All posts by Spencer Hotz

Admirer of the weird, the bizarre and the heavy, but so are you. Why else would you be here?

Phobocosm – Gateway Review

[Cover art by Lauri Laaksonen] Phobocosm’s fourth album, Gateway, is very much an album that sounds like its cover. It is a bleak, colorless, and intimidating swath of rocks with some room to breathe that

Dead And Dripping – Nefarious Scintillations Review

[Cover art by sole band member Evan Daniele] I had a roommate in college who would regularly say, “I’m gonna spray noodles out your dome” after a few drinks (i.e. shoot your brains out of

Stillbirth – Survival Protocol Review

[Cover art by Aghy R Purakusuma]  If you’re reading this on the day it’s published, then it’s the middle of the week. Despite how popular that one Geico commercial was with the camel, real life

An Abstract Illusion – The Sleeping City Review

[Cover art by Alex Eckman-Lawn] If you look at other pages and conversations about An Abstract Illusion, you’ll likely find that they are most often saddled with the progressive death metal genre tag. Surely, I’m

Abraded – Ethereal Emanations From Chthonic Caries Review

[Cover art by Mihály Zichy] There’s certainly nothing wrong with grindcore that sounds like a violent raccoon orgy in a dumpster full of nuclear waste, but I tend to be ever-so-slightly more partial to those

Hebephrenique – Decathexis Review

[Cover art by Grellach] One of the great joys of heavy metal is how often it forces you to learn random things. A little peek behind the Last Rites curtain for you: we have a

Blast Rites: Scalp – Not Worthy Of Human Compassion Review

[Cover art by Ricardo Bettazzoni] I bet you were expecting Albert Pecans, or whatever that idiot’s name is, but he’s not the only one who listens to grind around here. Sure, he’s the only one

Castrator – Coronation Of The Grotesque Review

[Cover art by Jon Zig] Despite forming in 2013, this NYC-by-way-of-global members quartet didn’t fire off their debut, Defiled In Oblivion, until 2022. Rather than continue to roll with a slow build, they’ve struck while