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 …
I had sort of given up hope, you see. After I grudgingly convinced myself ages ago that the world would never see a follow-up to 2002’s Posthuman, British avant-black metal troupe Void has now just …
This December marks the end of a long, tiring and treacherous year. Most unfortunate were the deaths of many of our favorite musicians, as well as an abnormal amount of tragic events that happened to …
As I listen to this record, one word keeps coming to mind: “destructive.” That word gets tossed around in reference to many a record by all types of metal acts. I myself am guilty of …
What a year… I don’t know if I just paid more attention in 2010 due to free time or if this much stuff really did blow me away, but I never remember listening to and …
In case you were worried that the classic power trio format was dying or dead, Royal Thunder is here to straighten you the hell out. The Atlanta three-piece plays a spooky, occult-tinged blues rock that …
I’m all for progression and evolution, but during a time when the black metal boundaries continue to cloud and push the genre further into more tempered terrain, it’s refreshing to come across projects whose primary …
originally written by Jim Brandon At times it’s like the sound of the Earth dying, and other times it’s more like the tortured groans of a laborious rebirth. In a perfect world, this would be …
What the hell happened to Disiplin? Back in the early to mid-2000s, they stood out as perhaps the least industrial-tinged of the entire Moonfog roster, earning their keep as a workmanlike, black-and-roll outfit in the …
