Although this album recently got released, the Committee got ahold of it and mucked up the production and changed the tracks. You want the original 1996 version which compiled demos from Vader in the years leading up to The Ultimate Incantation. Fans of Slayer, Massacra, and early Sepultura will notice the original style of death ..read more

For years, our writers have enjoyed not just Zeni Geva but the subsequent outpouring of solo and collaborative works from Kazuyuki “K.K. Null” Kishino, who wrangles operatic emotional conflicts out of pure sound distorted, twisted, echoed, and stretched into plaintive sounds. With the release of his latest collaboration, Psychic Drones 3, Null has joined in the conversation that is music yet again, and was kind enough to take the time to grant us an interview. How does your music differ from regular pop, rock, metal, and other forms which use a more conventional approach to notes, scales, cho ..read more

Percussive speed metal and death metal hybrid Exhorder is cruising around the states for a late summer tour. You can catch them at the following dates. EXHORDER Tour Dates (w/EYEHATEGOD): Aug 13 – Memphis, TN – Growlers Aug 14 – St. Louis, MO – Red Flag Aug 15 – Indianapolis, IN – Black Circle Aug 16 – Dayton, OH – Cosmo Joes Aug 17 – Mansfield, OH – Show Trails Aug 18 – Detroit, MI – Sanctuary Aug 19 – New Kensington, PA – Preserving Underground Aug 21 – Clifton, NJ – Dingbatz Aug 22 – Waterbury , CT – Elite 23 Aug 23 – Brooklyn, NY – Monarch Aug 24 – Baltimore, MD – Ottobar Aug 25 – Albany ..read more

Condemner offers us the most bare-bones death metal possible. We hear only a straightforward guitar. Simple, slow battle drums that press on the same emphasis points of the guitar riff. Traditional death metal vocals round off the bare minimum arrangement, with the occasional higher-register growl doubling for demonic effect at tactical points. As can be imagined, this album is all guitar. The drums are there to amplify it, to add the sonority of percussion that the genre needs. Male Patratis Sunt Atra Theatra Parata is entirely about the guitar riff and as such, does a very good job. It main ..read more

Noise gets less attention than it did back in the 1990s when everyone wanted to try new sounds with new gear that escaped the tyranny of notes and scales, but it remains a powerful force for voicing a union between texture, rhythm, and the basics of melody. K.K. Null has developed it into a voice of its own. Partnering with Swiss guitarist Joel Gilardini, Null shapes sound like sculpted static into soaring and diving drones which are interrupted by abrupt rhythmic changes and staccato internal dialogue. Riffing off the melody of guitars, he expands the space of sound with dynamic contrast. Ps ..read more

Doom metal probably does not qualify as a genre, more as a descriptor, since doom stretches between old school heavy metal all the way through melodic death metal and even grindcore, but it requires a certain mood: a slow ominous urgency with a sense of gravity bearing down the futility of all existence. Unlike the happier “stoner doom” bands that are more hard rock than metal, Doomraiser presents a base influenced by Candlemass with an infusion of Nevermore around the vocals, using Black Sabbath style broad riff structures that focus less on groove than cadenced inertia. This approach gives ..read more

We talk often here of how form-over-content/means-over-ends thinking has predominated in Late Heavy Metal. That is, people got good at the mechanics but forgot what the music was supposed to express, so now heavy metal is wallpaper to signal anger and partying for normies. That is after all how they use it in movies. How many times do they signal to us that a character is a loser, a partier, or just on the wild side by playing heavy metal in the background? They milk metal posters for edge cachet. And if all else fails, some Satanists listening to Slayer can be the bad guys. Since the media j ..read more

Before melodic death metal became a new way to rebrand Iron Maiden style heavy metal with death vocals, a few bands explored the idea of applying melody to death metal, and Desultory distinguished themselves early on with a speed metal influenced variety of heavy metal that used a lot of death metal technique. Comprised of three demos — “From Beyond” (1990), “Death Unfolds” (1991), and “Visions” (1992) — this compilation shows Desultory moving from a hybrid of Destruction, Merciless, and Testament on the first to a smoother-flowing variety of metal that fit more into the death metal mold. In ..read more

Metal music stood against its time by endorsing the mythological-historical view of our world instead of linear progress driven by technology, metaphysical dualism, and peer pressure. As such it is the ultimate minority voice calling for realism among the blur of human emotions and fears. It converts our fear of power, nature, death, disease, war, horror, and the metaphysical into a battleground of ideals where the saner must win out over the irrelevant. By finding beauty in noise, it connects us to the transcendent which views destruction and creation as necessary for existence. Unlike your ..read more

When we look back at the present era, we will separate out stuff that was aligned with the mainstream illusion from material that tried to discover an inner truth paired with external reality. Anything outside of the bourgeois Consumerist, Communist, and Christian social bubble will endure. From the outsiders who opposed the ersatz Potemkin social bubble, heavy metal will stand out with punk and prog as one of the few standout voices, with a few bands like Motörhead, Judas Priest, Slayer, Morbid Angel, and Deicide rising to mythological status. These acts clarified not just what we were think ..read more