The first week of February sees a battle being fought between life-hungry prog and bitter, shadow-dwelling black metal, bringing you some of the best of both worlds.
Bipolar Architecture – Metaphysicize
Genre: Progressive metal
Subjective rating: 3.5/5
Objective rating: 3.5/5
A dark progressive album that feels like it’s balancing between modern, near-industrial rigidness and floating melancholy seeping in from the realm of atmospheric black metal. The mix works a lot better than it sounds like it should.
Corpsevore – Feed The Plague
Genre: Death metal/grindcore
Subjective rating: 2.5/5
Objective rating: 3/5
Barebones death metal infused with grindcore’s ferocity and utter lack of patience. It’s raw, slightly clunky, and utterly relentless.
Deadyellow – What Was Left of Them
Genre: Atmospheric black metal
Subjective rating: 2.5/5
Objective rating: 3/5
This is black metal heavily steeped in introspective, mellow melodies, and taken to a warmer tone than is generally the norm.
Dwarrowdelf – The Fallen Leaves
Genre: Black/folk metal
Subjective rating: 3.5/5
Objective rating: 3.5/5
An epic, triumphant experience tempered by its stern-toned black metal framework. Instead of over-relying on dreamy atmosphere, the energy level is kept high throughout, and you get a sense of the same melodic playfulness that exits in melodic death metal.
Enterprise Earth – Death: An Anthology
Genre: Technical deathcore
Subjective rating: 3/5
Objective rating: 3.5/5
A hammering of brutal percussion and breakdowns, with varying levels of semi-melodic, technical playing in between. There is an attempt to showcase distinctly different approaches to the songwriting on each song, which makes for decent variety, but also a slightly disjointed experience overall.
Graywitch – Children Of Gods
Genre: Heavy metal
Subjective rating: 2/5
Objective rating: 2.5/5
Epic, larger-than life classic metal that might scratch an itch if you miss the late 70s.
Hasturian Vigil – Unveiling The Brac’thal
Genre: Black/heavy metal
Subjective rating: 2.5/5
Objective rating: 3/5
Here’s a band that hopes to get the most out of both nihilistic black metal and spritely heavy metal, but only partially succeeding in getting the two to meld.
Hollow Woods – Like Twisted Bones Of Fallen Giants
Genre: Black metal
Subjective rating: 3/5
Objective rating: 3/5
A bleak and outraged black metal album in the traditional early 90s style, although with an influx of darkly poetic, lamenting chants and lingering melodies.
KMFDM – Let Go
Genre: Industrial/electronic metal
Subjective rating: 3/5
Objective rating: 3.5/5
A major nostalgia trip diving headlong into what feels like the early rave scene, although this album has a story to tell. It ebbs and flows and morphs into different flavors as it goes along.
Meanstreak – Blood Moon (EP)
Genre: Heavy metal
Subjective rating: 3.5/5
Objective rating: 3.5/5
A dark-toned heavy metal EP that hovers on the edge of doom, gothic and power metal. It’s got heavy, chugging riffs, soaring vocals, cheeky solos and sections of ponderous, patient slow burn. The songwriting could be a notch or two tighter, but overall this is very interesting and shows a lot of promise.
meth. – Shame
Genre: Noise/experimental metal
Subjective rating: 3/5
Objective rating: 3.5/5
This sounds like a hardcore band that’s gone absolutely apeshit from being stuck in a noise torture room for too long and is fighting with all their might to get out. There’s absolutely nothing pleasant about this record, and it actively gnaws at your sense of mental equilibrium.
Mind Conflict – Temple Of God
Genre: Death metal/hardcore
Subjective rating: 3.5/5
Objective rating: 3.5/5
This is very much mostly a old school-ish death metal album with pounding riffs and a threatening tone, but for extended sections it will also shift gears into much more agile, metallic hardcore rhythms. Some of the heft does seep out at the same time, but it keeps the album lively and slightly unpredictable.
Necrowretch – Swords Of Dajjal
Genre: Black/death metal
Subjective rating: 4/5
Objective rating: 4/5
This is blackened death metal that doesn’t care for a single second about being understatedly evil . It’s a bile-spitting inferno with a demonic rhythm section, where the emphasis is very much on the black metal the entire way. It’s aggressively rousing, large in scope without feeling grandiose, and doesn’t let up. You know you’re in for it when the LAST song is called “Total Obliteration”.
Highlights: “Numidian Knowledge” and “The Fifth Door”.
Persefone – Lingua Ignota: Part I (EP)
Genre: Progressive metal
Subjective rating: 4/5
Objective rating: 4/5
Here Persephone drops a medium length EP, partly to introduce their new vocalist, but also, of course, to delight fans of aggressive-yet-melodic prog. The balance between melodeath force and emotion-laden harmony is expertly struck on this one, and even though it’s far from experimental, it’s also feels free from an adherence to tropes. An experience that leaves you wanting more.
Highlights: “Lingua Ignota” and One Word”.
Perveration – Putrefaction Of Infinite
Genre: Brutal death metal
Subjective rating: 2.5/5
Objective rating: 3/5
Wanna feel like there’s a perpetually-propelled, flesh-eating bouncing ball loose inside your head?
Solbrud – IIII
Genre: Black/doom metal
Subjective rating: 3/5
Objective rating: 3.5/5
An ambitious, far-reaching journey of a doomy, atmospheric black metal album. It goes both very gentle and very harsh, and certainly has the space to transition between the two, but the blend still doesn’t feel entirely natural.
Stages Of Decomposition – Raptures Of Psychopathy
Genre: Black metal
Subjective rating: 2/5
Objective rating: 3/5
An absolutely unhinged brutal death metal album raging down a low-fi path of clicking drums and hoarse-gurgly vocals.
Transit Method – Othervoid
Genre: Progressive/heavy metal
Subjective rating: 4/5
Objective rating: 4/5
A traditional metal-modeled prog album that oozes stylistic confidence. Light on its feet, it effortlessly shifts tempo and mood without disrupting the flow. There are traces of a slightly milder, prog rock mindset throughout, but rather than rob the songs of heft, it keeps proceedings explorative and playful. Some of the riffs on here are on the verge of iconic, but the band never bothers to dwell on them for long, instead prioritizing variety.
Highlights: “Frostbite” and “Psychometry”.
Utopia – Shame
Genre: Mathcore/technical death metal
Subjective rating: 3/5
Objective rating: 3.5/5
This is not album that was in any way shaped to be manageable. Combining the constantly shape-shifting unpredictability of mathcore and clinical-yet-brutal technicality of tech death, it’s a sound that constantly demands your attention.
Vægtløs – Aftryk
Genre: Black metal/shoegaze
Subjective rating: 3.5/5
Objective rating: 4/5
A thoroughly sad experience, this mostly forgoes the bleak, hopeless nihilism of typical black metal and infuses its melancholy soundscape with heart-rending emotion, Desperation interweaves with anger, hurt, longing and grim acceptance, making for a profound statement about wading through life’s strongest currents of adversity.
Highlight: “Tag dit knuste hjerte og lav det til kunst”
Wandering Oak – Resilience
Genre: Black/heavy metal
Subjective rating: 3/5
Objective rating: 3/5
Speedy, adventurous black metal that’s a bit too preoccupied with chasing impressive and pleasing instrumental flourishes to pay quite the necessary attention to song structure.
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 