Generally Impressed With Riffs
[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 …
[Cover artwork by Subhuman at Desert Dungeon] Let’s talk about our love for quirky metal. Okay, sure, any definable level of ‘quirk’ is obviously subjective, but I’m guessing you know we’re not talking about the guy who loves The Black …
At what point is black metal too nice? Orthodox black metal basically begs this question every time it rears its ever-so-serious head. The paradoxical beauty of much of this movement of the past half-decade or …
originally written by Jim Brandon Ever since the 1999 release of In The Eyes Of God, Today Is The Day has chosen a path of relentless battery over the psychotic brain-fuckery of everything up to …
Not long ago one of my esteemed colleagues (that would be His Royal Danhammer of House Obstkrieg, First of His Name) reviewed an album that he could honestly recognize the quality of, but just couldn’t …
I realize it’s an absurd comparison, especially considering the fact that I’ve never been a parent, but I imagine I’d have nearly as difficult a time rating one of my children as I do a …
All Shall Perish‘s fourth full-length, This Is Where It Ends, contains about as much excitement as those minute-long YouTube videos in which narcissistic Wal-Mart goers place themselves in front of a camera and begin jiggling …
Considering the album that sits atop this list, Volume 4 of MetalReview’s 100 Most Essential Albums of the 90s could very well just be titled EPIC WEEK. With major classics of folk and Viking metal …
Finland’s Unkind makes their Stateside debut with their fifth record, Harhakuvat, released on Relapse. Akin to crusty d-beat acts Tragedy and Wolfbrigade, with a more than hefty dash of Neurosis, Unkind shines when channeling the first …
[Welcome to Part Three of MetalReview‘s interview series featuring artists included in the 100 Most Essential Albums of the 1990s. In this edition, we speak with Immolation guitarist Robert Vigna about the band’s seminal debut, Dawn …
