Armchair rhetoric on extreme metal
The Temples of Offal/Return of the AncientsOut 10th June on ATMF (originally released in 1991) One often forgets that - along with the likes of Massacre and Napalm Death- Absu were another Triggerโs broom band. (Thatโs bands whose latest incarnation features none of their original members for any none UK readers). But with this latest... Continue Reading →
Waan van de leegteOut 6th June on Terratur Possessions Similar to the recent Selenite Scrolls in its ability to insert itself into a very crowded style and still find room for a USP. This debut slots in somewhere between early Enslaved and Ulver with a less explicitly folkist orientation. The album washes over the listener... Continue Reading →
Oh no, a cheap clickbait listacle! Fear not, however, I come with good intentions. Staying abreast of new material in 2026 feels like navigating a tiny dinghy through a great storm of biblical scale. All you can do is cling on and stay the course through the sensory overload. The annual AOTY roundup functioning more... Continue Reading →
Dire Garden of the AgesOut 29th May on Naturmacht Productions The second album from this Irish solo project could be framed as a transfer of styles from one zone to another. Whilst the debut behaved like an epic fable heavily rooted in Viking and Celtic metal stylings, the follow up offers a rather dramatic volte-face... Continue Reading →
The Secret of DeathOut 21st May on Xtreem Music Since the departure of Jarno Nurmi in 2016, Tommi Grรถnqvist has steered the good ship Desecresy in painfully incremental steps from one album to the next, a process that feels like itโs finally bloomed on their latest album โThe Secret of Deathโ. ย Namely a synthesis of... Continue Reading →
Permit me to perform a magic trick. Having not listened to a note of Darkthrone's latest album, behold, as I begin typing a review: โanother fearless, authentic, and infectiously fun tour through classic 70s and 80s metal, track X leans more into the classic doom direction of the last three albums whilst track Y takes... Continue Reading →
Kirjad sรตgedate kรผlastOut 25th April on Antiq Five years since their debut and a very different beast has wriggled free of the Kรตdu moniker. Where โUnusta kรตikโ unfolded a jagged, dissonant array of plodding black metal, at once surreal and haunting despite the cold, mechanistic approach, the long awaited follow up broadens the aesthetic spectrum... Continue Reading →
The dark satanic content mills vs. Angine de Poitrine Never try to go viral. Thereโs a unique embarrassment that comes with trying to go virality. The kind reserved for TV ads that appropriate internet meme culture. An abyssal exercise in the pathetic stemming from the fact that virality, by its very nature, is a freak... Continue Reading →
MorgongloฬdOut 27th March on Vidfare/NoEvDia Mortuus, aka Daniel Rostรฉn, continues his habit of saving his best for well outside the Marduk roadshow. This is the third album released under the DomJord moniker, his own contribution to the long tradition of black metal artists dabbling in various ambient side projects. Being a relatively late comer to... Continue Reading →
Good clickbait draws in an audience even when they know theyโre being baited. Rick Beato recently did this to me with his โIs metal dead?โ thumbnail. As an experienced Youtuber with an audience in the millions, heโs an adept practitioner of this dark art. In this case heโs served up a kind of double baiting.... Continue Reading →
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