Coming off a “breakout” album, metal bands of the less-adventurous nature than Ireland’s Altar of Plagues tend to play it safe. Figuring their audience will lunge at anything they toss out, certain Read more […]
Released primarily as means of something to promote for the band’s stint on the 2011 installment of the Summer Slaughter tour, History Repeats is a mostly all-covers EP cobbled together by Dying Fetus, Read more […]
Counting (or math for that matter) is not Blistering’s forte, but we are of the belief that there are a total of less than ten riffs on 40 Watt Sun’s The Inside Room. Naturally, this compels one to Read more […]
The side project of Epica guitarist Mark Jansen, Mayan is certainly a grandiose lot; sort of a mix between brutal death metal, and the symphonic mummers Jansen is usually popping out in Epica. Not necessarily Read more […]
Totally unrehearsed and improvised, Intensus’s self-titled debut is the type of album that would make Pro-Tools lovers and perfectionists cringe. This is actually a cool idea, something bands of this Read more […]
Hailing from Michigan, Battlecross are a unit ready for solid collision course across the touring globe thanks to its potent debut record, Pursuit of Honor. Blurring the lines of old-school thrash and Read more […]
Like stepping in a puddle with one’s socks on, power metal “supergroups” are largely an unpleasant experience. Because power metal is such worn-out brand of metal that needs to be totally spot-on Read more […]
Has it really been eight years since Exhumed released Anatomy is Destiny? It’s amazing how quickly time flies by but then again, to an Exhumed fan, eight years probably seems like three decades. For Read more […]
Stating the obvious, nothing can stop Behemoth. Not even a life-threatening disease, something that threatened the very existence of the band when mainman Nergal was stricken with Leukemia earlier this Read more […]
Aurvandil’s Yearning is one of those “Where have you been the last five years?” black metal albums. And yeah, black metal has been a lot of places in this span of time (still waiting on a good Read more […]
Not the usual fare typically released by AFM Records (read: these guys would scare the label’s melodic rock contingent), Sweden’s Rev 16:8 emerge as the label’s most extreme act, with Ashlands being Read more […]
A sobering, yet seductive mixture of string work and Goth metal, The Living Fields paint quite the bleak picture on their second album, the appropriately-titled Running Out of Daylight. Naturally, anytime Read more […]
Gospel of Pestilence is what happens when two bands of disparate styles (Mouth of the Architect and Acheron) get together to kick around some vintage and necro black metal in the form of Bringers of Read more […]
Full-blown Carcass worship has long been an exciting proposition to death metal bands without an original bone in their bodies, and for Spain’s Haemmorhage, mining the vintage works of Symphonies of Read more […]
Hard to pin this one down, only because Tombs fall into the now wide-open gap that is best described as “wall of sound metal.” We won’t toss the “post” tag at these guys, only because there’s Read more […]
Prog, but not really “prog,” Sweden’s Wolverine have taken their sweet time in following up 2006’s totally killer Still (of which yours truly had in his Top 10 for said year), returning with Communication Read more […]
Without the drama that saddled their previous Poisoned Legacyrelease (singer Toke Eld was unable to participate due to troubles with the law), Denmark’s The Cleansing lay down a familiar, but staunch Read more […]
Poland’s extreme deathsters Decapitated have finally returned to the fold after a five year hiatus to deliver their fans (and possibly a legion of new ones) their fifth full-length release. Named Carnival Read more […]
Typically, gore-ridden brutal death metal doesn’t deviate a whole lot. Which isn’t always a bad thing, considering there are some fantastic and very consistent acts out there. However, it is nice to Read more […]
Essentially Alexi Laiho (Children of Bodom) singing over punk rock/80s metal songs, Sweden’s Sister (not to be confused with the 70s Sister that had Nikki Sixx and Blackie Lawless in the ranks) manage Read more […]
A parody of Cannibal Corpse set to the tune of brutal death metal songs about marijuana, Cannabis Corpse proves that not all bands that sing about Mary Jane are lazy and lethargic-sounding. Fact of the Read more […]
Led by Kamelot keyboardist Oliver Palotai, it’s not a stretch to see why Sons of Seasons gets such a push – Kamelot are as hot of commodity in the power metal scene as ever. Naturally, anytime a band Read more […]
As expected, Dedicated To Chaos couldn’t be a further cry from Queensryche’s hardened cerebral metal days. They’re not interested in that anymore, especially singer Geoff Tate who hates metal Read more […]
With no real desire to score highly on the cerebral scale with songtitles like “Keg Stand and Deliver” and “Skid Marks the Spot,” Barn Burner prove that one can get away with humorous-sounding songs if Read more […]
One of the more noted purveyors of traditional metal in North America, guitarist Jack Frost (Blistering has always wondered if that’s his real name) and Seven Witches return with their eighth album, Call Read more […]
We’ll take “feel” over go-for-broke technicality any day of the week, but somewhere you gotta draw the line, and that line is with Gallhammer’s third album, The End. Reduced to a duo after the Read more […]
There’s a slew of bands that would be better served to make plays like the one Book of Black Earth make on their third album, The Cold Testament. And by “plays” we mean not trying to trick anyone. Read more […]
Stream of Passion’s sophomore album The Flame Within was quite the winner, having racked up mondo points from the press (including this scribe) for its unabashed portrayal of swooning, sultry, symphonic Read more […]
A much harder sell than they used to be, Unearth prove that on Darkness In the Light that they’re perfectly happy with coloring in between the lines, thus crapping out their fifth album of All-American Read more […]
A rather standard and predictable band, something must be in the August Burns Red brew, ‘cause they’re racking impressive sales figures (at least by 2011 standards) and primo concert tours. We’ll Read more […]
