BARBARIANViperface Hells Headbangers (2022)Rating: 6/10 Italy’s Barbarian releases albums like movies such as Halloween shits out sequels… frequently! The title of Viperface doesn’t quite sit well with me, probably because it’s better suited to a track title rather than an album title, but this is the fifth full-length from a band who have mastered the […]
DYNAZTY Premiere ‘The White’ Music Video August 12th, 2022 Stockholm, Sweden-based melodic metal band Dynazty have filmed a music video for the track ‘The White’. Directed by Ted Lindén (Bullsize Production), the clip can be viewed below. Speaking about the song, vocalist Nils Molin said: “Two weeks before our full album drops, ‘The White’, a […]
GROTESQUERIESHaunted Mausoleum EP Caligari (2022)Rating: 8/10 Grim riffs aplenty arise in this three-track EP from the hideous manifestation known as Grotesqueries. The Boston, Massachusetts-based combo are the brainchild of former Garrotted and Black Mass drummer Yianni Tranxidis, who on this debut offering is joined by Michael Buonomo (vocals, Morgued), Brendan O’Hare (guitar, Black Mass) and […]
SWARNWhispers From Beyond Warhorn (2022)Rating: 8/10 Oozing into earshot like some rank and fetid Swedish death metal heap of the macabre, Estonian metalheads Swarn have erupted with one of the year’s biggest surprises. I wasn’t sure what to expect from this album having not followed the band who since their formation in 2016 have released […]
ZABBETHZabbeth Witches Brew (2022)Rating: 7/10 A few years ago I was bewitched by the Bathory worship of a Swedish one-man band named Born For Burning whose debut album The Ritual was an authentic re-run of some of Quorthon’s most evil children. And now we have another similar design, only this time it’s Maltese musician Chaos […]
MORGUE TARImmersed In Mortiferous Enmities Surrogate Rec. (2022)Rating: 8/10 So, I thought I’d heard it all when it comes to sick grindcore / death metal vocalists, but Morgue Tar’s rather insane “singer” has taken such outbursts to another, more sickening level. Imagine puking and shitting in your toilet, then eating the contents and throwing it […]
SABATON Issue Animated Story Video For ‘The Red Baron’ Track August 5th, 2022 Falun, Sweden-based power metal band Sabaton have released an official animated story video for the track ‘The Red Baron’, which can be viewed below. Regarding the clip, the band stated: “This is the animated story of Manfred Albrecht Freiherr von Richthofen, which […]
OMINUMMonument Witches Brew (2022)Rating: 7/10 I apologise for thinking that the album cover depicted a giant pile of excrement, because on closer inspection it is in fact a heap of bodies! But anyway, this is the debut full-length platter from Swedish thrash metal act Ominum. The band formed in 2018 and while this new effort […]
EARLY MOODSEarly Moods RidingEasy (2022)Rating: 9/10 Early Moods is a Los Angeles act sure to cause a stir within the doom metal scene. In 2020 the five-piece released its debut EP Spellbound, an intriguing melting pot of 70s styled grooviness very much inspired – like many – by Black Sabbath. I was surprised at the […]
SOULFLYTotem Nuclear Blast (2022)Rating: 8.5/10 Isn’t it strange how one can return to a band many years later and re-new your friendship? Soulfly stirred me back in 1998 with their self-titled debut full-length, but there was little in the way of love on my part. The late 90s experienced a peculiar and less rewarding shift […]
