February starting off with what looks like a mixed goodie bag and a few titles I’m really looking forward to sinking my ear teeth into. Let’s see if they deliver.
Abhoria – Abhoria
Genre: Black/melodic death metal
Subjective rating: 4/5
Objective rating: 4/5
Great way to start the week! This is just my kind of black metal, taken a couple of steps in a melodeath direction. Bit of anger, bit of brutality, bit of epicness, all layered with a frosty coat of black metal misanthropy. Not all of the tracks are as good, but “False Idols” and “Sunless” stand out for me.
Abysmal Dawn – Nightmare Frontier EP
Genre: Death metal
Subjective rating: 3/5
Objective rating: 3.5/5
This is barely even an EP, but I’ll let it slide. The one new track is not exactly my favorite style of death metal, but it’s obviously quality stuff. I’m more a fan of the re-recording, and the cover of “Behind Space” makes me really miss old In Flames.
Bevar Sea – The Timeless Zone
Genre: Heavy/stoner metal
Subjective rating: 2.5/5
Objective rating: 2.5/5
It’s mid-tempo trotting heavy metal with a spacy stoner vibe and some vocals that sound overly strained, to the point where it’s a little distracting.
Beyond The Styx – Sentence
Genre: Hardcore/thrash metal
Subjective rating: 3/5
Objective rating: 3/5
This is certainly no reinvention of the wheel, but some nicely aggressive hardcore driven by thrash – sometimes death – riffs and rhythms. Should be good workout music.
Cold Night For Alligators – The Hindsight Notes
Genre: Alternative metal/indie rock
Subjective rating: 2.5/5
Objective rating: 3/5
This is a weird cross for me. Several of the songs start off as fairly mellow indie rock, even leaning into electronica and pop, then transition into heavier sections of hard rock and metal. Unfortunately, the latter parts are the ones I like the least, with the vocal style touching on emo, and the riffs feel a little uninspired.
The Final Sleep – Vessels of Grief
Genre: Progressive/melodic death metal
Subjective rating: 4/5
Objective rating: 3/5
This is an interesting one. I’ve heard plenty of good progressive death metal before, but this is sort of the other way around, as in prog first and death second. So… brutalized prog metal? Deadened? Deathified? Murdered? Anyway, there’s also some black and groove in here, which makes for a varied listening experience, and they manage to avoid a lot of the big prog tropes. The album as a whole doesn’t come off sounding the most cohesive, or stylistically confident, but I still enjoy each “bite” of the experience.
Golgothan – Leech
Genre: Death metal/deathcore
Subjective rating: 4/5
Objective rating: 3.5/5
Some real mucusy vocals on top of modern death metal flirting with prog and black n’ roll. Some of it is pretty run-of-the-mill, but there are enough highlights here to elevate the overall experience. For me it gets better from “Parent Organism” (which might be my favorite track) and on. A solid effort that should please fans of both death metal and deathcore, but also run the risk of falling in between two chairs.
Grimentity – DSM-5. The New Chapter
Genre: Death metal/grindcore
Subjective rating: 2.5/5
Objective rating: 3.5/5
Although this isn’t my cup of tea, I want to commend the effort. It’s punishing stuff, but very tight and technically competent, with enough rhythm variations to make it interesting, at least in the context of this particular subgenre.
(hed) PE – Califas Worldwide
Genre: Rap metal/industrial/reggea
Subjective rating: 3/5
Objective rating: 3/5
What to say about this one? There’s a lot of different things happening across the album’s 20 tracks and certainly not all of it can be considered metal. There’s hiphop, reggea, r&b, punk and hardcore, with some alternative- and industrial metal bringing the heavy on select tracks. If you feel like a mixed bag, then dig in.
Korn – Requiem
Genre: Alternative/nu metal
Subjective rating: 4/5
Objective rating: 3/5
There’s something comforting about leaning into the audial flow of a sound as familiar as that of Korn. There’s very little to disrupt that flow on this album, which is great if you’re just looking for a fix. It’s not that it feels stale or worn, just safe. I’ve honestly never thought that Korn had the most distinguishable songs, so I would appreciate their albums more or less as one continuous groove. Which I feel you absolutely get here. It is perhaps overly mellow, and I’m probably being too generous with my rating, but there are very few things on here that make me not want to listen to it.
Krvvla – X
Genre: Black metal
Subjective rating: 2.5/5
Objective rating: 3/5
Some bleak ass black metal with death leanings. There’s not a great deal of tonal variety to be found here. Good thing about that is if you really like one song, then you should like all of them.
Mass Worship – Portal Tombs
Genre: Death/progressive metal
Subjective rating: 3.5/5
Objective rating: 4/5
Some very aggressive death metal that sounds like it’s on the precipice of several different subgenres. There’s doom, prog, black, hardcore, even math. In a way it reminds me of early Meshuggah, without fully committing to the strictness of that style. I enjoy the more atmospheric parts, but they’re in a little too short supply for me to fully embrace this endeavor.
Mystic Circle – Mystic Circle
Genre: Melodic black metal
Subjective rating: 2.5/5
Objective rating: 3/5
I don’t exactly know how serious these guys want us to take their music, but for me it feels like a power metal band that suddenly decided to go all out black metal, and has the same sort of formulaic approach to the subgenre. The result feels more than a bit tacky.
Obsidian Sea – Pathos
Genre: Doom metal/hard rock
Subjective rating: 3/5
Objective rating: 3.5/5
To call this doom is actually a bit of a stretch, cause this feels mostly upbeat. It has some of that doom tone, but peps it up with oldschool hard rock and a touch of psychedelia spaciness. There are actually a few Queens of the Stone Age moments in here, but overall it’s a bit too sedate for me.
Persefone – Metanoia
Genre: Progressive/melodic death metal
Subjective rating: 4.5/5
Objective rating: 4/5
This is really my kind of prog metal. If you have the patience for a few lengthy buildups and the (more than) occasional instrumental tangent, you’ll be rewarded with a vibrant, melodic experience bolstered by some tech death aggression and technical prowess. What they don’t do is get completely stuck in instrumental masturbation. There are smaller and bigger journeys in here, with clear goals and a unifying tone. “Katabasis” and “Architecture of the I” are just two of several highlights.
Rolo Tomassi – Where Myth Becomes Memory
Genre: Progressive metal/mathcore/electronic rock
Subjective rating: 4/5
Objective rating: 4.5/5
I won’t try too hard to describe all the different musical influences in here, because I’ll probably leave a discouraging impression of something terribly disjointed. Which this somehow really isn’t. Sure, there are some extreme mood swings, but trust me, it’s all part of the plan. There’s a longing beauty lingering throughout, even through the heaviest parts, so when it slows way down, it just feels like an organic change of pace. If the melodies had dared to soar a bit more at certain points it would make for an even grander experience, which is one of the very few things I have to criticize.
Saxon – Carpe Diem
Genre: Heavy metal
Subjective rating: 2.5/5
Objective rating: 3/5
I feel like there’s not much more to say than – you know what you’re getting. Some epic-sounding, oldschool NWOBHM. I would rate it above average, but the vocal style of Saxon has never really worked for me, and still doesn’t.
Seremonia – Neonlusifer
Genre: Psychedelic stoner/doom metal
Subjective rating: 2.5/5
Objective rating: 3/5
Some psychedelic stoner that sounds – perhaps with the exclusion of the vocals – like it’s being played in the basement below you. If you’re a fan of – or at least don’t mind – low-fi production, then you might have some fun with this.
Thorn – Yawning Depths
Genre: Death/doom metal
Subjective rating: 2.5/5
Objective rating: 3.5/5
Plus for an album cover perfectly matching the title, in context of the sound within. Which is a bit too monotonous for me, but if you like your death metal pummeling to be a crushing grind rather than a revving jackhammer, this might be for you.
Trauma Field – From Wounded Soil
Genre: Folk/melodic death metal
Subjective rating: 3/5
Objective rating: 2.5/5
Not the strongest stylistically, and steps off the gas for extended periods of time, but I sense potential here.
Venom Prison – Erebos
Genre: Death/groove metal
Subjective rating: 4.5/5
Objective rating: 4/5
You gotta love when a band successfully expands their sound without losing the core that they’ve built themselves up on. There’s still plenty of that fury that caught my attention on their last record, but now with added groove, playfulness and panache. I don’t think they’ve quite found that unique signature just yet, but this album stands as a very entertaining step on their journey there. Lots of great songs here, but for a good demonstration of the variation in here try “Judges of the Underworld” and “Comfort of Complicity”.
Vorga – Striving Toward Oblivion
Genre: Melodic black metal
Subjective rating: 4/5
Objective rating: 4/5
If you like modern, well produced black metal, and don’t mind it taking on a sense of epic scale without becoming symphonic, then I’d say this is for you. Very few black metal tropes at all on this one, sometimes it’s more akin to bleak melodic death. But it’s stylistically confident, and doesn’t get bogged down with unnecessary concept gimmicks. “Disgust” might be my favorite track.
As always, if you think I’m completely off on an observation, unfairly dissed your favorite band or need to give an album another shot, do feel free to express yourself in the comments below.
The Metal Dispatch 