<em>The White Crematorium</em> was originally released in 2005 by The Monolith Deathcult, and now it has been re-released five years later. The result? Just slightly better sound and a bonus track. It is a bit of a letdown, at least for a re-recording of an album. Compared to the band's last album, <em>Trivmvriate</em>, the album was a masterpiece...

10/06/2010

Vergil perform gothic rock from Finland. By incorporating lush melodies with soaring vocals, but not as soaring as power metal vocals, they develop a style of rock that is heavy but also melodic, thanks to the keyboards. <em>Tomorrow Will Be Worse Than Today</em> is a short album, but the music is exciting rather than depressive. Some of the guitar...

10/06/2010

Hindrance are a brutal death grind band to spawn out of Spain in 1992. After honing their grinding technique they unleashed their debut in 2004, followed by numerous shows, an EP, and finally their second album. Compared to the first, it still has that filthy grim grind sound to it due to the cranked up distortion, the extensive speed, and growled...

10/06/2010

Fuck Your Shadow From Behind is a young deathcore band that have just come to fruition under their new home, Basterdized Recordings. Their first album,<em> Freigeist</em>, is a blend of extreme deathcore and metalcore, offering grunted vocals, chunky riffs, and plenty of nonstop drumming. Many of the tracks are the standard cookie cutter deathcore...

05/06/2010

<em>Evil Power</em> is thrash-doomsters Lair Of The Minotaur's fourth full length album. With a new label since the leaving of Southern Lord, the band continues in their drudged music by creating an atmosphere that is worthy of doom for being thick and raw but with the speed and catchiness of thrash metal. While their last album seemed a but more s...

05/06/2010

Germany's Lower Hell formed in 2008, followed quickly by their release of an EP. Two years later they signed on with Basterdized Recordings and got their debut full length out. Listeners should expect a lot of melodic riffs mixed with random song titles and snarled vocals. There's plenty of catchy hooks with each track and more than enough groove t...

05/06/2010

Listeners will have to turn their speakers WAY UP to be able to hear this short demo. Og Tegnet offers very raw, very twisted black metal that seems to have been turned down a bit to really create an atmosphere of obscurity. But, once one can hear the album, it is appreciable for more than just mediocre black metal. While the vocals are raw, throat...

05/06/2010

Og Tegnet took the time to split his work with fellow Hippie Records labelmate Rotting In An Open field. Both perform a similar style of black metal, but Rotting has a more atmospheric style to their sound rather than the bleak, necro lo-fi black metal that Og Tegnet produces. The first six tracks are performed by Og Tegnet and the last six are by...

05/06/2010

Hyperial are a death metal band from poland with symphonic elements mixed in. Formed in 2006 the group had no trouble picking up Psycho Records as a label after their short, but strong demo. Here, with Sceptical Vision the band hammers away with the brutality of a band like Deicide, but also has lush layers of beauty mixed in, thanks to the synth....

29/05/2010

Kna'an are a melodic death metal band out of Israel who profess religious callings in their music, but it isn't out to slander or beat it down with brutal melodies. Instead, the group focuses more on the Christian and Jewish literature around the Bible without being so black and white about the situation. While some bands blatantly title their trac...

29/05/2010

Sercati are a Belgium black metal band who perform lo-fi black metal. With their second demo, <em>The Night Stalker</em> is certainly low in production and very raw, but it comes to a point where it becomes so raw that it isn't easy to listen to. The opening track is a long keyboard piece that sounds like something Mortiis used to create. It's very...

29/05/2010

Mortemia is the side project of Sirenia mastermind, Morten Veland. He does all the instrumentation on the album- guitars, drums, keyboard, vocals... everything. Similar to his other gothic metal band, Mortemia features plenty of lush orchestrations and melodic guitar work. However, there is one key aspect that sets Mortemia aside from Sirenia, and...

29/05/2010