CD Reviews

The concept of recording and releasing not one, but two live albums from one of the great pioneers within the sludge/stoner rock sound, is nothing but brilliant. With the use of highlights from the band’s ever evolving sound, back catalogue, which has contributed to the band becoming a go to band for inspiration from aspiring and established music makers. Originally, High on fire were formed from the remnants of Sleep with leading axe man Matt Pike, powerhouse drummer Des Kensel, and slick bassist George Rice. A band renowned for bringing a darker, heavier magnitude of sound to shows more...

My dying bride is a band that needs no introduction at all. With an impressive 11 studio albums in their portfolio the English doom legends bring a new EP entitled The Manuscript.

It took me several spins to absorb the whole essence of its music, and the conclusion came simply: beautifully made music with experience, heart and soul. There is not one element that leaves room for doubts, everything is done by the book: all instruments are written and played beautifully, the My Dying Bride way.

"The Manuscript " is the Ep's opening track,a fantastic and romantic song carrying the MDB emblem along past tracks like...

If there was a band that has impressed me so much and had me hooked from the very first minute of listening, that band would have to be Usnea. And these guys have left me in pure awe.

And their music is oh so hard to describe, lots of funeral doom influence, actually a mixture of doom styles. Black metal has a big impact on the vocal delivery and the feeling and atmosphere of the music. There is also a fantastic range of drone and experiments of noisy unstructured phrases that do add dynamic and dimension to the songs.

What does the...

'Galloping Blasphemy’ is the debut album from this Greek outfit. Their bio says they play blackened thrash metal plus their black album cover emblazoned with the band’s logo (their name is made up into an inverted cross on fire) was all the encouragement I needed to give it a spin. 

Now Satan’s Wrath pertain to deliver Blackened Thrash and man do they! They have that old school thrash sound right down, but it also has a range to it, using many forms of the thrash spectrum, though you wouldn’t guess this by the opening track ‘Leonard Rising - Night Of The Whip’. It starts with eerie ritual chants and whispered voices which then breaks into a trad heavy metal style riffing. Yes, there is a little hint of thrash further in with a lead guitar section played...

Darkthrone is a band that needs no introduction. A band that has become something of an institution (whether you like it or not) within the global metal scene throughout the longevity of it’s existence, consistently adding to a commendably lengthy back-catalogue of relatively steady quality and never straying too far from it’s roots despite it’s existence in a constant state of flux, change and progression. Darkthrone has proven itself a monolith of consistency in change.

Indeed, from its conception in the late 1980s and over the course of it’s near 25-year lifespan, the band has been forever shaping and shifting through a variety of manifestations and although the significance of it’s early 90s era is not to be understated; it’s absoluteness is often over-emphasised by those who deem it...

With it's 40^th anniversary only three years away Barnsley's finest heavy metal export has unleashed its 20^thalbum. Yes, Saxon has been at it that long. “Sacrifice” is arguably the band's best work in years. With the mighty Andy Sneap at the helm for recording in Yorkshire, Biff Byford said it was intended to be a stripped down, no-nonsense affair. It's as subtle as a brick, but just as solid.

A striking feature is the erratic mix of subjects and locations in the songs. We begin with what sounds like Indiana Jones in the jungle with a Hammer Horror soundtrack. This intro gives way to a pummelling thrasher the likes of Testament would be proud of. The title track confirms its locale with a tale of human...sacrifice. Then it's off to Northern Ireland, where Byford pays tribute to the long gone ship building industry of Belfast. It's called “Made In Belfast”...

Summing up as a fifth release, "Welcome Farewell" is definitely a fine piece of work from Norwegian black metallers VREID.

From the very start, I can say the album is darker and even more aggressive than their 2011 release "V" (also a brilliant album). The manner in which the album is written leaves no room for interpretation though, everything is done with precision and care, restless construction of riffs, menacing blasts and powerful bass tones.

It is a bit hard to avoid talking about "V" in order to relate impressions for "Welcome Farewell", there are elements the band are accentuating and trying to bring up front, like the "thrashiness" of the riffs and a more...

I am an unashamed fan of Technical Death Metal- I find the challenge of absorbing the 'all-points-attack' of a band like Spawn of Possession or the blistering '1000-Uzis' approach of Brain Drill a total joy.The ice-cold chaos of Ulcerate brings me much happiness but occasionally one wants to reset the system, cleanse the palette of Death and this E.P. fits the bill perfectly.

Rex Shachath bring the sledgehammers, the spiked clubs and the cudgels on their debut E.P., quite content to leave technical wizardry and dizzying time-changes out in the modern day cold and drench us in the warm viscera of classic Old School Death Metal, the kind that we all grew up on, breaking our milk teeth on the likes of Death, Obituary, Entombed, Cannibal Corpse to sit proudly alongside Vomitory, Severe Torture...

There’s a long-running commercial on this side of the pond that derides the common misconceptions of California. A parade of surfers, boy bands and vapid celebrities bemoaning the typical stereotypes.

Yet, so far from the frozen fjords of Scandinavia, there’s a cold heart beating under the sweltering sun; dark hordes sprouting like weeds across the Golden State. Twenty-one years after Von poisoned the Pacific coastline and helped kick-start the USBM movement, the Californian black metal scene is among the nation’s most venomous and vibrant, with LA’s Lightning Swords of Death fast becoming firm fixtures on its dark mantel.

Taking a page from their bay-area brethren and binding it to the obsidian texts of black metal, the band have accumulated a decade of...

This is the second full length album from these Dutch death metallers. It is the follow up to 1998’s ‘Pure’ which is a 14 year gap but then the band have been on hiatus for a chunk of those years. The cover is your first look at this release and the artwork is a lesbo-necro-paranormal affair with a skeletal audience giving you an insight into the style and lyrical content contained within.

So as you may guess from the imagery Antropomorphia play death metal from the darker side of the fence. The core to their sound has a brutal death metal style with variations such as a more black metal element to the faster sections. The song structures remind me of Deteriorot for example the slow with the fast pace changes but with those extra embellishments. ‘Nekrophilian Mass’ is a perfect example to...