both texture and progression.

We get early patches of smooth ambiance, but also aggressive industrial and sludge metal, eventually moving to more soothing and meditative synthy stuff around the middle, finishing with some serene, Have a Nice Life-esque shoegaze. But really there’s no way to sum up this album stylistically without breaking down every single song on here, and that would just ruin the fun and the experience. You really just have to experience it for yourself.

9/10

December 2020 (and more)

Okay, get ready because this one’s a doozy (however that word is spelled).

December is usually a pretty slow month for releases as the year comes to a close and publications start doing their year-end lists and whatnot. And I’m getting to mine, which I like doing at the very end of the year to make sure I don’t miss any December gems. And I’m glad I did that because I did indeed find a lot that’s going on my year-end lists, the bad one too. Indeed, I took December as an opportunity to give a try to a lot of the music I had missed or intentionally avoided in 2020, and a lot of it validated my initial inclinations to steer clear. On the bright side though, my continued digging for gold that I passed by earlier indeed produced some results, and I found me some great albums that I’m excited to be covering right now. Like I said, this is a big one, so I’ll just get in with it.

Lingua Ignota-The Caligula Demos

After offering up harrowing covers of “Jolene”, “Wicked Game”, and the infamous Eminem song, “Kim”, on Bandcamp throughout the year, for the last Bandcamp Friday of this goddamned year, Lingua Ignota mastermind and Cheezit connoisseur Kristin Hayter has released a batch of demos from the sessions from the recording of her noisy, neoclassical industrial darkwave, reverse horrorcore, poetic hellwave masterpiece from last year, Caligula. We get a lot of rough noise precursors to the frightful cacophony that eventually made it onto the album proper, as well as some more stripped back piano demos that highlight Hayter’s classical singing chops, but also a few songs that don’t resemble anything on Caligula and maybe just got cut from the album, like the song “KYRIE”, which features Hayter singing soulfully and relatively softly over a minimally Sunn O))) kind of metallic amplifier drone. While it is indeed a demo album and the roughness that typically characterizes demo scraps does come through in a few of the less put-together pieces here, the demos here offer a great few snapshots of the creative process of one of the most transfixingly terrifying and emotionally raw albums of the past few years for fans of Lingua Ignota.

7/10

Dines X Heafy-Dines X Heafy

The friendship between Trivium frontman Matt Heafy and YouTuber Jared Dines has finally materialized in a 20-minute EP of, disappointingly, some of the most generic and unnecessary metalcore of the year.

5/10

Godthrymm-The Vastness Silent

The band are supplementing the debut album they dropped earlier this year with a couple of new songs to keep their name hot. And I can see why the band wanted to get these two songs out there because these songs do straddle the epic, fantastical side and the more somber side of doom metal with pretty respectable tact.

6/10

Insubria-Harvest Moon

This is the sophomore EP from Italy’s Insubria, an as-of-yet independent act. While it gets off it a slow start with the opening “Heritage”, the ripping blast beats, crunchy riffing, and folky strings of the song “Soil” lead into a pretty promising folky take on melodic death metal that I think the band could build upon and carve out a little niche for themselves in.

6/10

Soilwork-A Whisp of the Atlantic

Don’t let its classification as an EP fool you, Soilwork go big on this release, on the epic opening title track particularly, whose grand proggy voyage would make a band like Between the Buried and Me wet. Out of a lack of feeling a necessity to do so, I haven’t really returned to last year’s Verkligheten, which I remember for its being such a relatively standard melodeath outing. A Whisp of the Atlantic is a much more ambitious affair, and yes, mainly for its sprawling title track, which does deserve the attentiveness one would afford a track from the aforementioned progressive death metal nerds, or Opeth. But the four shorter tracks that follow serve as their own theatrically adventurous act of proggy, groovy melodeath that plays more to the genre’s strengths than their previous full-length did. It’s definitely worth a chance for anyone disappointed by the band’s last album.

7/10

Undergang-Aldrig i livet

I genuinely love Undergang’s general modus operandi of caking death metal in as much mud as possible and slowing it down to its nastiest and most swamp-monster-ish, and the band continue the mission here with aesthetic precision, the only thing lacking on Aldrig i livet being the compositional creativity that would make it a more compelling listen beneath the surface.

6/10

GamaBomb-Sea Savage

You know, having grown up on Metallica, loving thrash in general all my metalhead life, and appreciating its pretty drunken origins, I’d like to think I’m not much of a snob about my thrash. Albums like United States of Anarchy by Evildead, this most recent Anvil album with its song about the chemtrail conspiracy theory (as well as just about 90% of the rest of their catalog), and this new album from Gama Bomb, however, make me question otherwise by reminding me just how stupid a lot of the music was that came out of the earliest waves and challenging me on how much stupid I can take. In my ever-active search for good fresh thrash metal, I have stumbled across what is probably the worst thrash album I’ve heard all year. I’ve never been much of a fan of Gama Bomb’s toddler-sugar-high take on high-soaring thrash metal a la Anthrax, and the seemingly uncontrolled drunken punctuation of operatic tenor screams and uncomfortable coked out hysteria of Sea Savage is not making me any more eager to become one. No fucking thank you!

3/10

Cro-Mags-2020

Topping off their comeback year with another handful of topical songs, Cro-Mags don’t really do anything beyond their usual hardcore punk, save for a more groove-focused approach on the dissonant title track. Otherwise it’s basically just a continuation of what the band were doing on In the Beginning earlier this year.

6/10

Cadaver-Edder & Bile

With a much more thrilling synthesis of thrash and blackened crust punk, Cadaver give us at least one more 31-minute shot of nasty, snarling death metal with no frills around the edges before we peace this year out. The stylistic homogeneity can get a bit tiresome, but I’d say there is enough riff dynamic and performative energy to keep the album lively for as long as it needs to before it heads backstage to puke into and pass out hugging the toilet.

7/10

Eraser-A Deal with the Devil

With a healthy dose of 90’s groove metal influences (as well as some of the industrial and electronic elements their homeland has become famous for, which includes an at least curious dubstep bridge breakdown) to vary up their At the Gates-esque melodic death metal, German six-piece Eraser have burst out of the gate with a brilliantly balanced and head-turning independent debut album that I’m sure will land them on a label in no time. Boasting that sharp, fire-blackened death metal melody that both hooks you in and ties you to the alter it’s about to sacrifice you upon, A Deal with the Devil grooves so infectiously that you’ll find yourself nodding your head in rhythm as it sets the wood you’re strapped to ablaze. I think the band have some ironing out to do when it comes to a sound they want to cultivate, but they’ve laid a fine groundwork in what they’re capable of on this debut here, which is certainly an enthusiastic one that will catch you off your guard, well done.

7/10

Oroborus-A December Dawn

This is a demo album from newly emerged UK act, Oroborus, and it certainly is rough. There’s a foundation there to work with, but it is going to take a lot of work if this band wants to get into the prog metal stratosphere they’re shooting for, in composition and performance, as well as some aesthetic ironing out. The vocal leads especially need some technical practice to sound less nasal-y and amateurish, and they’re not helped by the repetitive parts of the song-writing nor the cheesier, on-the-nose power metal and classical heavy metal the band try to emulate on “Fortress of the Brave” and “Wings of Wax”. Meanwhile, the more brooding “Morphine Queen” features what sounds like an odd date set up by friends of Jonathan Davis and Train of Thought-era Dream Theater and the title track a very clear try at something similar to Opeth’s work on My Arms, Your Hearse. Ultimately, I think the band are biting off more than they can chew, and I think they need to grow some of the teeth necessary to do so as well, but that should not discourage them, hopefully the feedback they get on this demo points them in the right direction.

Revise-and-resubmit/10

Grayceon-Mothers Weavers Vultures

What an album to wait until the end of the year to release! The San Francisco trio’s fifth LP, Mothers Weavers Vultures, is a gorgeously tragic and utterly heart-clutching outing of progressive post-metal. Backed by Jackie Perez Gratz’ ever-present cello playing, Grayceon never let their hands off your shoulders as they stare you down and urge you to find the best of yourself within. My only criticisms of the album would be of when it does occasionally feel a bit understated when the band are building up to something more unrestrained and no-holds-barred expressive. Gratz’ vocals are a bit rough in some places, and possibly an acquired taste for some listeners too, but I think the type of grungy clean (and occasionally operatic or screamed) style she employs contributes to the album’s openness and emotional realness. It’s definitely worth a listen, definitely the kind of album that captures the toll of year’s turmoil on the heart.

8/10

Pharmacist-Medical Renditions of Grinding Decomposition&Thanatological Reflections on Necrotism

SoMedical Renditions of Grinding Decomposition was the Japanese band’s debut record that came out back in August, but for as unrestricted and brutal as that album was, they still had some left in the tank to drop on our asses before the year’s end, with a five-track EP, Thanatological Reflections on Necrotism. I didn’t cover the band’s debut LP, but I’m up to the task now! Better late than never. Medical Renditions of Grinding Decomposition, as any remotely astute listener of the genre would probably suspect, is a disgusting, odious goregrind album, and what a goregrind record it is! Clearly inspired by the early works of Carcass, and perhaps the work of the 90’s Czech band Pathologist, Medical Renditions of Grinding Decomposition is a filthy and unforgiving exercise in savagery, fixated on making the riffs as sick as possible, the bass grooves as nasty as all hell, and the vocals as gargled and unintelligible as any Pissgrave recording. And that’s all fine and dandy aesthetically, but the band have the compositional chops to back it up, a good taste for metallic structural flair and a firm handle on the dynamic instincts necessary to integrate it all without sounding erratic. After hearing a lot of good grindcore earlier in the year, I’m glad I got to hear another great offering (one of the year’s best) before the end of the year.

8/10

And another! The band released another five tracks to supplement their debut album in the form of the Thanatological Reflections on Necrotism EP just on the 19th, which is basically a solid continuation of the groove-filled deathly goregrind that the band exhibited their prowess with in August. Once again it’s no bullshit, no brakes, and no complaints as Pharmacist ooze and grind destructively through another 17 minutes of sickening old-school grindcore with impressive ease and acrobatic versatility.

7/10

Hollywood Undead-New Empire, Vol. 1&New Empire, Vol. 2

Hollywood Undead’s 2017 album, Five, was my least favorite album of that first year when I started this blog, it’s wild to think it’s been four years since then, but the rapcore pack is back again, with two albums this time. The first one came out in February, and I was just not in the mood for it then. But this month, since they had another one coming down the pipe, I figured what the hell, so I gave it a listen. Right out of the gate it really had me worried with that first song, “Time Bomb”, that I was going to be in for another unbearable album’s worth of lame-ass radio pop choruses and butt rock hooks, which this album still is in part. But thankfully, New Empire, Vol. 1 is an improvement compared to its predecessor, with more fiery energy that actually connects more often. There’s still the dumb juxtaposition between the sugary arena rock anthemism and the Eminem-imitating chest-puffing (the two of which I would rather have more of than the other), but the band keep it short and make fewer slip-ups this time, which, perhaps only by chance, makes this one a more bearable experience. The way the album ends with the line “I just spit 32 and I didn’t say shit” isn’t the ironic meta commentary the band probably think it is though, and its foreshadowing did not age well…

4/10

As for the second installment of the series, imagine a lot of distressed preparatory sighing taking place right here instead of this part of the sentence because… fucking Christ. The band start off on a horrible foot again with the absolutely nauseating singalong arena pop anthem, “Medicate”, whose refrain of “meda- meda- medicate!” is both cheesy as fuck and just astoundingly lazy. The difference between this volume and the first is that there are even fewer redeeming moments to tip the scales the other way. Whereas the first installment had some bangers to at least be on the scale to be outweighed by the Eminem rip-offs and stupid fucking pop choruses, on volume two the only breather we get from this auditory water-boarding comes from the consecutive features from Killstation and Tech N9ne on “Monsters” (which even still mimics Em a little too much to be ignorable, this time one of his token pop-feature crossover ballads that this track even practically shares a name with) and the sole heavy banger, “Idol”, which Tech N9ne’s standard feature counts as the most invigorating performance across the entire two volumes. Apart from those two songs, part two is mind-numbingly untasteful and packed with an onslaught of poorly curated combos of expired trendy styles that even Linkin Park on One More Light might have had the tact to avoid. Goddamn it, the first volume had me thinking that this was just going to be mildly, tolerably bad and that we were gonna be okay. I’m rubbing my squinted shut eyelids medially as I write this damn thing, as I did pretty much though my entire time listening to this damn album. I knew I should have avoided this. This might actually be worse than Five, which I know is longer, and I know that might be my angry recency bias talking, but I’m not about to go back and side-by-side these two shit piles. Corporate King 810, Hollywood Undead, came off the bench in the last minute to snatch, undoubtedly, one of the coveted top spots on the year’s worst-of list.

2/10

Well being that that last one was from this past month and from February, I suppose now is a good time to move into the stuff from earlier in the year that I missed, but I’m excited to be covering now. How about a pallet cleanser after that trash album, something good:

Sinira-The Everlorn

With its eight tracks covering an hour of impressively progressive and technical ability even for the style, The Everlorn is one of the year’s most elegant displays of black metal and melodic death metal, and not through gratuitous technical wankery, but through carefully crafted songs that present the style the band plays in such enveloping and glorious fashion.

8/10

Thrown into Exile-II: Illusion of Control

After aping Trivium’s approach to thrashy metalcore a bit heavily on their 2016 debut album, Safe Inside, which still produced tremendously fun and head-banging results, Thrown into Exile ease off those melodic elements that showed their influential cards on their sophomore effort here, and while it is indeed a little more homogeneous than its predecessor, the band’s second full-length keeps the pit circling and the heads banging rather consistently.

8/10

Killswitch Engage-Atonement II: B-Sides for Charity

I wasn’t really all that enthusiastic about Atonement when it came out last year, and I wasn’t super eager to jump on a new EP of B-sides from that unmotivating album, but I can’t go too hard on the band for their good-hearted intentions here, and the songs here actually aren’t too bad; if anything, they’re a step up from the album they came from, at least as a whole for the diversity they present. It does come with the over-reliance on the clean-scream trade-off and style of guitar melodies that has characterized their music and became the only feature of last year’s LP, but with just six songs, released for COVID-19 charity, it’s hard to get upset about it.

6/10

Mark Morton-Ether

After his over-collaborative debut solo trainwreck last year being what I named the worst album I heard all year, I was intentionally avoiding this new release here, despite it being just an EP. Well I bit the bullet and came out, not impressed at all, but relieved. Maybe if it went on for another 20 or 30 minutes I might have gotten more irritated by it, but Ether is just a really meek alternative rock album that stays in a safe acoustic zone for most of its time, which is good because there’s nothing really worth amplifying too much here. The country track in the middle with Lzzy Hale gets pretty obnoxious, but it does stay pretty stripped back still, so not too unbearable. Morton kept it safe this time around, and thank god for that. I just hope he settles on a sound he’s more fluent in and can be more authentic and take his time with on whatever solo project comes next.

5/10

Ded-Mannequin Eyes

Wow we’re getting the return of quite a few of my old least faves since I started this blog in this segment here, Ded doing the best job of changing my mind. While the Tempe band’s 2017 debut album felt like it represented too vibrantly so much of what tanked alternative metal in the 2000’s, the two songs Ded offer here are a breath of fresh air in that they are much more up to date, more tightly composed, and less like a caricature of the mistakes of the past. Meshing the alternative nu metal and metalcore of bands like Red and Motionless in White, Ded make a stronger case for themselves with these two songs than their debut did.

7/10

Nightwish-Human. :II: Nature.

I appreciate the Finnish symphonic giants’ always thinking big, but they have such a tendency to bite off way more than they can chew in terms of material. They certainly have the chops and basic arrangement skills to produce the style of music that they do competently, but they tend to have a hard time generating enough in the way of novel musical ideas to span the lengths of their increasingly bloated projects, and that is certainly the case with their first break of the 80-minute mark on this year’s Human. :II: Nature., which is a standard amalgamation of theatrical, folky, symphonic metal that the band has become so well known for, but possibly in its most dilute concentration to date.

5/10

Fates Warning-Long Day Good Night

In a case of maintained consistency, Fates Warning continue trucking along with an album that serves as a tacit reminder of the band’s veteran status that will keep the prog icons’ fans happy for the time being. The band don’t really spice up their sound too drastically or take too many risks, which probably will leave this album somewhat forgettable to passers by, but make no mistake, Long Day Good Night is still an exercise in prog metal fundamentals that most bands would be proud of. Fates Warning are just making it look easy, like a long-time surgeon just doing that shit routinely.

7/10

Benediction-Scriptures

As far as blunt death metal goes, Benediction’s return to the fold after another lengthy break with Scriptures is about as meat-‘n’-taters as it gets, respectable technicality and decent enough energy, which I think is basically all the band was going for, but nothing really beyond the most snack-like appetite satiation.

6/10

Amaranthe-Manifest

Being that I’ve only been exposed to their dance-pop-influenced brand of power metal in small doses (and not being enticed to have more), this was my first full-length experience with Amaranthe, of which I just have to say, “thanks, I hate it”. I have nothing principally against power metal, electronica, dance pop or any if the other styles implemented here on their own, and on paper the synthesis of these styles (united by high potential for unabashed fun) seems theoretically enticing, and there is a sparse handful of moments on Manifest that do manifest that potential. Unfortunately, the vast majority of the album is hampered down by its incredibly formulaic implementations of the styles here that really need that creative energy to thrive and end up with the party sucked out of the room like the arrival of a purposely uninvited guest.

3/10

Elder-Omens

For their follow-up to the psychedelic and progressively winding Reflections of a Floating World, Elder take a much more chill approach that focuses on the other aspects of their sound. While a lot of bands in the field struggle to solidify an identity and exhibit their nuance through overwhelming layers of sludge and might benefit from a more measured tactic, this was never really a problem for Elder, and their dialing back of the heavier elements of their sound to nearly zero leaves the psychedelic prog rock, doom, and stoner rock feeling a little bit incomplete without the sludgy wall of sound powering it all, resulting in an album whose decreased heaviness only spotlights otherwise standard psychedelic rock elements.

6/10

Saul-Rise as Equals

This is the debut full-length album from the Iowan project Saul, which was formed by Blake and Zach Bedsaul all the way back in 2007, and the quartet’s debut sure sounds like it’s struggling to get one of its feet out of the mud of that era and into the present. There’s a good set of bones holding the djenty melodic alternative metal of Rise as Equals upright, but the band are really going to have to vent their songs a bit more thoroughly and break out of the formulaic writing that makes the album tire quickly if they’re to make any meaningful mark on today’s metal landscape (and, for my sake, ditch the Hot Topic pop punk melodic stylings that drag down the songs that they show up on).

4/10

Contrarian-Only Time Will Tell

My earlier tastes of Contrarian’s very Cynic-influenced brand of modern techdeath didn’t really entice me to explore them further despite their being engined by Nile’s percussive speedmaster George Kollias, and as they continue their prolific streak with their fourth album in five years (now without Kollias), my first full serving of their music really hasn’t exposed any novelty they’re bringing to the scene that needs it so desperately. I’ll say, the album does at least end on its best note with the pairing of the two closing tracks, but otherwise, the techdeath here is just too uninspired.

5/10

Voidsphere-To Sense | To Percerive

Voidsphere is an online studio project that has been active as long as I have been active with this blog, releasing an album every year for me to review, and yet, I have missed them all until this year’s because I am an inadequate loser and clearly just a giant poser who can’t find any good underground shit. The fourth installment of the project follows the same “void metal” style (just extra spacy atmospheric black metal that intentionally invokes the feelings of vastness and celestial darkness) that has been making waves on Bandcamp lately and that the previous three have also channelled. Despite the grittily lo-fi mixing of the album, the full-bodied and indeed fittingly atmospheric instrumentation that spans the entire length of the album is powerful in its effect and successful in its intended application. Once acclimated to the mix, the album takes you on a harrowing, trip spiraling uncontrolled through cerebral void in such an immersive fashion. I wish I found this sooner, but I’m glad I get to highlight before year’s end.

8/10

Intervals - Circadian

While guitarist Aaron Marshall’s studio creative brainchild may not incorporate the same subtle hip hop and electronic elements that instrumental math rock cool kids Polyphia do, Intervals manages to find a certain swagger of its own on Circadian through similarly forward-thinking implementation of prog rock’s core traditional elements that make the very stylistically roots-y music lively and not feel so stylistically homogeneous. It’s a fun time and I’m here for it.

7/10

Puscifer-Existential Reckoning

After a big year with Tool last year, Maynard James Keenan returns to his “creative subconscious” project for an hour of spacy, stream-of-consciousness, ambient electronic rock even sleepier than the more soothingly instrumentally minimalist moments on A Perfect Circle’s Eat the Elephant.Existential Reckoning does function well enough as a relaxing electronic space rock album for fans of the softer side of Maynard’s voice, but anyone expecting any kind of super immersive or meticulously planned out album won’t be getting what they want. This album is, again, functional enough and interesting enough in its sonic pallet, but it’s also pretty stream-of-thought and (with a few exceptions) much more about expressive fulfillment for Maynard than songcrafting.

6/10

Necrowretch-The Ones from Hell

As opposed to the more modern and evolved form of death metal that most bands like Behemoth and the contemporaries around them, it’s the thrashier, Morbid Angel-esque old-school death metal that France’s Necrowretch choose to blacken, and given the closeness of black metal and death metal to thrash in their earlier, less divergent forms, the sound feels rather natural and seems to flow smoothly like a babbling brook of vintage melodicism. While I think the band do sometimes coast compositionally on the innate qualities of the concoction of styles, The Ones from Hell is still one of the better and most unique blackened death metal albums I’ve heard all year.

7/10

Dark Tranquillity-Moment

I’ve been hearing a lot of rather convincing melodic death metal lately, and I was hopping that Dark Tranquillity could keep the trend going and get themselves more fully out of their compositional funk with their twelfth album. Fulfilling those dual purposes about halfway, Moment is still a relatively mixed effort from the Gothenburg giants, with some chest-clutching and melodically emotive songs sprinkled in with about as many minor twists of the ankle as the band land right back in the pitfalls that have dotted the ground they’ve travelled further down their career’s road. While it may not be the kind of late-career rejuvenation that Construct was, Moment at least avoid kneecapping Dark Tranquility’s progress and keeps the Swedes’ momentum relatively steady.

6/10

British Lion-The Burning

Led by Steve Harris’ signature galloping bass lines, British Lion takes on a more classic hard rock flavor than the Iron Maiden bassist’s main band, but bears a similarly bombastic approach despite the superficial instrumental tone-down that give the project the feel of a band that might have otherwise been hypothetically active around the time Iron Maiden was gaining early traction and took inspiration from them or vice versa. While on paper the project has a lot going for it gunning its performative engine, unfortunately, the band’s second LP fails to launch its second compositional engine into drive and the album ends of stuck, jetting around, bright as they may be, in circles.

5/10

Turmion Kätilöt-Global Warning

WhileGlobal Warning certainly does a rather generic job of embodying it, the energy with which the Finnish group carry the Rammstein-esque electro-industrial metal of the 90’s into the 20’s deserves at least a modicum of respect, though I don’t think Turmion Kätilöt can carry the torch on their own. I’d be thrilled for them to feed me my words though.

6/10

Havukruunu-Uinuos Syömein Sota

There’s been a lot of good stuff coming out of the Scandinavian country that metalheads tend to forget about, but the third LP from the Finnish pagan black metal ritualists is one of the more middle-of-the-road albums of its style that I heard this year. There are some sweet solos here and there’s and some blizzards of frosty black metal melodicism that do bite a little more sharply than the average black metal album, but I did find myself thirsting for a bit more variety as the album went on, which the longest two tracks on the album close it out with pretty well thankfully.

6/10

Annihilator-Ballistic, Sadistic

With the headbanging party energy of Anthrax and demo-era Metallica and the snarling grit of early Testament, Annihilator have been flying the maple leaf thrash flag from the north with infectious fervor for seventeen full-length albums now, and although it’s not perfect and it has its entirety stoppable corny tracks, Ballistic, Sadistic is an impressively energizing and enthusiastic album for a band that’s been at it for so long, and a genuinely good thrashing time in a tasty variety platter of ways.

7/10

Dark Quarterer-Pompei

I will give give credit to Pompei for at least being the only album of its kind that I heard all year as far as any superficial genre descriptors would be able to set albums apart of from one another. In fact, I’ll give it credit for its pretty fair handling of the lofty sound that band set out to achieve with the album. The Italian group indeed go big and conceptual on Pompei, narrating the cataclysmic tragedy of the titular Roman city’s apocalyptic destruction in the wake of the eruption of the neighboring Mt. Vesuvius. The prog metal opera draws from the intricate instrumentation of Yes, the theatric presence of Led Zeppelin, and the heavier elements of bands like Iron Maiden or even Rush, and it all goes well enough… in the drawing room. Once rubber meets the road, the album is not the heavy prog rock opera masterpiece it set out to be. While not as dilute and lifeless as the unnecessarily massive Therion rock opera I reviewed awhile ago, Pompei is critically short on those vital compositional ideas that keep albums relying on a narrative afloat. So the band charge up a big sound but they ultimately end of blasting it off mark, maybe just grazing their intended target, not doing enough meaningful with it. But the vocals for me are where this album lost me the fastest. After the infamy that characterized the reviewers who mocked Geddy Lee’s voice when Rush was trying to establish themselves, I tend to give a second thought to any vocal style I might just not be accustomed to so as not to embarrass myself down the line in similar fashion. The vocals on Pompei aren’t particularly unfamiliar or boundary-pushing though, they’re just really unappetizing, to me at least. The album is already kinda cheesy on the face of it, and I can appreciate some self-aware cheese, but the vocals here just come off as dorky in a way that was clearly meant more to be bombastic and biblical, with a marring gutlessness behind the wild operatic style that makes it sound like a kid who just learned how to reach those upper notes but doesn’t have the power yet to sing them comfortably. And if it were possible to focus on the other aspects of the music more easily, that would be okay; if there were captivating hooks or anthemic sections to convince me, it’d be a different story. But the ineffectual instrumentation leaves the album sounding, unfortunately, unintentionally goofy.

4/10

The Spirit Cabinet-Bloodlines

And here we have another campy one, made so mainly by the vocals as well: the sophomore album from the Dutch four-piece, The Spirit Cabinet. The band’s 47-minute effort takes a bit of a trip into the older days of classical doom metal similar to that which Candlemass have made their name off of that’s pretty balanced in new and old familiarity, some more modern black metal influences shoveling coal into the instrumental furnace. It takes some getting used to with the semi-clownishly operatic vocal style, but once that’s been acclimated to, there’s a very lively and epic form of doom metal on Bloodlines that I think, with further honing on the part of the band’s craft, could eventually spawn a bonafide doom metal epic.

6/10

Afterbirth-Four Dimensional Flesh

Gurgling and growling through their sophomore effort, the Long Island band bring a fresh sense of technicality and prog-mindedness to the gory grind of brutal death metal that isn’t typically associated with the genre. Sure, it’s recognized for the physicality required to maintain the speeds it’s played at, but the compositional dynamic that Afterbirth showcase and the types of angular solos that they incorporate on Four Dimensional Flesh really sets it apart from other slamming death metal albums in its vein, and I hope there more to come from these guys because this was a wonderfully fresh take on the genre.

8/10

Haunt-Mind Freeze

I’d thought that I had covered their album earlier this year when it came out because I was so frazzled for my having missed out on covering the band’s sophomore release just last March (If Icarus Could Fly), but at least I caught myself before the end of the year for a chance to highlight the old-school revivalists. And when I say old-school, I mean really old school; Haunt reach back in time for a similar melodic version of classic heavy metal in its most primordial form to what Spirit Adrift call back to, though I’d say Haunt rely on even less of today’s advancements (save except for the unavoidable melodic influences that inform the solos that are perhaps the only aspect of the music that would stick out if this album traveled back in time). The solos on “Saviors of Man” and the title track, for example, feel way more emotive than what any band was doing back in the early 80’s, which the speed metal and early thrash influence on songs like “Divide and Conquer” would most reasonably limit the bands time travel to. As far as songwriting goes compared to the material from that era that’s stood the test of time, Mind Freeze holds up pretty damn well, feeling like it really would have succeeded even in the more competitive landscape of the germinating heavy metal scene. Granted, Haunted has the advantage of decades of hindsight, but fuck me if this doesn’t rival the best of that era. If Icarus Could Fly felt somewhat overly reliant on its nostalgic novelty factor as a crutch and lethargic in many spots as a result. But on Mind Freeze ironically, Haunt sprout their winds and soar majestically through catchy and gorgeous traditionally styled guitar and synthesizer melodies with just the right amount of retrospective wisdom from the current epoch. Absolutely brilliant!

9/10

Haunt-Flashback

That’s right, the Fresno band put out two albums this year, two full-size LPs, you know, to really capture the essence of those super prolific old-school bands who had an album out (sometimes two) every year or two for the first few years of their careers. And after the incredible album they started the year with, I can’t blame Haunt for wanting to strike again while the iron is both hot and stuck inside. Frequency aside, Flashback is perhaps the most aptly named Haunt album for the band’s musically rewinding mission. Whereas Mind Freeze felt a little bit more informed by modern doom melodicism, Flashback is much more riff-focused and hook-focused in a way that Iron Maiden, Ozzy, or Dio might have been in the mid-80’s, which the slightly more muffled guitar mix, sure, stays true to, but which I think didn’t need to be altered from what the band had worked with so well on Mind Freeze. The band do employ some more melodic guitar work on “Figure in a Painting” that seems more akin to their previous album and stands out more on Flashback, but I’m not complaining about it. With a second LP, Haunt notch themselves a second critical hit and a big win that they deserve to feel on top of the world for (as it crumbles) this year.

8/10

Eternal Champion -Ravening Iron

Oh the nostalgia trip doesn’t end there. Haunt dropping two stellar trips down memory lane was not the only push in this “new wave of traditional heavy metal”. Enter Eternal Champion, whose sophomore full-length this year goes all in on the fantastical comic book grandiosity in spirit and lyricism, while letting very naturally flowing riffs and committed clean vocal performances do the talking musically with the ballsy move being the minimal modern supplementation. There is a taste of some Sabaton-esque power metal in there, but it’s not nearly distracting enough to take away from the tightness of the songwriting and the consistency of the old-school vibe the Texan band gives off. While I might personally gravitate more toward the Spirit Adrift/Khemmis-informed classic heavy metal of Haunt, I sure don’t deny the truly raw steely power of the clean-cut trad-metal on display here.

8/10

Paradise Lost-Obsidian

This is the sixteenth studio album from the British death-doom pioneers, and sixteen albums into their gothic metal career Paradise Lost are beginning to sound a bit fatigued. Now when it comes to death-doom, a lethargic, melancholic sound is kind of a feature rather than a bug, which means discerning whether Obsidian’s sluggish gothic death-doom sound embodies an artistic melancholy that the artists were intentionally amplifying or if it rather more embodies an artistic fatigue on the part of the band. While the album has some moments that do shine pretty bright (the gorgeous “Fall from Grace” in particular), Obsidian does find the band frequently dirging in circular ruts that do mar the experience of the album as whole by disrupting the formation of any kind of cohesive feel or atmosphere beyond the basic downtrodden head-hang of the genre.

6/10

Sons of Apollo-MMXX

The second album from the A-list prog metal supergroup finds the collective focusing primarily on the hard rock and groove aspects of the music: heavy metal first, progressive metal second. Still, the winding prog waltzing of Dream Theater from Mike Portnoy’s and Derek Sherinian’s times in the band can’t help but leak into MMXX, but they never lead the music too far for Billy Sheehan’s rumbly bass lines and Jeff Scott Soto’s full-bodied soaring vocals to reel everybody back in. Balancing the technical exhibitionism of prog metal and the heavy instrumentals at the core rather well, Sons of Apollo certainly have the potential for more longevity than the usual supergroup.

7/10

Kaoteon-Kaoteon

Sporting a strong enough performance energy but little in the way of stylistic or compositional creativity, the Lebanese band’s eponymous third album is a pretty forgettable blackened death metal affair.

5/10

Glorious Depravity-Ageless Violence

This is the debut album from Glorious Depravity, a Brooklyn supergroup formed from the death metal underground seemingly to help satiate a gargantuan appetite for death metal of these guys. I’m being a little facetious; the album only constitutes a half hour of crisp, nasty death metal. But that’s plenty of time for Glorious Depravity to rail against incel sexism, wage slavery, and drone warfare in familiar deathly fashion. Incredibly straightforward in its instrumentation, Ageless Violence isn’t going to be turning any heads, but it’s a pretty tight half hour of no-nonsense death metal for anyone in the mood for it with only so much time on their hands.

6/10

Countless Skies-Glow

Countless Skies may have gravitated to many of the same ingredients that their contemporaries have in the quest to maximize the impact of their melodic death metal and take it to a more epic height in the stratosphere. Not just for the uncannily similar operatic vocals, Glow takes on an adventurous prog ethos that feels strange to not be coming from Devin Townsend. I’m supposed to believe Devin Townsend isn’t bankrolling this with his big Canadian bucks? It’s not possible. It’s definitely a conspiracy by big coffee to establish a colony in the UK under Ziltoid’s control. My biggest complaint of the band’s sophomore effort here would probably be the jumbled structure of a good few songs on here that lead to parts of the album flowing less logically than they should. And I get that with the wide pallet of Iron Maiden-esque melodic guitar lines, grand choirs and symphonic elements a la Dimmu Borgir, and a lot of progressive stylings to balance, there are bound to be a few compositionally sloppy moments from a band only two albums into their craft, but not adjusting for the band’s rookie status, Glow is an incredibly accomplished and enticing album with so much gorgeous and cathartic instrumentation (and singing) to enjoy and appreciate, even if it’s arranged oddly sometimes.

8/10

Hallas-Conundrum

The sophomore LP from the Swedish quintet falls more in line with the prog rock of the 70’s that bands like Kansas, Rush, and Yes, but the sheer energy it has should surely be enough to win over metal heads the same way the band’s prog rock grandfathers did. Boasting gorgeous swelling synths and ambitious song structures with shimmering guitar passages acoustic and electric, complete with big prog solos to match, Conundrum is in many ways the answer to the creative staleness of Yes, as it not only builds this fantastical world of naturalistic prog rock sound, but it does something worthwhile with it.

7/10

Within the Ruins -Black Heart

Injecting quite a fair dose of creative instrumentation into their sixth LP, Within the Ruins come through with a deliciously refreshing technical deathcore album. With actually moving guitar melodies and chest-beating grooves, Black Heart is quite possibly the best technical death metal album I’ve heard this year. The instrumental track, “Eighty Sixed”, perhaps best captures the band’s musical imaginativeness with its many twists and turns through such novel sounds for the genre, but there is so much here to groove to, headbang to, and air-sweep-pick to.

8/10

Convulse-Deathstar

Though definitely one of the more stylistically daring and dynamic progressive metal albums of the year, Convulse’s incomplete melding of death metal with the various other out-there elements and occasional riff-borrowing (Sabbath’s “Children of the Grave” on the opening track and Sepultura’s “Roots Bloody Roots” uncannily on the title track) on Deathstar holds it back from being a more sure-fire experimental success.

6/10

Hexecutor-Beyond Any Human Conception of Knowledge…

If Quarthon were to pull a Jesus on us and come back from the dead, his musical ventures would probably sound something like this second Hexecutor album here. The French band offer a well-modernized and remastered take on the thrashy first wave of black metal that Bathory kicked off in the 80’s, blending with some of the intricate instrumentation that it led to less than a decade later in the 90’s death metal scene, though the mood of the album avoids the brutal darkness and harshness of the early death metal it draws influence from, staying pretty upbeat and occult in a way that first brought to my mind the work of Tribulation. Indeed, the instrumental work on here is dazzling and elaborate to a point where my earlier hypothetical situation about Quarthon creating this in a world where he was still alive kind of falls apart. Beyond Any Human Conception of Knowledge… is as meticulously written and compositionally impressive as its title suggests. I think a little more dynamic in the album’s mood would have been beneficial, but there’s not a whole lot to complain about for an album of its type, and even though I don’t gravitate toward this type of black metal as heavily as latter forms of the genre, I still found myself thoroughly enjoying this one.

7/10

Sea-Impermanence

After a promisingly soulful self-titled debut EP back in 2015, the Bostonian band made their full-length debut way back in January of this year, Impermanence being a forlorn, but empathetically human take on the doomgaze sound the band birthed from. It may not have hit the same melodic gold that the EP did, but what Sea offer on Impermanence is more than just gloom. There’s a much-needed sense of hope and solidarity too, and I do hope the band keep it up.

7/10

Wake-Devouring Ruin

The fifth album from the steadily improving Wake finds them getting a little more compositionally confident and bold enough to branch into some more atmospheric territory as the Alberta band continue hone their blackened death metal chops. There’s a little taste of the kinds of atmospheric elements that made Numenorean’s album last year such an open-hearted affair, though Devouring Ruin remains rooted in its more traditionally deathly motives. Make no mistake though, there is a good serving of interesting guitar work on this album, especially for an album of its type, and it all feeds pretty well into the uniquely elegant blackened death monstrosity of the band’s sound.

7/10

Psychotic Waltz-The God-Shaped Void

Well damn, show this album at a seminar for old-school bands trying to make a comeback, and at a prog metal conference too because Psychotic Waltz have made the prospect of a progressive heavy metal comeback look easy with The God-Shaped Void! The album doesn’t have to go crazy with technical wankery or even excessively long and meandering songs to hit its prog quota; rather, the album lets the prog come naturally into the classically inspired 90’s heavy metal the band play as they let the grandiosity come naturally, without artificial flavors or shortcuts. And the result is indeed a well-balanced and immersively addictive prog metal record that lets its very organically glorious composition speak for itself, one of the year’s very best in fact.

8/10

Neptunian Maximalism-Éons

I was so on the fence with this one, not about if I liked it or not (I quite love it), but with regards to how I covered it on here, as a “metal album” or an “outside album”, because it’s certainly got enough there to justify invoking metal in a review of its aircraft-carrier-sized slab of material, but so much else and lots of everything. Ultimately, with how much it’s been making its way through metal circles and getting appreciation long the likes of Lingua Ignota and Oranssi Pazuzu, I figured it’s enough to justify me giving it a “metal review”. If I have time, I might give this thing a more long-form review later because trying to capsule review a more-than-two-hour-long mammoth that I really really like feels unjust. That being said, I should probably get on with the review. To give Éons a predominant genre feels a little weird, but I don’t think anyone would have any objections to classifying it first and foremost as a jazz album, being that jazz is the solvent that the majority of the other musical elements are swimming around in on this record. Not your grandpa’s jazz: wild, disorienting, unsettling big band jazz that contributes greatly to the otherworldly atmosphere throughout the 2-hour odyssey, supporting by plenty of manic percussion that keeps you on you toes, but not so much that the hyponotic underlying rhythms and entrancing atmospheres don’t lure you like a siren into the colorful void it all creates. And a substantial part of that void is the big wall of sound the metallic drones help create, similar to the amplifier drone of Sunn O))), but it’s not always just accomplished with ultra-sustained distorted guitars. Sometimes the swell of sax and tuba create the mounting wave of sound that towers over you and consumes you effortlessly. Either way, you’ll completely lose track of space and time as this album sucks you into another weird dimension that never really lets up on the gas, and that’s totally fine.

8/10

Völur-Death Cult

Regardless of the somewhat slow start it gets off to with the shyer doom of the first track, Death Cult is one of the year’s most creative post-metal albums, whipping up a frenzy of unnervingly jazzy string arrangements and well-paired blast beats to make for a very dark, nightmare-world folky experience. It indeed feels like being lost in the woods and stumbling upon a deranged dystopian cult whose put-together exterior veils its ritualistic sacrificial practices or something. All you know is you have to run, but you’re already lost. Yeah, really interesting blend of styles on this album.

8/10

Uada-Djinn

I realized with this album that for my writing about it, I’m going to be doing something that I have unusually not done much of this year, and that is going against the grain, as the rain on the parade. Djinn is the third album from Portland’s Uada, who have been gradually solidifying what I can acknowledge to be a rather uniquely melodic sound within black metal that pulls from funeral doom as well as the kinds of shoegazy ambient black metal melancholy that Deafheaven and their contemporaries pedal, but I what I’m having a hard time with on Djinn is the melodic approach. The combination of the less overtly sinister stylings of black metal with the often more dragging aspect of doom, with a big focus on the melodic product of the synthesis of the two, to me makes for a very counterproductive team-up. And the band can get away from this when they do amp the speed and energy of the music up, but when they’re going for the slow-burn doom metal approach on most of the record, it just highlights these really meandering and emotionless guitar melodies that are strewn all across the record that just do nothing for me. I really do not get what fans heaping praise onto this album hear in these guitar lines that evokes any kind of strong feelings whatsoever. They’re not particularly somber, or heartfelt, or psychedelic, or ethereal, or anything that adds to an atmosphere or vibe that the album is building around; they’re just tremolo-picked (or worse, just metronomic quarter notes the whole way through) chord progressions that seem selected for no reason in particular. I don’t particularly like being the sourpuss in the room, but I’ve listened to this album over and over again to see if something clicks for me and it’s only redundantly highlighted the moments and aspects of the album I do find somewhat enjoyable, but nothing about the vast majority of mindless, demo-level Pallbearer doomgazing with some pretty much negligible black metal flair is at all appealing to me. Like I said, a lot of it comes down to how spotlighted the guitars are in the sluggish bulk of the album and how seemingly little was put into the melodies they have to carry. Maybe the next one will be more convincing, but the presentation of the band’s style that Djinn gives is really not selling it well, and I think they have to do a lot of work on that melodic approach that’s so central to their sound.

4/10

Cirith Ungol-Forever Black

Awakening in 2015 after almost a quarter century of slumber, the Californian heavy metal occultists have really come down the stairs to quite the Hell’s Kitchen to cook up their breakfast album in, and if I had made a bet on how well I though my Forever Black would turn out from the groggy, bed-headed Cirith Ungol, I would have lost some money because the band’s shrieking, soaring comeback album is fiercely energetic, tightly composed, and way better than I would have expected it to be, and I’m glad I got to hear it before year’s end.

7/10

Aseitas-False Peace

After the independent release of their debut album in 2018, Portland, Oregon quintet Aseitas find themselves up to bat for Translation Loss Records in 2020 with their massive sophomore effort, False Peace, an album of death metal and hardcore muscularity steeped in cerebrally tormented experimentation. Indeed, hardly anything on False Peace goes normally or by the books, and that’s the intent, which sometimes leads the album into territory where it gets a little bit lost in the weeds, but never too long to find itself back on something intriguing that you’re glad you came along on the ride for: weird style experiments that you don’t usually associate with metalcore and death metal, weird rhythms and dynamic shifts. It’s a wild ride to say the least, and at 72 minutes it’s definitely a long ride too, but the commitment definitely pays off and proves more than worthwhile as it is an album to digest with concentration.

8/10

Autonoesis-Autonoesis

This debut album from the Toronto-based act has been getting a lot of hype since its release back in August for the tightness and engaging writing of its deliciously lick-filled melodic thrash/death metal sound, and for good reason. The solos are majestic and the riffs indeed abundant on the self-titled debut; I’ll add that the band seem to take a good bit of progressive ambition and inspiration (as well as compositional influence) from the likes of Death and Orchid-era Opeth, to make for a well-above average debut for an act in this field.

8/10

Pyrrhon-Abscess Time

Last on my long list of albums I tackled for the end of the year is the fourth album from the Brooklyn-based four-piece, Pyrrhon. The band have been relentlessly pushing death metal into new territories since 2008, but Abscess Time is my introduction to their work, and what an introduction it is. The band’s aim is to expand the definition of what metal can be, and they make that no secret. Right out of the gate, the title track careens seemingly drunkenly, but enraged and dangerous, through punchy bursts of bassy strides in off-kilter rhythms that feel reminiscent of Swan’s early work in the no-wave scene. The track feels as much like noise rock as it does avant-garde death metal, and not far off from a song like “Stay Strong” from Swans’ Filth record. The music across the album is familiarly heavy and rooted in the core elements of death, but the disfigurement the band puts it through really makes the adequate term “experimental death metal” quite the understatement. The album takes on a hectic and tormented quality rather similar to what Imperial Triumphant do in their most high-energy moments, and it draws a lot of its vertigo-inducing immersion from completely unconventionally harrowingly jazzy dissonant guitar work, as well as wild rhythms and percussive accents out of nowhere that embody the dystopian plethora of anxieties it highlights lyrically. Indeed, the lyrics on Abscess Time, and the thematically relevant film audio samples, peel off the inadequate bandages covering the social rot, alienation from labor, and dehumanization in the infected wound of late-stage capitalism. The album feels like the claustrophobic nightmare world of a Darren Aronofsky film, and its utterly sensorily discombobulated reaction to the hell of capitalist wage slavery and the demons in charge of it is fucking terrifying to witness because it just amplifies the reality of everyday anxieties that one’s catastrophizing under the implicit threats of violence under capitalism keeps them trapped within. The deep, stressful panic that the album portrays is so real; it’s the fear we all operate under that ceasing to participate in alienated labor will incur the consequential violence of the loss or seizure of basic human needs, and that’s what’s so horrifying about this album’s experience. Well done Pyrrhon! Truly the embodiment of the COVID-19-ridden hell world of 2020 where the profit-generating machine refuses to cease even momentrily and burns what it treats as disposable human capital in the furnace of a pandemic to keep the engine turning.

9/10

Eraser-A Deal with the Devil

With a healthy dose of 90’s groove metal influences (as well as some of the industrial and electronic elements their homeland has become famous for, which includes an at least curious dubstep bridge breakdown) to vary up their At the Gates-esque melodic death metal, German six-piece Eraser have burst out of the gate with a brilliantly balanced and head-turning independent debut album that I’m sure will land them on a label in no time. Boasting that sharp, fire-blackened death metal melody that both hooks you in and ties you to the alter it’s about to sacrifice you upon, A Deal with the Devil grooves so infectiously that you’ll find yourself nodding your head in rhythm as it sets the wood you’re strapped to ablaze. I think the band have some ironing out to do when it comes to a sound they want to cultivate, but they’ve laid a fine groundwork in what they’re capable of on this debut here, which is certainly an enthusiastic one that will catch you off your guard, well done.

7/10

Lingua Ignota-The Caligula Demos

After offering up harrowing covers of “Jolene”, “Wicked Game”, and the infamous Eminem song, “Kim”, on Bandcamp throughout the year, for the last Bandcamp Friday of this goddamned year, Lingua Ignota mastermind and Cheezit connoisseur Kristin Hayter has released a batch of demos from the sessions from the recording of her noisy, neoclassical industrial darkwave, reverse horrorcore, poetic hellwave masterpiece from last year, Caligula.

We get a lot of rough noise precursors to the frightful cacophony that eventually made it onto the album proper, as well as some more stripped back piano demos that highlight Hayter’s classical singing chops, but also a few songs that don’t resemble anything on Caligula and maybe just got cut from the album, like the song “KYRIE”, which features Hayter singing soulfully and relatively softly over a minimally Sunn O))) kind of metallic amplifier drone.

While it is indeed a demo album and the roughness that typically characterizes demo scraps does come through in a few of the less put-together pieces here, this is hardly a typical demo album, and the tracks here offer a great few snapshots of the creative process of one of the most transfixingly terrifying and emotionally raw albums of the past few years for fans of Lingua Ignota.

7/10

November 2020

System of a Down - Protect the Land / Genocidal Humanoids

The Armenian-American nu metal revolutionaries reconvene after 15 years of studio silence for a quick two-song punch to raise funds for their war-steeped homeland. The songs are a good warm-up-sounding appetizer of two very distinct sides of System of a Down that certainly do not on their own set up the precedent for any further new material. For now though, I’ll take whatever positives I can get out of this year, and a couple of new System of a Down songs are certainly that.

Celebrity Sex Scandal - The Fundamental

I don’t want to be too hard on this album because I genuinely don’t think it’s particularly ill-conceived or transparently lazy; it just kinda didn’t work out. Celebrity Sex Scandal are a pretty hefty eight-member ensemble from San Antonio, Texas who got their start partially through an online crowdfunding campaign. The band dazzled eager fans with their odd, cockeyed approach to the gratuitous genre layering of progressive metal and experimental rock, and the band’s third album unfortunately just goes to show that experimental doesn’t always equate with good, of course, because not every experiment is a success. In fact it’s kind of suggestive in the name that most of it isn’t. The thing that makes The Fundamental not such a hit as an experiment is that it’s really more messy than experimental. While it tosses together the disparate likes of funk rock, sludge metal, southern rock, and swing into a blender with a bunch of unusual instrumental components, at the core of it all and most prevalent in the mix of styles is this stale post-grunge alternative rock/metal that also dictates the direction the music goes in, which ultimately leads to the individual compositions being surprisingly predictable for an eccentric experimental album (and not in a flattering way). There are a few pretty rough performances throughout the album too. I get that this album is obviously pretty tongue-in-cheek and that some of its forced oddity is meant to serve the purpose of parody, but it doesn’t exactly salvage the mostly unappealing compositions and performances throughout, not that there aren’t a few relative bright spots. Overall though, I’m just not feeling the band’s superficially wacky genre-orgy style on this album. Still, I will be eager to hear whatever the band have in store for us next; hopefully this was just a hiccup in the grander scheme of things. And I hope they keep at it with their experimental ambition.

4/10

Blood from the Soul - DSM-5

If not outright masterful, nearly everything Jacob Bannon touches is at least vibrant as the sun itself. The prolific Converge frontman teamed up with Napalm Death bassist Shane Embery to revive the latter’s long-defunct moniker from the early 90’s, Blood from the Soul, which had but one industrial metal to its name before its resurrection through Bannon’s Deathwish Inc. Embery had originally paired with Lou Koller of Sick of It All for the first album’s industrial hardcore leanings, and with Bannon in the other chair in the cockpit two and a half decades later, Blood from the Soul takes on a much different life with DSM-5. It’s rather predictable and holistic blend of the types of aggression of both members’ main bands isn’t necessarily a bad thing on the principle of it being foreseeable, and the album does cross-breed pretty well the death-metal-leaning grindcore of modern Napalm Death with the fiery chaos of first-wave metalcore of Converge, two genres that marry quite well to the surprise of no one watching.

8/10

Surma - The Light Within

Making their debut for Metal Blade Records after making some pretty noticeable noise from the tiny Faroe Islands, Surma go big and theatric with their take on symphonic neoclassical metal on The Light Within. And I can see why their label saw Surma as a promising prospect (though Metal Blade also shamelessly milk Six Feet Under and the hotly disputed “fake” Batushka for whatever cash is in those udders, so make of that what you will), but Surma’s writing chops with the huge pallet they choose to paint with are clearly still maturing, their appeal coming largely from the natural grandiosity of the medium they work with. A few exceptionally compositionally accomplished songs like “The City of Winds” and “The Selkie (Kópakonan)” do suggest that this band can indeed live up to their expectations; it’s gonna take a lot of work though.

6/10

Ghostemane - ANTI-ICON

As much as it may get metal’s puritans’ panties in a bunch, yes, musicians who create largely outside the realm of metal can also have some metal cred up their sleeve that we just don’t see too much. And Floridian rapper Ghostemane has plenty of prerequisites in metal to justify his presence in the scene and his wielding of the genre. The 29-year-old got his start in the music world in local hardcore bands and has taken a ton of influence from nu metal and industrial metal, and that comes through in no uncertain manner on ANTI-ICON. Bristling with an unregulated darkness, Ghostemane traverses ANTI-ICON with brooding, Manson-like, low-register moaning as well as amped up hardcore quick-spit rap verses about the most self-loathing depths of depression and the depravity of the most aggressive and sinister intrusive thoughts. And sure, the edginess is pretty over-the-top across the whole album to the point of including an extended and rather isolated sample of someone choking severely that slightly repulse even a death metal fan, but there’s something so fresh, honest, and addicting about the unabashedly masochistic mesh of sounds here. The consistency of the gritty industrial center and the punchy metallic hardcore accents across the album are mountainous evidence that this isn’t some quirky side quest for Ghostemane. He knows his shit and he’s not messing around. With no high-brow filter over the cup, Ghostemane’s pitch black brew on ANTI-ICON is an upfront and captivating illustration of a disturbed mind in its lowest of lows that puts brutal emotional honesty before poetic eloquence, and it makes you appreciate it for its willingness to be unattractive and unembarrassed.

8/10

Of Feather and Bone - Sulfuric Disintegration

After an explosive sophomore release in 2018 (Bestial Hymns of Perversion) Of Feather and Bone suffer only a mild third-album slump in their pivot toward the more hazy, cerebral tendencies of other bands on the Profound Lore label. The more cerebral Sulfuric Disintegration points the band in a more cavernous, more compositionally abstract, and potentially more promising direction within death metal’s foggier waters for future releases. While I do prefer the band’s debut for their current label, I think this album sets them on a course for things ahead that will soon outshine what they have released so far. That being said, there are plenty of nasty riffs and filthy bass lines to salivate over on this, so enjoy the present too.

7/10

Sólstafir - Endless Twilight of Codependent Love

Apart from the heart-wrenching character that the sometimes strained vocal performances across it give it, Sólstafir’s seventh album isn’t all too stylistically different from most albums in their catalog or their post-rock/metal field. Yet the band make quite the case for why they are indeed one of the most vital participants in the echo-soaked genre after its peak, and with a variety of styles. “Dionysus” recalls the band’s earlier black metal era, while “Úlfur” recalls White Pony-era Deftones. The stoic folksy post-rock closing track, “Hann For Sjalfur”, ends on a fitting, somber note, but the top prize has to go to the heart-crushing “Her Fall from Grace”, whose standard post-rock guitar melodies serve as a stark reminder of just how powerful the saturated genre can be. Endless Twilight of Codependent Love captures well all the themes its title implies in a raw, cathartic, and open-hearted stream of emotive post-metal sorrow and blackgaze languish.

8/10

Dark Buddha Rising - Mathreyata

Dark Buddha Rising, who paired up with Oranssi Pazuzu last year for the mind-warping Syntheosis under the name Waste of Space Orchestra, return to their own solo ventures, just as their fellow psychedelic black metal collaborators did earlier this year, in injecting a little bit of magic mushroom hallucinosis into black metal through spacy, freakish synth work. While not quite as psychedelically wild as Oranssi Pazuzu’s transforming of more traditional black metal Mestarin Kynsi,Mathreyata follows a similar pattern of progression through heavy, dizzying atmospheres that build to fulfilling climaxes with a more ambient, droning, and meditative form of blackened post-metal that the band of course give a little dose of LSD to. And the results are intriguing at the very least. I would highly recommend this to anyone who enjoys atmospheric black metal at its most meditative or Sunn O))) for thee enveloping atmospheres their music can create.

8/10

Jesu - Terminus

Embodying the creative rot of the genre as a whole on this album, Jesu are back with another offering of forgettable, unconvincing indie-post-rock-influenced post-metal.

5/10

Live Without-Mannequin

Colliding filthy guitar tones a la Bloodbath or Cannibal Corpse with the visceral rage of hardcore and lyricism even more blunt and less poetic than what is usually associated with the genre, it’s good to hear Live Without still sounding lively and fucking shit up while swearing gratuitously and emphatically. This quick, 5-track EP isn’t doing anything innovative or particularly interesting, but goddamn can you feel the commitment to the metallicization of hardcore and the hardcorification of groove metal. I do hope they keep at it because they have quite an energy that can be deadly if they harness it to its fullest.

6/10

Ghøstkid-Ghøstkid

Jumbling together the bristling melodic metalcore of Architects with the focus on cool of amo-era Bring Me the Horizon with a writing style that hearkens to being in a Hot Topic in the mid-2000’s, Ghøstkid’s debut album has a lot that just doesn’t appeal to me without a lot of convincing, and Ghøstkid’s unspecial, average performances aren’t doing any of that necessary convincing.

4/10

Killer Be Killed - Reluctant Hero

The, possibly, most high-profile metal supergroup, Killer Be Killed, are back after a lengthy break following their self-titled 2014 debut with a rather similarly well-rounded sophomore effort. Sepultura founder and current Soulfly leader Max Cavalera, dynamic frontman of the late Dillinger Escape Plan and The Black Queen Greg Puciato (who just put out a fantastic solo album a month ago), Troy Sanders of Mastodon, and Converge drummer Ben Koller make for a rather promising and lineup. Though it takes some time to break into its shoes, a few songs in to build some momentum, Reluctant Hero is a pretty boisterous display from the star-studded alliance, who really have no excuse to fail with their combined pedigrees in the album’s thorough combination of relatively straightforward thrash, groove metal, and sludge metal. The multi-vocal attack serves some of the more dynamic trade-offs well, but with three of them singing, I think they could have gone a little harder on layered vocal harmonies and dizzying trade-offs. Indeed, the album’s greatest weakness is perhaps how unambitious it feels for a project made by the joining of four metal giants, especially in comparison to their works with their respective main bands. Despite feeling largely like a less-proggy, safe version of an early Mastodon album, Reluctant Hero delivers the no-nonsense thrashers and groovy bangers it needs to, and any complaints about it are mild and largely overshadowed by the exciting dynamic exchanged among the four superstars here.

7/10

Tombs - Under Sullen Skies

After whetting our pallets with their EP, Monarchy of Shadows, back in February, Tombs are back with their main course of the year, Under Sullen Skies. I was a little lukewarm toward the Brooklyn band’s first release this year, but this LP really steps it up for them not just in terms of its more comprehensive look into their sound and their ability as a band, but also in the performances. The band virtuosically juggle black metal, death metal, and doom metal on Under Sullen Skies with impressive fluidity across the album without the track listing coming across disjointed. There’s also a greater sense of conviction and emotional potency on the performances here compared to this year’s earlier EP. Tombs more than delivered after what they teased earlier this year suggested they would come through with, showcasing an expansive range of stylistic talents through dazzling and constantly engaging performances, and I’m glad the longer format of this LP lent itself to a better showcasing of their abilities.

8/10

Liturgy-Origin of the Anomalies

Just a year after the surprise release of H.A.Q.Q., the polarizingly bright and philosophical Liturgy are back with another offering, albeit somewhat shorter, of heavenly, awe-inspiring transcendental black metal. Though the first few songs in the album traverse an odd array of neo-classical ambient styles, the album does eventually settle in to the sound Hunter Hunt-Hendrix formed on Aesthethica. Origin of the Alimonies is almost entirely instrumental though, and it’s jumbled flow and composition make it feel a lot like an afterthought from H.A.Q.Q. and its creative process.

6/10

My Dying Bride - Macabre Cabaret

After a satisfactory, but hardly thrilling thirteenth LP after a five-year gap, My Dying Bride bounce back quickly with a bit more potent and raw of an EP, capturing the sorrow that surrounded the band for the past half decade more fully than their LP did.

6/10

Sodom - Genesis XIX

We’ve long known what to expect from Germany’s blackened thrash pioneers basically ever since M-16, but album after album Sodom keep the riffs coming and the pit circling with ample energy, Genesis XIX being wonderfully no different. Lobbing one riff-laden screamer after another drizzled with a the war-themed commentary that they and thrash in general have come to be known for and a tasteful amount of aged cheese, Genesis XIX makes up for its predictability with a forceful demonstration of confidence in what continues to motivate the Teutonic thrash titans to stick to their Gatling guns on the metallic battlefield, and the reward for their undying dedication is victory in securing one of the year’s best thrash albums.

8/10

MSW-Obliviosus

While the majority its slow, somber dirge plays more like a stream-of-consciousness therapeutic processing of the tragic loss its creator experienced through the medium of doom and ambient black metal, Obliviosus has its flourishes of beautifully solemn instrumentation (particularly the build in the middle of the closing title track), and an open-hearted listen easily lends tangible insight into the sorrow that inspired it. What it lacks in structural cohesion and musical wealth it supplements well enough with candid expression.

6/10

King 810-AK Concerto No. 47, 11th Movement in G Major

Flint, Michigan’s rapcore representatives have had a hard time connecting their intentionally controversially violent lyricism and live presentation to the systemic ills that have plagued their tragically notorious hometown, but the band did tone down the machismo a bit on last year’s oddity-laden Suicide King in favor of a more solely musically ear-catching strategy. While I wasn’t particularly into that album, it might have been just the reset that King 810 needed to recalibrate on this year’s more meat-and-potatoes rapcore album, AK Concerto No. 47, 11th Movement in G Major. It might not have been a super sudden or even conscious decision to ease off the edginess this time around, which might be a tough choice to make for a band basing so much of their identity on their bravado, but the result of the band’s turning the spotlight away from their theatrics and more fully onto the music is an album that feels more honest and more focused. The brutal truths of their environment aren’t smoothed out or whitewashed, and honestly, if this is what their independent journey is going to look like, I’m here for it.

7/10

Psycroptic - The Watcher of All

Teasing with a little two-song taster, Psycroptic flex their techdeath muscles indeed, but they’re doing the bare minimum when it comes to refreshing the hype that built around their name after 2018’s As the Kingdom Drowns. The songs here are solid enough in the basics of technical death metal, but they provide just an inkling of the keen compositional instinct that bolstered their prominence in 2018. I’d say I slightly prefer the greater intricacy of “A Fragile Existence” to the speedy, but more predictable, title track.

6/10

Lie in Ruins-Floating in Timeless Streams

Lie in Ruins have failed to really dazzle me with their early output so far, after two full-size albums, despite their now-extensive experience in the field. But bubbling with a whole lot more energy and a more palpable sense of confidence in their direct approach to (slightly blackened) old-school death metal the Finnish band’s third LP here might be change in tides for them, a potential start of a new era in their career. Floating in Timeless Streams finally captures the raw, gritty sound of 90’s death metal in a more flattering light, hopefully giving the band some momentum heading forward.

7/10

Scour-Black

Another prominent supergroup (if we count Phil Anselmo’s many musical projects as such), Scour, which started back in 2015 and only put out two EPs and a Bathory cover barely eclipsing a half hour of material total until this month, is the Pantera frontman’s intended venture into black metal. I say “intended” because it’s not as pure of a black metal venture as the genre’s finicky purists might grant it; for my money, there’s no point really deliberating it pedantically. It’s black metal. But the various members’ pedigrees with grindcore and death metal from experience with bands like Misery Index and Cattle Decapitation do show through here, and while that would lead naturally to the suggestion that what Scour produce would be under the banner of blackened death metal, I don’t think that label really captures it. Epecially on Black, whose sound is intensely focused on sinister darkness and evil, just whose players can’t help themselves from breakneck speed and nasty growls, Scour are clearly playing black metal. Black plays much like a Watain album just with even faster elements and more death growls influenced by Cattle Decapitation’s semi-blackened deathgrind. There’s also the occasional groove-focused section like the rhythmic riff of “Propaganda” and the delicious palm-muted groove of “Flames”, but it never feels unlike black metal. Regarding Anselmo and potential valid concerns about his (hopefully just drunken) racist shenanigans (to put it generously) potentially coming through in the lyrics, there’s nothing to really worry about here. The guy has clearly been loving him some Portal lately (as shown by his wearing their t-shirt in the bands promo photos), and the lyrics here mainly just mimic the heady, ultra-abstract (kinda nonsensical) surrealism that that band employs. I think this project’s brevity is a clever move on the band’s part, leaving a thirsting for more, making me really hopeful for a full-length sometime in the future, because this extremely grindcore-influenced, and rather fresh, approach to black metal is so savory and addictive.

8/10

Hatebreed - Weight of the False Self

While Jamey Jasta might have become more well-known as a podcast host than hardcore frontman for the past few years, that hasn’t lessened the impact of Hatebreed’s blood-pumping, grind-motivating, weight-slamming, room-cleaning metalcore. In a way, perhaps his visible juggling of his label-owning business ventures and his career with Hatebreed alongside his newfound role as the Joe Rogan of the metal world is what gives his life-coaching lyricism weight and Hatebreed’s individualist motivational ethos its life, or at least its cred. Weight of the False Self is a familiar half-hour motivational speech through hardcore for anyone who’s come into contact with Hatebreed or the scene they emerged from, and that’s not a bad thing here. The band continue to get their reps in on their metallically muscular sound and on the rhythmic grooves and hardcore breakdowns they need to maintain their technique and musical physique. While still being just another day pumping iron, gym analogies aside, this album is a great representation of how invigorating standard, but committed hardcore can be, and I’m sure I’ll be lifting to it a lot in the coming future.

8/10

Scour-Black

Another prominent supergroup (if we count Phil Anselmo’s many musical projects as such), Scour, which started back in 2015 and only put out two EPs and a Bathory cover barely eclipsing a half hour of material total until this month, is the Pantera frontman’s intended venture into black metal.

I say “intended” because it’s not as pure of a black metal venture as the genre’s finicky purists might grant it; for my money, there’s no point really deliberating it pedantically. It’s black metal. But the various members’ pedigrees with grindcore and death metal from experience with bands like Misery Index, Pig Destroyer, and Cattle Decapitation do show through here, and while that would lead naturally to the suggestion that what Scour produce would be under the banner of blackened death metal, I don’t think that label really captures it.

Epecially on Black, whose sound is intensely focused on sinister darkness and evil, just whose players can’t help themselves from breakneck speed and nasty growls, Scour are clearly playing black metal. It just happens to be significantly more furious than your average black metal record these days where speed has kind of fallen to the wayside in a relinquishing of that aspect of the music at its most extreme to death metal.

Black plays much like a Watain album just with even faster elements and more death growls influenced by Cattle Decapitation’s semi-blackened deathgrind. There’s also the occasional groove-focused section like the rhythmic riff of “Propaganda” and the delicious palm-muted groove of “Flames”, but it never feels unlike black metal.

Regarding Anselmo and potential valid concerns about his (hopefully just drunken) racist shenanigans (to put it generously) potentially coming through in the lyrics, there’s nothing to really worry about here. The guy has clearly been loving him some Portal lately (as shown by his wearing their t-shirt in the bands promo photos), and the lyrics here mainly just mimic the heady, ultra-abstract (kinda nonsensical) surrealism that that band employs.

I think this project’s brevity is a clever move on the band’s part, leaving a thirsting for more, making me really hopeful for a full-length sometime in the future, because this extremely grindcore-influenced, and rather fresh, approach to black metal is so savory and addictive.

8/10

Continue growth since original lineup reunion. Happiness Is one of favorites of year it came out. Album much continuing on current style. Love punk rock feel of Death Wolf, Tidal Wave, and others. Still true emo style in songs like We Don’t Go In There. Much long term loving dynamic between Nolan and Lazzara. Maybe not as fully consistent as last album, but very strong album. 3 ½ paws up.

Every pop-punk connoisseur has heard of this iconic band, I’m sure, and lo and behold, they released a sophomore album only a few days ago! Did it – in my opinion – match up to its predecessor, Double Dare? You’re about to find out.  

Track 1: 11:11

The 10-track album opens up with 11:11, a song that plays with mystical and mysterious sounds, beginning with distinctive synth-sounds and then it elaborates with the guitars and drums. Unfortunately, it did not live up to my expectations. I think it is sufficient; it definitely grows on you the more you listen. Also, it does the job of giving the listener a small taste of what’s to come later on the record, but it’s not particularly memorable. I did notice that the drums are remarkable so, kudos to Otto!

Song rating: 6.5/10

Track 2: Blonde

From there we move to Blonde, the first single and one of the best songs of the album. At a first listen it can be deceiving, the upbeat rhythm and lyrics like I think the blondes are done with funandI think the blondes are done we’re all too cool for fun may seem fun and shallow. Nonetheless, if you pay close attention to the words, they speak of sadness and depression, but at the same time they hint of recovery through love, so it’s both sad and happy. Musically it’s exactly what you’d expect of Waterparks, a tune! So yeah, 10/10 would recommend!

Song rating: 10/10

Track 3: Peach (Lobotomy)

I must admit, this track had me hook within the first 10 seconds, and for the most random of reasons. It reminded me of Dick & JanebySidney York, which is the theme song for the South Korean series Age of YouthorHello, My Twenties! on Netflix (if you haven’t seen it I would also recommend it ;-)).

Anyways,Peach (Lobotomy) is a very pop-inspired song about being so in love with somebody they take over all your thoughts. It does an exceptional job of conveying this feeling of obsession, and madness even. It seems to me that the guys dared to step outside the box on this one and do something a bit different to what they would usually do, which is so commendable and it definitely worked!

Song rating: 10/10

Track 4: We Need To Talk

We Need To Talk is a difficult tune to judge, in my opinion. It’s catchy, for sure, but what bug me are the lyrics. The song discusses Awsten’s doubts with a previous relationship and his revelations that had occurred whilst he was in the relationship. Loads of songs deal with this kind of issue but with this one it just sounds cliché and overused, unfortunately.

Song rating: 7.5/10

Track 5: Not Warriors

I don’t know if it’s just me who finds Not Warriors to be particularly obnoxious and annoying… it’s a more pop generated track compared to their other works. It’s sang on high-pitched voice for most of the song and, I don’t know, I don’t really like it, so let’s just move on, okay? 

Song rating: 4/10

Track 6: Lucky People

Halfway through the record we get to hear Lucky People, my absolute favourite, no doubt. Where do I even start! The best way I can think of explaining this song is what the band account tweeted once: THIS IS THE MOST HAPPY JASON MRAZ ASS SONG YOU EVER SAW. ALSO THE SADDEST. YOU DECIDE, I GUESS. Fairly accurate because the song is cheerful and upbeat, but the lyrics vaguely speak of being madly in love, only to end up “sitting, wishing, waiting for your call”. Also, I find it pretty refreshing for pop-punk bands to compose songs that are different than their usual stuff, that are acoustic and melodic, like 21 Questions on their debut album, that one it’s just  g e n i u s!

Song rating: 10/10

Track 7: Rare

I was about to rank it low, but I think you gotta give Rarea bit of a chance and listen to it a few times. By when it gets to the bridge and the beat drops right before the last chorus, I’m sure it will have you convinced. Still, it’s not a wow from me but also, not too shabby!

Song rating: 7.5/10

Track 8: TANTRUM

I must admit, this songhit me like a ton of bricks. I was not expecting something like it at all. TANTRUMis mainlyAwstenventing about injustices, double standards, and unoriginality in the music industry and how these have affected him. I admire the way all elements correlate together so perfectly, the title of the song, the fact it’s written on uppercase letters, the words of the song and of course, the music. Screamy and angry. Again, it’s venturing a bit away from what they usually do, much like Little Violence on their first record so, very much appreciated :-)

Song rating: 9/10

Track 9: Crybaby

Reaching the end of Entertainment, I feel like we hit a small bump on the road with the last two songs. It’s not like they’re awful but they’re definitely the ones I’m least bothered about. It seems to me that one particular defect of Crybabyis the chorus. It repeats itself for way too long, to the point it becomes monotone. I just think something more – and better – could have been with that time.

Song rating: 6/10

Track 10: Sleep Alone

I believe that Sleep Alone sounds just like every other Waterparks song which is a bit disappointing; given it doesn’t show any effort towards evolvement and growth.

Song rating: 6/10

Overall, it’s sad to admit this album was nowhere near as exceptional as Double Dare. Maybe the expectations were too big, maybe the bar was set too high, whatever the reason, the guys have failed to deliver this time, but it’s okay, they’re still baes! ♥

Album rating: 7,65/10

If you want to get into them or are interested to hear what they’re like, be sure to check out Double Dare first, and then perhaps give Entertainmenta chance, who knows, you might love it.

Ghost - Impera in-depth, song-by-song album review

Ever since I started to like Ghost in 2019 (I know I’m a little late to the party) I’ve been waiting for a new album by Ghost. Prequelle became one of my favorite albums in less than a couple months after I first heard it so I was really looking forward to what Papa and the Ghouls come up next.

Some people say Tobias’ writing is prophetic, since Prequelle was about the plague in the Middle Ages and everyone knows what happened in late 2019/early 2020. He was right once again since Impera is about an empire’s rise and fall and yet again we know what’s happening in the world right now. He said in interviews that according to him, “history is cyclical” and he can pretty much determine the big events because similar things have already happened in the past. I don’t know if he’s a prophet or not, but I know something very well: he’s a damn great songwriter, musician and artist.

1,Imperium: The intro to this album is a little different from previous Ghost albums. Instead of a choir or an organ solo we get a really 80’s sounding guitar solo that sounds almost even hopeful and is reminiscing of 80’s hair metal/heavy metal/power metal bands. Great way to introduce the album.

2.Kaisarion: Oh did I mention 80’s heavy metal? Cause there’s a lot of Iron Maiden in this one. The guitars kept that little hopeful sound from Imperium even though the lyrics are not even a little bit positive. It’s a love song to the 80’s NWOBHM scene that has been out of mainstream rock since the early 90’s. The dual guitars sound great and there’s still a choir in the background of the chorus to keep the Ghost sound.

3.Spillways: In a short review I called this: the most ABBA Ghost has ever sounded. People used to say that Ghost sounded like heavy metal ABBA Scooby Doo chase music and it’s perfectly true in this song. Some people even compared it to the Pokemon theme song which I also hear. It’s the disco-rock song of Impera, just like Dance Macabre was on Prequelle. The dual guitars are back in the solo, they sound really glam metal. The lyrics are once again dark, and about us spilling a little part of the darkness from the inside of us every now and then.

4. Call Me Little Sunshine: The second single of the record. Tobias said he wanted Kaisarion to be the second single for the tour (Hunter’s Moon was released last year as the first single but back then they hadn’t announced the album yet), but instead the record label insisted on keeping this one. It’s a little more doom-ish than the rest of the songs in my opinion. The guitar riff reminded me of Cirice which is one of the biggest songs of Ghost, so it’s obvious they wanted to bring that sound back. If you watched the live from the Ministry you heard the Ghoulettes’ backing vocals, which made the song a hundred times better. The lyrics are about Lucifer (who would’ve thought) and Aleister Crowley, a famous occultist (to who the album cover is also a reference to). I needed to look up the story behind this song but Tobias’ perspective he gives in the lyrics are definitely interesting.

5,Hunter’s Moon: The first single of the album, released for the new Halloween movie, Halloween Kills. While I pretty much know nothing about the Halloween franchise except the masked killer, I still found the theme engaging. There’s not much to say about it, the rhythm is kind of hectic and almost even proggy, the lyrics are a nostalgic love letter to the Halloween franchise, the theme still fits Ghost.

6, Watcher in the Sky: Undoubtetly the heaviest piece on the record. The ‘Faith’ or 'Mummy Dust’ of Impera if you will. The choppy 000-000-000 guitars remind me a lot of thrash bands from the 80’s with a little slower, pop-ish sound. The bridge has a great buildup that ends in a dual guitar solo as usual. The chorus by the end of the song is a little too overplayed as the song fades away.

7,Dominion:Even for an interlude that’s supposed to hype up the next song, this one is boring. Like to the point that I even forgot that I was listening to something in 1 minute 22 seconds. It kinda reminded me of Deus Culpa in a weird way, I had the same feeling with that one. Brass with orchestra, nothing special.

8,Twenties: The single weirdest song on the album, by a lot. It’s a party song about the 1920’s and how everyone knew it was about to be shit. The timing of this single couldn’t be more accurate. It references the rise of the dictatorships in the early 20th century, and even actual political commentary (“We’ll be grabbing 'em all by the hoohaas”). The whole thing is a sarcastic, great piece of art. Tobias said: 'It’s like Slayer meets Missy Elliot’. While I don’t hear that comparison it’s still a banger.

9,Darkness at the Heart of My Love: The most 80’s power ballad of this decade so far. It reminds me of songs like “Total Eclipse of The Heart” and “I Want to Know What Love Is”. The lyrics are about those that preach about them being god-loving and righteous when they only give a crap about money. Kind of like “He Is” on Meliora, this song is more than what it seems.

10,Griftwood: If Ain’t Talkin 'Bout Love was a Ghost song. The chorus is dance-y, the rhythm is simple and the lyrics are continuing the thought process of Darkness. One of my personal favorites, but maybe I just like Mötley Crüe and Van Halen type of guitar work and melodies way too much.

11,Bite of Passage: An ominous intro to the closing song. A simple guitar melody that will ring in your ear. It doesn’t promise much and that it doesn’t fail to deliver.

12,Respite on the Spitalfields: The closing song, and also the longest one on the record. Another great power ballad, with that the band is doing the same dual ballad formula as on Prequelle (Life Eternal and Pro Memoria -> Darkness and Respite). When the first notes of the first guitar solo started I legit wanted to cry of joy. If Hysteria by Def Leppard was a Ghost song. I know I made a fuckton of comparisons like this in this review, but these are for a reason. This whole album is the lovechild of Tobias’ nostalgia with the lyrics talking about the current disasters the world is facing. Even for me, a guy born in '97 this was the most nostalgic experience I could’ve asked for. And this is what Tobias is aiming for with this album. Everything including the nostalgia and the great tragedies are cyclical.

This album easily became an instant favorite of mine. I really want to enjoy these songs live partying with Papa and the ghouls. Easy 10/10, will listen a couple hundred times more.

(Not So) Short Opinion On Taylor Swift’s “folklore”

I feel kinda conflicted about folklore. The lyrics are amazing, but all the songs make me feel. so. damn. sad.

Like, pretty much every song sounds sad, and it’s kind of emotionally tiring. After listening to the entire album, I just felt emotionally drained, and not necessarily in a good way. And this is maybe just a personal preference, but I think an album is better if it doesn’t just have only happy sounding songs, or only sad sounding songs. There needs to be a little bit of a break. Lover was an incredible happy sounding album, but it still had some songs that sounded sad. Here, after a while, all the songs start sounding kinda the same. Which is sad (pun not intended), because now I can’t enjoy the lyrics as much as I normally would otherwise.

And I get that this is probably intentional. The focus is very much on the lyrics and the singing, so the music takes a bit of a backseat.

So yeah, folklore. Lyric-wise: ten out of ten. Music-wise: maybe a high five, low six? Somewhere around there.

And unfortunately for this album, my enjoyment of music is more determined by the music than by the lyrics.

Songs I currently feel are worth listening to more often:

betty, definitely betty (the key-change was heavenly, and the storytelling amazing),

my tears ricochet,

cardigan,

the last great american dynasty,

(and I guess also)

the 1.

2 additional notes:

1. Taylor’s singing is great, which, you know, kinda obvious, but I still feel like it needs to be said.

2. One of my biggest pet peeves is when song titles aren’t written with capital letters (same with “the”, “a/an”, “of” and similar words in titles of songs, movies…). This didn’t influence my opinion on this album, but it did annoy me to no end.