…und metal movement. North America may remember this act best during the mid-2000’s, when the album 66Sick came out on Nuclear Blast in 2005, although they’ve been a part of the Massacre (and now Listenable) rosters for quite a long time in their career. They’ve arrived at this eleventh studio record poised to capture followers who still crave authentic metal of the heavy variety. Ok, let’s get into it! The new Disbelief album Killing Karma is out…
…ve only ever really been a singer, so I really wanted to help out with the writing part of it. I started taking piano lessons, which led into learning music theory. That was a big part of it. Mark and I wrote “Writhing Red”, that one was written during the pandemic. Personally, I don’t know if I learned something new about myself. Maybe I originally thought of myself as not a very social person, but maybe I should get out there more. Dead Rhetoric…
…ic lead break plus subsequent catchy circular sequence. Settling into a mid-tempo punch for the follow-up “Nights in Turmoil”, the steady double bass foundation allows the other musicians to slither at varying paces, while Lee stalks in his vocal delivery in varying shades of Teutonic rasp or forceful soldier mold depending on the feel of the verses to chorus. Transitions often appear in unexpected places where these gentlemen go from comfortable…
…o your ears, vocalist Christopher Simmons elevating his melodies in a multi-octave power, his calling channels the best of Rob Halford and Bruce Dickinson through his scooping of the notes, especially in those higher falsetto / scream areas. The atmosphere bounces between that neoclassical meets traditional terrain – where the musicians sprinkle tasty progressive interplay aspects against proper earworm hooks and catchy vocals mandating audience f…
…n: Actually no. We parted ways with one of our oldest members and main songwriters at the beginning of last year. When it comes to songwriting, a lot of stuff has changed! Dead Rhetoric: So you had a shift in members from Solace to Transience. How do you feel it affected the album? Lela Gruber: It’s basically the same way we wrote for Solace, but with different people. We still have our guitarist, Valentin, writing songs and we also have Dennis, w…
…nn Benton’s iconic sounding barks. The intensity is that of the band’s self-titled debut, and that’s meant in the best way possible. Urgent riffing and solos, menacing barks, and blasting drums swirl around with just the right amount of aggression mixed in with memorable, punchy moments. It’s a great start. “Doomed to Die” continues this same sentiment with a fiery solo to start, and then more of that classic, mid-tempo ‘evil’ feeling that the ban…
…those big festivals again. You have to give credit to a lot of these Wacken-type festivals, they’ve really built it up. It’s now dead and center in the mainstream in Europe, you see multi-generational families going every year, using it as a family vacation, they camp out there and enjoy it. You now have Hellfest, Sweden Rock, major festivals – I wish there was more and more stuff like that here in the United States, big festivals with 20,000-40,0…
…d Ligature” which opens up with a Jacob Bannon guest spot and ends with not-so-ecstatic trumpeting. 15 years in, and Full of Hell just keeps doing whatever the hell they want with their sound, and I wouldn’t have it any other way. Coagulated Bliss is the soundtrack of the American dream, and the inevitable horrors that came with it. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5MeB7fa8vGA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oZ26WDVpVnQ Full of Hell official websit…
…s improved the health and status of the metal genre here – as I remember 25-30 years ago, it would be tough to get 100-200 attendees to decent festival lineups like Powermad or the Classic Metal Festival? Ravage: Again, it’s hard to say. A festival like this – I was talking to Christian who runs the festival when I went last year to the Stormbringer Festival. He was saying that over 70% of the people who go to Hell’s Heroes are from out of state….
…alf favorite “Mother of All”, one of the heavier cuts on here marrying the best of 90s period Savatage with acts like GTR, FM, and other well established AOR-oriented bands from the 80s. With future live gigs planned in Spain, A Neverending John’s Dream through Coming Back to Paradise have established a debut effort rich in melodic hard rock/metal tradition, delivering catchy songs that stay in your brain for quite a while. An act to watch if you…
…etting, definitely. “Desolation’s Harp” concludes the opening salvo of fast-as-fuck drumming and soaring dynamics anchored by Paparo’s unreal vocal performance. Joel Moore, Inter Arma’s newest and (hopefully) permanent bass player, makes his dexterous presence known with the title track and breather “Endless Grey”, as Trey Dalton and Steven Russell solo the shit out of their axes. “Gardens in the Dark” is Mike Paparo’s most memorable vocals to dat…
…of stuff in the middle there for everyone. But reemerging is so great! But yeah, we are trying to get things going, so there’s lots on the horizon. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V97-IxNPaoM&pp=ygUHc3VsZHVzaw%3D%3D https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z-uw2lFaMek&pp=ygUHc3VsZHVzaw%3D%3D Suldusk on Facebook Suldusk on Instagram…
…g or stinky or something. Dead Rhetoric: Could you also talk about the pink-theme for the “Best of Me” video? Was there any sort of intent to it, since it’s not something you regularly see in heavier music? Mitch: The intention with “Best of Me” was to represent being a depressed person and not feeling comfortable with how the world appears sometimes. We thought of Instagram and all the fake shit there. Wouldn’t it be cool to represent this fake w…
…irlwind movements. Most of the songs clock in at a respectable four to five-minute timeframe, while the lone epic “No Solace From Above” at almost nine-minutes illustrates the band’s expansive outlook, featuring piano and distant talk-oriented vocal parts next to some penetrating doom riffs that pick up momentum to crush souls, the deathly lacerations of singer Heval Bozarslan channeling the best aspects of Necrophobic, Dissection, and Unanimated….
…any long-time fans. The modern, explosive approach that Ingested have fine-tuned continues to power the way forward. Opening cut “Paragon of Purity” embodies that groove-friendly spirit, with pulverizing riffs and subtle melodies elevating the band’s sound into one that can hit like a sledgehammer yet still leave you aware of all of the details inside it. It’s a fantastic opener, and the tracks that follow it up (“Endless Machine” and “Where No L…
…hy I keep saying I’m really proud of this album. For me, vocally, it’s the best one for me. Dead Rhetoric: So is there anything else that makes you feel that it’s your best work so far? Siirala: It’s the combination of knowing my instrument better now. I know my strengths and weaknesses – I know some things I can’t do as well, but there are others I’m really good at. It’s bringing that to the table in a more knowing way. So that I can do justice t…
…he gallop-fueled opener “Knights of Terror”, the pace floating between semi-thrash meets standard mid-tempo power overtones. Mike Benetatos and Jon Hasselbrink as guitarists understand the need of interspersing clean, adventurous guitar lines next to their normal crunchy power chord machinery they implement in every song – aspects of King Diamond / Mercyful Fate float in for “Curse of Creation” while the stop/start double barrel rhythms within “Wo…
…ect to push Disbelief through the best possibly channels, handling the ever-changing music industry as best as possible? Jäger: I think they work very professionally, and they work very fast. I’m satisfied with their work. I hope they do a lot of promotion for the new album; they give all kinds of possibilities. It’s the last album on the contract, it was a three-album contract. I hope we can go on with the label in the future, but I won’t make a…
…er. The diversity of attack between straight ahead fast bashers and the mid-tempo machine gun-like precision present in the riff styles of the Dennis/Leda tandem keeps the head whirling action on point. Many will be hard pressed not to lose their collective minds to the triplet chugging in “Mental Disorder” which has that Grip Inc. meets Bay Area charm, while youthful angst fuels “Ilwast”. Small interludes of gunfire/bombing and military soundtrac…
…orchestration process for this album? Joensen: That was incredible. When I write the music for Týr, I write it in a very classical way. I write the notes, so when the time comes to make the orchestrations, I send the audio and the notes to the guy who makes it, Lars Winther, so he can start. He doesn’t have to make notations as he would for other artists, I’m sure most bands don’t. I tend to incorporate the classical parts properly into our music,…
Connecticut-based metalcore act Boundaries have had two previous full-length efforts under their belts, but it seems the best was yet to come in their case. Their third album, Death is Little More, the group takes some influence and nods from the early heavy-hitters of the scene and injects a bleak and aggressive modern twist that puts them into more unsettling and dark waters than many of their current peers. In short, the type of effort that sh…
…e a busy life; Vicinity is both a social outlet and a reprieve from the day-to-day life. Dead Rhetoric: What’s on the horizon for Vicinity over the next year or so to support the new album? Are there any other side bands/projects that you’d also like to mention here? Kim-Marius: We started rehearsing to a release gig, May 24th here in Trondheim. We will play the entire album and some older songs as well; it will be an undertaking. Hopefully we wil…
…forming thing – we want to be active musicians and probably not make another album until 2025, let’s see what happens. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0-w-hbeDD1Y https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rh1tQeDubYU Hammer King on Facebook…
…ns likam further ingrained them in the metal lexicon, and it would be a six-year wait for their return. During said time, three of the members dropped an EP for their death metal project Goresquad, and lead singer Jón Aldará was part of one of the very best albums of 2021 via Iotunn’s Across All Worlds. Nevertheless, we’re glad Hamferð have returned with Men Gu​ð​s hond er sterk. Conceptually, the album tells the story of a famous whaling catastro…
…retch his technique into extreme pastures) and the subsequent crunchy, half-time pit moving Nevermore-ish angle, and you have the makings of a certain Dialith staple for years to come. Returning to Andy LaRocque (King Diamond) for mixing/mastering duties as well as a continuance on the art front for Marta Sokolowska (together since their 2019 Extinction Six record), Dialith excels in providing the greatest value for final product even as a self-re…
…s of the depth the songs all have and the highs/lows in it. I think we are writing for ourselves and no one else, and no one is directing what we write. We stay true to ourselves and there’s no direction from the label or anyone supporting us. That was one of the things that when we got signed, we had great discussions about what we wanted to do, and what we saw and how we had to do it. There’s no decisions on what and how we would write, which is…
…nd of Illusions”, crunchy modern anthem “Dead Man’s Eyes”, or guitar heroic-oriented “Justice Will Be Mine” – it’s evident that these gentlemen strive to give listeners the best riffs, arrangements, and memorable parts/melodies to latch onto from initial listen to subsequent exposure well down the road. Peavy’s voice continues to have that spitting, venomous nature in forceful, commanding form – using minimal effects to just grab you by the throat…
…hat they like or to be recommended to us by Spotify or any other streaming service based on what they already listen to, is priceless. It’s the next best thing to having a friend recommend a good band. Much like having to promote yourself on social media, it is a necessary evil that we do begrudgingly whilst accepting that it is our best means of connecting to our listeners and promoting shows, etc. Unfortunately, I think it is here to stay at lea…
…h a mix of Blind Guardian/Rage-like energy next to comfortable early Maiden-ish charm. At other times the heavier down-picking nature along with progressive twists in unexpected places reaches into the back catalog of Iced Earth (circa Night of the Stormrider) or even Bay Area thrash – allowing singer Svenja Rohmann to stretch her sultry voice into various rock/metal tones. Her bluesy touch intensifies the groove-laden “Crossroads” while additiona…
…from Rosellini, bombastic and fantasy-driven atmosphere, and plenty of fist-to-the-sky riffing that is sure to rally fans of the genre. We took a few minutes to talk to Rosellini to see what defines this fresh act, as well as a broad discussion of nerd culture items such as video games, cosplay, and fantasy itself. Dead Rhetoric: You are in Alterium with some members of Kalidia, do you feel like you are continuing the essence of that band, in some…
