A week showcasing the versatility of dark metal, in its ability to kick your door in, set your blood ablaze or thoroughly warp your mind.
The Anchoret – It All Began With Loneliness
Genre: Progressive metal
Subjective rating: 4/5
Objective rating: 4/5
Sax-o-licious, light on its feet and not sacrificing tonal consistency for instrumental playfulness, this is an adventurous prog metal release that will brighten your day. Certain sections dip into semi-retro prog rock, so don’t expect every song to deliver the same amount of punch, but it makes for a varied and flavorful listen, from a band that sounds confident in their style, and has the obvious talent to back it up.
Highlights: “Forsaken” and “All Turns to Clay”.
Crepitation – Monstrous Eruption Of Impetuous Preposterosity
Genre: Death metal
Subjective rating: 2.5/5
Objective rating: 3/5
Brutal death metal in its most parodic-and-I-know-it form, which means lots of vulgar fun and an absolute musical murder carnival.
Degrees Of Truth – Alchemists
Genre: Symphonic metal
Subjective rating: 3/5
Objective rating: 3/5
Offering up divine vocals and heavenly melodies, this is symphonic metal with enough instincts to veer off the formula that it stands out from the crowd.
High Priest – Invocation
Genre: Doom/heavy metal
Subjective rating: 3.5/5
Objective rating: 3.5/5
A cosmic-flavored take on melodic, classic doom that showcases a distinct vocal talent and the band’s proficiency for balancing eagerness and restraint for a full, engaging sound.
Jag Panzer – The Hallowed
Genre: Heavy/power metal
Subjective rating: 2.5/5
Objective rating: 3.5/5
Solo-happy heavy metal that borrows a fair bit of flair from its more epic cousin, and takes us on a lofty journey of defiant struggle.
Krigsgrav – Fires in the Fall
Genre: Melodic black/death metal
Subjective rating: 4.5/5
Objective rating: 4/5
Take the expansive and aggressive nature of melodic black metal, replace some of the coldness with the more patient and solemn tone of doom and up the impact with some melodeath riffs, and you’re honing in on the formula behind this album. And yet the result is definitely greater than the sum of its parts. It feels grand in a grim and darkly prophetic way, and flows at an organic pace that showcases the band’s aptitude for atmosphere as much as rushes of controlled fury.
Highlights: “Shadowlands” and “In Seas of Perdition”.
Mental Cruelty – Zwielicht
Genre: Deathcore/melodic black metal
Subjective rating: 3/5
Objective rating: 3.5/5
Infused with theatrical grandeur and pulling out every modern deathcore trick in the book, this is a successful brutality upgrade to melodic-to symphonic black metal.
Miserere Luminis – Ordalie
Genre: Atmospheric black metal
Subjective rating: 3/5
Objective rating: 3/5
Mournful melody takes front and center on this, and weaves well together with a grief-stricken, slightly atypical approach to black metal.
Perracide – Underdog
Genre: Death/thrash metal
Subjective rating: 2.5/5
Objective rating: 3/5
A band that doesn’t seem sure whether they want to be thrash or death metal, as emphasis on either switches rather heavily from song to song, although they’re at their best when the two styles meld.
Persekutor – Snow Business
Genre: Heavy/black metal
Subjective rating: 3/5
Objective rating: 3/5
Old school heavy metal clad in black, yet still urging you to your feet with your hands in the air. The rock n’ roll is strong with this one..
Phantom Corporation – Fallout
Genre: Hardcore/death metal
Subjective rating: 3.5/5
Objective rating: 3.5/5
While the rhythms on here are about as predictable as they come within hardcore, the drive is excellent, and you’re treated to an absolute riff galore if you stay on for the whole ride.
Pyramaze – Bloodlines
Genre: Power/pop metal
Subjective rating: 2/5
Objective rating: 2.5/5
Anthem-seeking, modernized power metal with Michael Bolton vibes.
Sculforge – Intergalactic Battle Tunes
Genre: Heavy/power metal
Subjective rating: 1/5
Objective rating: 1.5/5
Less than stellar, speedy power metal thematically ripping off Warhammer 40K in ultra cringe-worthy fashion.
Seek – Kokyou De Shinu Otoko
Genre: Black metal/hardcore
Subjective rating: 3.5/5
Objective rating: 4/5
When you hear this level of resolve in blackened metal, you don’t need stabbing melodies or raging riffs to grab your attention. Especially the vocals emit an undeniable fervor, and the heavy, industrial drum work fully backs it up. There’s a lot of pain and anger in the violent yet nuanced atmosphere of this thing, and the level of hardcore harshness applied to it makes the message seem all the more urgent.
Soul Grinder – Filth Encrusted
Genre: Thrash/heavy metal
Subjective rating: 2.5/5
Objective rating: 3/5
Simple thrash metal bot in terms of performance and production, offering some heavy, mid-tempo groove.
Structural – Decrowned
Genre: Melodic/technical death metal
Subjective rating: 3.5/5
Objective rating: 3.5/5
Modern, technical and sort of prog-melodic death metal that makes up for a slight lack of brutality with precision and tenacity.
Tsjuder – Helvegr
Genre: Black metal
Subjective rating: 4.5/5
Objective rating: 4/5
This is that traditional, 90s wave of Norwegian black metal in all but actual musical approach. Sure, it’s still been produced to sound grim and frigid, but the adherence to technical precision goes far beyond its origins. It sounds like the controlled fury of a modern army assault in the form of an orchestra, with the specific purpose of getting your blood boiling.
Highlights: “Prestehammeren” and “Surtr”.
Vexed – Negative Energy
Genre: Deathcore/nu metal
Subjective rating: 3.5/5
Objective rating: 4/5
If you want to get analytical about it, this sounds like djent-deathcore with the straightforward mono-aggression of hardcore, rhythm approach of hiphop-heavy nu metal and melodic sensibilities of metalcore. But don’t let all this fool you into thinking that it sounds like a mishmash. The term “nu-core” actually covers it quite well. It’s sharply honed and consistent stuff, and, unlike many of its ilk, quite mature-sounding.
Xasthur – Inevitably Dark
Genre: Experimental black/doom metal
Subjective rating: 3.5/5
Objective rating: 4/5
Ready for a near 2 hour journey that sounds like the grim reaper inviting you along for an acid trip? There’s a varied host of different personalities to this music – all of them doom-laden to a certain extent, and all put together it makes for a markedly disturbing whole. You get noisy black metal, dark folk and lots of ambience, most of which with a undeniably nightmarish quality to it.
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 section below.
The Metal Dispatch 