Armchair rhetoric on extreme metal
How to avoid sex through music Spring is here. Trees are budding. Birds engage in their annual renewal of the housing stock. Days are lengthening, and somehow even the rainfall seems charged with heavy handed virility. The very air you breathe oozes sex. Of course this is all something Iโm thoroughly against. The listening rotation... Continue Reading →
Vspolokh: ะัััะฒะพะทะตะผัOut 25th December on Purity Through Fire Coats the stoic austerity of Slavic black metal with a dusting of populist melodic metal sugar, resulting in an exhilarating and rewarding experience on a visceral level, but one that nevertheless leaves one feeling cheated. Architecturally, there is a clear articulation of identity, intent, and purpose. A... Continue Reading →
At the Altar of the Horned God: ElementsOut 13th December on I, Voidhanger Records Having already signalled their love of various goth formulas through their manipulation of ritualistic melodrama and black metal furniture to create a kind of hybrid style that was appealing in concept even if it fell short in execution, itโs unsurprising to... Continue Reading →
The riddle of steel So that was Christmas. The auditing fury of December gives way to new projects launched, ideals dusted off, promised resolutions, and a renewed drive to make life better, cleaner, more focused, efficient, slicker, or otherwise optimised. If youโre a hustler psychopath that is. For normal folk it just means a fucking... Continue Reading →
Na utriniOut 27th December on Osmose Productions CMPTโs debut album โKrv I pepeoโ released in 2021 caught me off guard for its slick development of Burzum style black metal, dragging the form in a more expressively riff based direction whilst retaining the liminal, dreamlike atmosphere that seems so lacking in many paler imitations of Vargโs... Continue Reading →
FolkstormOut 25th December on Purity Through Fire With a release schedule as adversarial as its nature, a lot of black metal tends to come out in the latter half of December. As if to disrupt pundits keen on tying up their AOTY lists before Christmas. Gnipahรฅlan, as a shamelessly traditional, lavish, opulent, overwhelmingly cacophonous outlier... Continue Reading →
Peccatum MortiferumOut 13th December on Void Wanderer Productions Energetic, warm occultist black metal with aspirations toward high melodicism, and subtle yet effective gestures toward epic narrative storytelling. The soft, pillow punching snare combined with a bass guitar lead and a generally strained and dramatic poise will inevitably invite comparisons to Necromantia, Mortuary Drape, or Masterโs... Continue Reading →
Thunraz: Incineration DayOut 22nd November, self-released Sterile, mechanical, jagged death metal meets an undercurrent of dark gothic atmosphere on the latest album from this Estonian entity. There is a clear intent to blend the abstracted violence of death metal with a more grounded, artificial aesthetic. Despite the clear industrial current running throughout 'Incineration Day', one... Continue Reading →
The Skorian // The GreyleerOut 29th November on Profound Lore Records The existence of Mefitis within extreme metal is in many ways metatextual. They imbibe its raw materials only to churn it up into a cocktail of inuendo, subversion, duality of meaning that would go largely unnoticed by anyone not intimate with the legacy they... Continue Reading →
Auriferous Flame: The Insurrectionists and the CaretakersOut 8th November on True Cult Records/Stellar Auditorium Productions โThe album explores the theme of revolution and delves deep into the complexities of resistance and change, offering listeners an intense and thought provoking experience.โ Given the eagerness to share the complex subject matter that inspired this album, one might... Continue Reading →
Hate Meditations 