A week dominated by black- and doom metal, but not necessarily the kind that makes you want to crawl into a dark hole and hide from the world.
Acrid Death – Abominable Presence Of Blight
Genre: Death metal
Subjective rating: 3.5/5
Objective rating: 3.5/5
Here’s some death metal with that über-crunchy guitar tone that I can’t get enough of. It sounds beefy as heck and, even though it could definitely go heavier on the grooves, it’s a raging thunderclap of an album.
Bloom – Maybe In Another Life
Genre: Metalcore
Subjective rating: 3/5
Objective rating: 3.5/5
Emotionally charged metalcore that, despite a clear presence of cleaner, melodic songs, also knows to go harsh and heavy without it feeling like a gimmick. Not terribly memorable, but several of the melodies hit quite well.
Cercenatory – GoreSphere
Genre: Death metal
Subjective rating: 3/5
Objective rating: 3/5
Even though this sounds more or less like one continuous song, in the way that there’s little discernable variation in rhythm and tone, if you like what you’re hearing, there’s no reason not to keep the party going, right?
Darkspace – Dark Space – II
Genre: Atmospheric black metal
Subjective rating: 3/5
Objective rating: 3.5/5
Consisting of a single, 47 minute track, this isn’t the easiest album to speed review, but even as the usual black metal harshness gets muffled by a wall of darkly synthetic ambience, the core sensibility is there, and makes a mark.
Durbin – Screaming Steel
Genre: Heavy metal
Subjective rating: 2.5/5
Objective rating: 3/5
While Halford-esque vocals and tasty guitar solos certainly set the right kind of tone, this is much more an exercise in mimicking past glory than actually reviving it.
Elettra Storm – Powerlords
Genre: Power metal
Subjective rating: 3.5/5
Objective rating: 3/5
This one cuts straight to the core of what makes power metal a unique and viable subgenre, and basks in it. While not really approaching anything original, you get distinct vocals and tech-happy guitars, making for an altogether fun experience.
Eternal Storm – A Giant Bound to Fall
Genre: Progressive/melodic death/black metal
Subjective rating: 3/5
Objective rating: 3.5/5
An album that sounds ambitious in all the right ways – expansive, varied and technically competent, and yet the mixture of elements from black-, death-, and prog metal takes the form of a stationary maelstrom rather than a flowing current.
Far Beyond – The End Of My Road
Genre: Heavy/melodic death metal
Subjective rating: 3/5
Objective rating: 3/5
Epic and darkly adventurous, this sounds like the meeting of traditional metal and Finnish melodeath. A little uneven, it still definitely gets you in the right mood.
Farsot – Life Promises Death
Genre: Black metal
Subjective rating: 4/5
Objective rating: 4/5
Mildly progressive, moderately avant-garde, but riff-driven, modern black metal at its heart, this album has a clear direction in mind, but deftly navigates a changing landscape as it goes. Its realm is one of smog and sorrow, and yet it dares to dream beyond all this every now and then. It sounds mature and practiced, and at the same time light on its feet, which is an admirable thing to pull off.
Highlights: “Nausea” and “Chimera”.
Griffon – De Republica
Genre: Symphonic black metal
Subjective rating: 3.5/5
Objective rating: 3.5/5
A dramatic and forceful gale of a conceptual black metal album. Borrowing more than a few elements from deathcore, this isn’t quite the album for entering a grimly medieval state of mind, but it’s also far from tacky, remaining tastefully dark and on theme throughout.
Ihsahn – Ihsahn
Genre: Progressive metal
Subjective rating: 4.5/5
Objective rating: 4.5/5
Ever industrious, here Ihsahn gives us an album that sounds like the product of years, even decades of reflection. Retaining a delicate but defining black metal edge, this plays like a highly ambitious theatrical play, very much driven by the musical flow, rather than any momentum-killing ambient- or spoken-word sections. It feels grand, allowing orchestral elements to elevate it to lofty heights, but never dominate, and never dictate the next, genre-bending turn of events.
Highlights: “TWICE BORN” and “PILGRIMAGE TO OBLIVION”.
Illumishade – Another Side Of You
Genre: Symphonic/modern heavy metal
Subjective rating: 2.5/5
Objective rating: 3/5
Centered around accessible melodies and lyrics, you get a rich production with a vibrant use of modern instrumentation, with several highlights slightly drowning among more forgettable material.
In Autumn – What’s Done Is Done
Genre: Avant-garde doom metal
Subjective rating: 3/5
Objective rating: 3/5
Doom metal that sounds a bit torn between wanting to float in an ocean of genre-fluid atmosphere and rocking out with a mix of stoner, hardcore and blackened death metal .
Leah – The Glory And The Fallen
Genre: Symphonic/folk metal
Subjective rating: 2.5/5
Objective rating: 2.5/5
This is wholly uncomplicated, epic symphonic metal with a folk flair. The melodies are clean and soothing, just not terribly original.
The Obsessed – Gilded Sorrow
Genre: Stoner/heavy metal
Subjective rating: 2.5/5
Objective rating: 3/5
Striking out from a core of groovy stoner, this is a mid-tempo, relaxed affair that still has a generous scoop of attitude.
Pestilength – Solar Clorex
Genre: Experimental doom/death metal
Subjective rating: 4/5
Objective rating: 4/5
This sounds like some horribly mutated, spliced-together, unholy form of life painfully flailing, crawling, charging and stumbling its way around the labyrinthine underground realm in which it was birthed, blind to the chaotic and darkly vivid spectacle that’s going on around it. This is experimental death doom that doesn’t just want to scare you or make your head spin, but take you to a place of grim wonder that you never knew you wanted to visit.
Highlights: “Occlusive” and “Verbalist Aphonee”
Ponte Del Diavolo – Fire Blades From The Tomb
Genre: Doom/black metal
Subjective rating: 4/5
Objective rating: 4/5
This is old school doom metal with a distinctly occult expression, utilizing select black metal elements to sharpen the musical blade edge. Combining a bewitching vocal style with a rhythmic instrumental progression, a threatening tone and alluringly sinister melodies, this hits the sweet spot for combining pleasing subgenre conventions with bucket loads of character.
Highlights: “Covenant” and “Nocturnal Veil”
Praise The Plague – Suffocating In The Current Of Time
Genre: Atmospheric black metal
Subjective rating: 3.5/5
Objective rating: 3.5/5
Combining a relatively straightforward black metal approach with a cavernous, deep backing atmosphere, verging on death doom, you get a dark and unsettling sound, that manages to be both jagged, melancholy and brutally heavy.
Profiler – A Digital Nowhere
Genre: Nu-metal/metalcore
Subjective rating: 2.5/5
Objective rating: 3.5/5
Well-produced, metalcore-tinged nu-metal with elements of djent, a bittersweet disposition, and several nods to pioneers of the subgenre like Linkin Park.
Sujin – Save Our Souls
Genre: Melodic death metal/metalcore
Subjective rating: 3/5
Objective rating: 3/5
An eager and technically proficient young band with a penchant for speedy grooves. It’s fresh and suitably heavy, although a bit messy in places.
Thy Shining Curse – Theurgia
Genre: Symphonic death metal
Subjective rating: 2.5/5
Objective rating: 2.5/5
Grandiose and aggressive symphonic death metal that’s unfortunately let down by a murky production, a choppy mix, and a few questionable songwriting decisions.
UKC – Coming Out – Love & Hate Diaries
Genre: Black/doom metal
Subjective rating: 2.5/5
Objective rating: 3/5
A personal and melodically varied musical effort with elements of black-, doom- and folk metal, that never quite gets into a good rhythmical flow.
Vanir – Epitome
Genre: Melodic death metal
Subjective rating: 3.5/5
Objective rating: 3/5
Vanir is back with more rousing, heading-to-battle melodeath in the vein of Amon Amarth. It hits the spot well if you’ve got a craving for this brand of melodic brutality, but breaks virtually no new ground whatsoever.
Volucrine – ETNA
Genre: Metalcore/melodic death metal
Subjective rating: 2.5/5
Objective rating: 2/5
An odd combination of deathcore-style modern melodeath with a groovy hardrock approach, dipping into pop-oriented melodic sections, with transitions between the different styles that work rather poorly,
Witchorious – Witchorious
Genre: Doom metal
Subjective rating: 3.5/5
Objective rating: 3.5/5
This is classic, stoner-leaning doom metal that foregoes the fuzz and chronic sluggishness, and gets creative with its rhythm work. There’s elements of punk and hard rock, but with the big, crunchy riff at the top of the priority list, and a pleasing tonal consistency.
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, why not pop a comment down below?
The Metal Dispatch 