Sweden’s Wormwood burst onto the melodic black metal scene with 2017’s excellent Ghostlands, followed up by Nattarvett, the first of a planned trilogy of albums. Part two of the trilogy, 2021s Arkivet saw the band take a melancholic downturn befitting the tale of mankind’s general shittiness. I was hoping for a return to the more urgent stylings of the debut, but when the opening track, “Stjärnfall” starts, I immediately knew that The Star, the trilogy’s conclusion was going to be another more somber effort. However, it is still a superb album. The word I kept coming back to for this album is ..read more

Kentucky’s melodic black metal act, Volcandra, have benefitted from continuity and it helps when your line-up stays intact.  Formed in 2018 Mike Hargrave (Drums), River Jordan/Jamie DeMar (Guitars) and Dave Palenske on cocals have stayed together since their 2020 impressive debut, Into the Azure.  The album was released independently and it was not until getting signed to Prosthetic Records that things started to take off for the band, with their 2022 EP for the label, Border World, which showed the band continuing their blend of melodic black metal, with many emotive elements. The W ..read more

Man, as much as I love reliable old-school school, consistent bands that I’m familiar with and know what I’m getting with every album, I love discovering ‘new’ bands.  Whether the band is brand new on the scene or in the case of Australia’s King, a veteran band with some household names and two prior albums under their belt, that I just flat-out missed. Like Countrymates Oath of Damnation, King plays a blistering form of melodic black/death metal but the influence here is pretty clear: Immortal, and certainly the Immortal offshoots I, and Abbath . Vocalist Tony Forde (Ex-Blood Duster) has ..read more

I kinda dug, These Nameless Worlds, the debut EP from this atmospheric/melodic black metal duo from Sweden. Despite the light-less moniker, it was a cosmic-themed, uplifting, bright take on the genre with some very pleasant melodies in the vein of Ghostbath, Vinland, Numeron, and Vallendusk. Well here is the full-length debut on the very fitting label, Black Lion Records, and while it delivers the same sort of spacey atmosphere and melodies, it never quite improves on the debut or fulfills the promise of the songs on the debut EP. At One With The Night Sky by Lightlorn That’s not to say, At On ..read more

Sühnopfer (German for ‘Atonement’) is a French, one man black metal project featuring Ardraos, who has been around a while and has surfaced in a number of well known and lesser known French bands like Peste Noire, Aorlhac, Veratyr, Endymion, Antrum Mortis and others. This project, while productive with 2 full lengths and various demos and splits under his belt , is new to me, but it’s this third album that should put this projection the black metal map. This is a style of melodic black metal thats got some medieval, church-y hues, (ie Gregorian chants), which are horribly underused,  but ..read more

I’ve always been pretty knowledgeable when it comes to heavy/extreme metal and all its facets. All through my life, my fellow metalhead friends have referred to me as a metal encyclopedia. Like many die-hard metalheads, my affiliation with the genre has always been one from a “love and collect” aspect as opposed to merely a “like and buy”. This is essentially what fuels the need for metal knowledge; collectors like to know their shit. Having said that, I have to plead ignorance to being very schooled in one of the far Eastern blocks of the metal hemisphere, i.e. Mother Russia. To be fair thoug ..read more

Naglfar’s second album, Diabolical, is still one of the most successful ‘cold’ purchases I’ve ever made. And by cold, I don’t mean frosty black metal, although that obviously applies. No, in this case, I mean that I’d never heard the band before, and bought the album on a whim. This was back in 1999, the store in question was San Francisco’s Amoeba Records, and the recommendation card attached to Diabolical (in the store’s still-epic black metal section), simply stated “for fans of Dissection and Sacramentum.” That description did not disappoint. Diabolical (even moreso than the debut, Vittra ..read more

As I stated in my review of Drama Noir‘s Night Fall Upon the Asylum review earlier this week, there are two symphonic black metal releases vying for my attention right now. And while the aptly named Drama Noir delivered a solid, bombastic symphonic black metal album, in the vein of Dimmu Borgir and such, Swedens Avdagata (‘put to death’) has a little different approach that belies their Swedish roots and the ties of the band members and guest members that appear on The Faceless One. With a trio of members with links to bands like Dark Funeral, Night Crowned, Nightrage, Still I Wither, and Entr ..read more

With a moniker like Sodomisery, I blind-clicked on the promo for the band’s second album fully expecting a brutal death metal album full of ass, blood, and guts-filled lyrics with gurgled vocals. It was not that. Pleasantly so. Then I dug into the band a little and found it a more melodic Swedish death/black metal-based project started by Harris Sopovic (ex-live guitarist for Diabolical, ex-Smothered), aided by current Diabolical bassist Paul Viscolit and another former Smothered member, drummer Viktor Eklund. Also, the band at some point featured Netherbird members and  Niklas Sundin of ..read more

Those in the know and follow symphonic black metal, are aware that since their Piercing Through the Frozen Eternity EP in 2022, Finland’s Moonlight Sorcery has been touted as the next big thing in 90s-styled melodic/symphonic black metal. Some even saying they are going to be the next Dissection or Emperor, with a windy, grim, majestically icy take on classic 90s symphonic black metal. But the follow-up EP, Nightwind: The Conqueror from the Stars, cooled those expectations a little with a more melodic typically Finnish development. And now with the full-length debut finally upon us, expectatio ..read more