Armchair rhetoric on extreme metal
Book report - Melancology: black metal theory and ecology Dominik Irtenkauf: [black metal theory] seems to be more about speculative interpretations of a musical sub-culture than developing a coherent system of theory. Is that perception correct? Nicola Masciandaro: Yes. I recently had the misfortune of stumbling onto a debate raging across Substack between continental and... Continue Reading →
DecayOut 25th September on Relapse Records Hellfest 2010 was a pretty special festival. John Garcia got 75% of the band back together as Brant Bjork and Nick Oliveri took the stage for a few numbers during his Kyuss classics set. Immortal, Asphyx, and Carcass were all in their post revival pomp, affording a younger generation... Continue Reading →
What does the metalhead do on their day off and why is it ambient? I listened to all the “black ambient” releases from the 90s to find out. Black metal ambient (Part I) In Part I we ranged through Central Europe, taking in the Austrian syndicate, on to the bonkers peripheries of France’s already bonkers Les... Continue Reading →
What does the metalhead do on their day off and why is it ambient? I listened to all the “black ambient” releases from the 90s to find out. If you were to press me on a pithy definition of metal, I would say it's music written through the organisation of riffs. This means it can... Continue Reading →
Atomic Aggressor: The Occult ForcesOut 28th August on Hells Headbangers With a history stretching back to the mid-80s, Atomic Aggressor are arguably one of the first to enter Chile’s death metal race along with Pentagram. But following their reformation in 2007 this is only their second album, which may partly explain why they haven't receive... Continue Reading →
Hulder: VerbolgenOut 7th August on Season of Mist/20 Buck Spin Arranging the history of black metal into waves is a method as arbitrary as it is useful. The first wave being a retrospective concept imposed on a small group of early extreme metal artists who operated at the peripheries of the underground, only loosely related... Continue Reading →
Sallow Moth: Hydrophilous BroodOut 24th July on Willowtip Records Surrealist brutal death metal redrafts elements of ‘Obscura’ and post 2000s Suffocation, but as with most contemporary avant-garde progressive extreme metal, it conflates stylistic incontinence with a density of ideas. Sure, for solid stretches of this album Sallow Moth work the Rubik’s Cube of tightly packed... Continue Reading →
A hundred death metal albums not from the USA Between 1993 and 1994, death metal popped its head above the underground parapet to peek into the mainstream. From airplay on MTV’s Headbangers Ball, to Morbid Angel being the first death metal band to get major label backing with a signing to Giant Records, to bloody... Continue Reading →
Apocalyptic SteelOut 26th June on Season of Mist Underground Activists Say what you like about Nargaroth, but the guy dances to the beat of his own drum. In his earliest period Ash was simply content to write Nordic black metal fanfic, resulting in a surplus of flat, bloated material that bored more than it enraged... Continue Reading →
A hundred death metal albums not from the USA Where were you in 92? Well, I was being shepherded between various preschool childcare arrangements, blissfully unaware of the exploding death metal scene. Part I took us from the late 80s to 1991, and naturally Sweden dominated when you remove death metal’s other centre of gravity... Continue Reading →
