A couple of years have passed since their last demo release and some line-up changes, and Dublin-based Celtachor have finally released their full-length debut, ‘Nine Waves From the Shore‘. While it doesn’t necessarily reinvent anything within the formula of extreme metal and Celtic folk melodies that’s been coming out of Ireland since the early 1990′s, the album in itself is testament to a young band becoming more focused and stronger in the early stages of their career. Read More…
Rhode Island band Pilgrim are currently being hailed as the bees’ knees in the doom metal circuit, and on first listen it’s easy to see why. While it is understandable that a number of youngsters will copy their heroes as closely as possible, Pilgrim‘s debut album “Misery Wizard” takes influence from their heroes without using them as a direct template. The record sounds as fresh as it is traditional. Read More…
Two years have passed since the release of debut album ‘Try Something Different‘, and already Londoners Seven7 have upped their game with an “epic” record in their field of progressive rock/groove metal. That is to say, that where some bands opt to repeat themselves the second time around – a tactic that could go either hit or miss – Seven7 have actually chosen to rethink their sound on a bigger scale – making ‘Under Eye‘ a stand apart release from various other records under the groove label. Read More…
It’s only fair to say that Nightlord‘s debut record ‘Approaching Thunder‘ has stood the test of time, despite coming out just a few years prior to the Middlesex quartet’s disbandment in 1993. Read More…
It’s taken six albums, but ChthoniC have finally latched onto a sound that fits them like a glove. Moving away from the European synth-driven black metal template put up by the likes of Dimmu Borgir and Cradle of Filth, the group have focused more on their Taiwanese background for new offering ‘Takasago Army’ – a path which, contrary to negative outcries of pandering to Western stereotyping from music industry critics, the band have always followed through the years before the rest of the metal world even knew about them. Read More…
Six years have passed since the release of ‘The Devil’s Steed’, and now renowned neofolk act Sol Invictus have returned with an offering which they consider to either mark a new start or a final end to their career. ‘The Cruellest Month’ channels a more bleak and desolate outlook than its predecessors; tinged with an anguish and anger which feels as fueled by the decline of old age as it is that of English society. Read More…
Listening to Godsize‘s debut LP ‘Hymns For the Fallen‘, it shows how the band have mixed together their cultural influences to produce a sound that sets them apart in their respective field of sludge metal. Read More…
After ten years, Crucified Mortals have finally unleashed their first album. Like their past repertoire, this is meaty, underground thrash that stays true to a love of old school horror, murder and raw, angry riffs to match the words. While the underground scene’s ability to keep musical traditions alive and well cannot be refuted; it stands that the test of time means that new directions are expected to be crossed by many bands. Crucified Mortals may not exactly meet the latter, though from meeting the former one can easily overlook the band’s sticking to tradition in favour of just how well they do it. Read More…
With just two records under their belt including the recent ‘A Bleak Reflection‘, London-based De Profundis offer an example of how to shift the template of progressive rock towards a darker and more ominous strain of extreme music. Read More…
Having already established that they’ve moved on from the darkwave-electro influences to their form of death metal, Septicflesh now release a second album with an orchestral direction. Exploiting the dramatic flair and melancholic intensity of European classical music; ‘The Great Mass‘ is an extreme metal re-imagining of this atmosphere, though not without moments of hasty songwriting through burnout. Read More…
