Armchair rhetoric on extreme metal
Isen: Zaklinani posledni zimyOut 5th September on Northern Silence Productions Basic, repetitive black metal achieves a sense of triumphalism through a gradualist development of riffs. Each one is treated more like a single refrain, repeated ad infinitum to create a sense of size and scope. This is subsequently forced through subtle shifts in emphasis and... Continue Reading →
MercatorOut 12th September on Redefining Darkness Records Heruvim locate the carefree bounce of Pestilence circa ‘Spheres’ within the dark chasmic setting of modern death metal, flattening off progressive nuance in favour of creating something more accessible from the raw material. Demilichian chromaticism is recruited as binding material, linking the progressive allusions with the nihilism of... Continue Reading →
Please read the following scenario carefully. A discussion will follow. Scenario One: Andrew Lee is an American of Chinese descent. He has a death metal band called Ripped to Shreds. Ripped to Shreds were booked to play a gig with a much older death metal band called Master, who were in the middle of a... Continue Reading →
Gruwelijk OnthaalOut 18th September on Folter Records It’s been ten years since Kaeck’s debut ‘Stormkult’. Where that album consolidated an austere reading of early second wave black metal into an aggressive, tight, yet atmospheric celebration of the genre, subsequent releases have – at least aesthetically – dramatically deviated from this foundation. 2021’s ‘Het zwarte dictaat’... Continue Reading →
Eldur: Rituals of Death and NecromancyOut 25th August on ATMF Combines the purposeful militarism of simplistic Swedish black metal with a mystical eccentricity borrowed from modern occultist metal. Whilst balancing these two competing forces occasionally pays off, Eldur lean into basic thrash or melodeath riffing to plug the gaps, thus rendering what could be quite... Continue Reading →
Výstup k svätej KundeOut 29th August, Nomad Sky Diaries Porenut harness a wealth of competing strands both in and outside of metal to craft a surprisingly compact statement of uncanny black metal for this latest outing. Previous offerings were perhaps a little too whacky for their own good, but here these eccentric details are properly... Continue Reading →
All Powers of DarknessOut 22nd August on Hells Headbangers Medieval Demon, erstwhile outliers of the classic Greek scene, continue their eccentric second life with a run of occultist horror metal pitched plumb on the border between the sublime and the ridiculous. Where 2022’s ‘Black Coven’ was an articulation of shamelessly confident traditional gothic horror tropes... Continue Reading →
Coronation of the GrotesqueOut 15th August on Dark Descent Records Modern death metal is often guilty of running away from itself. Either gesturing at lofty, pseudo esoteric avant-garde affectations, or else leaning so aggressively into its own cliché that it begins to behave like novelty music. Castrator’s latest offering is something of a breath of... Continue Reading →
Incinerated: The Epitome of TransgressionOut 14th July on BlackSeed Lifts the clustered melodic density of late second wave black metal (think Cirith Gorgor or Gorgon) with a thread of fatalistic lamentation, topographically similar to modern dissodeath but pivoting more toward traditional melody, rendered abrasive by the freneticism of the performances. The strained emotion, and indeed... Continue Reading →
Sacrilege InfernusOut 25th July, self-released Access to culture has never been easier. Deciding what to access and spend time with near impossible. People idolise the traditional underground for its asceticism. The implied discipline required to enter an obscure channel of culture. The music itself a challenge of dense, alien sounds born of a hermetically sealed... Continue Reading →
Hate Meditations 