Generally Impressed With Riffs
[Cover art by Quinn Henderson] You’re familiar with the term, “unc,” right? If not, it generally refers to a washed up older feller whose personality in large part revolves around extravagantly performing confusion and/or displeasure at the mere notion of …
[Artwork by Caroline Harrison] “Nonsense” opens with a slow fade-in of distorted guitars and seismic drums — the chaos before the swarm. It’s a trick of the trade, the extreme metal equivalent of a camera operator calling out “speed” before …
[Cover artwork by Luca “Zeero” Zironi] There was always something uniquely charming about Konquest’s brand of traditional heavy metal—an almost whimsical breeziness that still felt like a near perfect balance of playful and substantive. A long-lost Italian cousin to Sweden’s …
[Cover art by Beyond Art] There are bad musical moods, and then there’s Mylingar. Over the course of the last decade this group of anonymous Swedes has concocted the type of ill-meaning black/death that makes Diocletian seem like a Care …
Tim Yatras can do a lot of things. Those currently unfamiliar with that name perhaps know him as “Sorrow” from the Australian black metal duo Austere. As musician, programmer, producer and sole founder of the …
It was a pretty shitty thing when Al Jourgensen announced that he would be disbanding Ministry, but they certainly went out swinging: 2007’s The Last Sucker perfectly capped off the band’s vitriolic trio of George …
In this bimonthly column, staff writer Doug Moore takes a very close look at extreme metal lyrics. Some will be serious, some will be silly, but they’ll all go under the microscope. On April Fools’ …
Our sixth lesson features a band that should need no introduction: Darkthrone. The riff we will examine is the outro to “Paragon Belial,” the third track from the band’s first black metal album, and second …
Originally written by Jordan Campbell Unless you’ve spent the last decade listening to Anvil in your sweatpants, you’re probably hip to High On Fire‘s status as (arguably?) the most complete band in heavy metal. They’ve …
Like most, I was surprised by Accept’s 2010 comeback, and more than pleasantly. Accept sans Dirkschneider had been attempted once, two decades prior and to dismal results, and so I initially approached Blood Of The …
Jarboe’s metal bona fides are well in order. Since the original dissolution of Swans fifteen years ago, this avant-goth noisemaker has boasted an impressive number of collaborations across extreme music’s fertile underbelly: album-length statements with …
Originally written by Nin Chan My friend posed a fascinating question the other day: just what do the words “American Black Metal” mean? While “Norwegian Black Metal” or “Nordic Black Metal” seems rather self-explanatory, “Finnish …
