All posts by Zach Duvall

Last Rites Co-Owner; Senior Editor; Obnoxious overuser of baseball metaphors.

Majesties – Vast Reaches Unclaimed Review

[Cover art by Juanjo Castellano] The short version: If you’re a melodeath fan, don’t buy the supposed return-to-form new record from In Flames, which is really a Korny-chorus-heavy Sounds of a Playground Fading wolf in

Frozen Dawn – The Decline Of The Enlightened Gods Review

With all due respect to the late Mariusz Lewandowski and the art chosen to adorn the cover of Frozen Dawn’s fourth record, The Decline of the Enlightened Gods, it’s a mite off for this sound.

Trastorned – Into The Void Review

[Cover art by Made In Darkness] Chile’s Trastorned can be counted among the many acts that take their sweet time getting music out to the (relative) masses. They formed way back in 2009, but after

Best Of 2022 – Zach Duvall: No Dung Ahead

Welcome all, to another view into my listening mind. As usual, I will surely regret the ordering of these items within the fortnight. Or maybe I won’t, because this is just a snapshot, and it

Diamonds & Rust: 30 Years Of Vader’s The Ultimate Incantation

[Cover art by Dan Seagrave] For a band named after a movie villain that tended to wax poetically about destiny, there sure was a coincidental amount of serendipity surrounding their proper debut album. But before

Deathsiege – Throne Of Heresy Review

Fast Rites: because sometimes brevity is fundamental. Sometimes you want bands with nuance, and sometimes you just want a band to roll over you with the force of 10,000 hammers wielded by 10,000 cloned Donnie

Ancient Enemy – The Plague Ship Review

Fast Rites: because sometimes brevity is fundamental. The Bandcamp page of LA’s Ancient Enemy proudly states that they play “down to the gutter” metal. With The Plague Ship representing their first official release, you might

Daeva – Through Sheer Will And Black Magic Review

[Cover art by Karmazid] You’ve surely heard of SyFy’s Sharknado franchise of “films,” presumably in which tornados carry sharks into human settlements to add some apex predator chomp chomp to all the weather-related madness. I