✦✦✦✧ Holy fuck is this heavy. “Paradise Gallows” makes Inter Arma’s previous releases sound like “(Listen To The) Flower People.” But that sledgehammer to your balls is not without finesse; how else could this band pull off 90 minutes without it feeling overly long? The expert pacing makes possible the band’s ability to cover a vast terrain of moods and progressive elements. See the rest here
✦✦✧✧ The newest incarnation of Katatonia begs a few comparisons to Opeth (“Damnation,” anyone?). More pointedly, any vestiges of metal on this album are largely relegated to the status of ornamentation in service to a pervasively gothy form of prog. Look: props definitely due for the band burrowing deeper into their softer side. See the rest here
✦✦✦✧ This is perhaps AAL’s best album since their 2009 debut. The band take a more spartan, less-distorted approach to their fourth album, which pays off handsomely. AAL’s brand of metal has always been less about walls of overdriven sound and more about precisely frenetic rhythm, and that’s all the truer here, where clean strings are even more predominant. See the rest here
✦✦✦✧ Wow. This album defies categorization. You could, with equal precision and certitude, call it black metal, stoner metal, space psychadelia, prog metal, 70s prog rock, world music… I could keep going. It’s surefooted in its dominance, without being ostentatious about it. And it’s full of surprises. A fascinating must-listen, which reminds me of Ihsahn but with more ambition, if you can imagine such a thing. See the rest here
✦✧✧✧ Super boring extreme/black metal by the numbers, produced as if the only natural way to hear this music is in a dark arena carved out of Satanic stone. Every clichéd trope you can imagine is here, with very little rhyme or reason. This feels like what DETHKLOK seriously think they sound like. See the rest here
✦✦✦✧ This is some highly polished stoner metal, equal parts Kyuss, King’s X, and latter-era AIC. But I mention all of that as a loose interpretation of what the band actually do with this album; the one universal thing you can say about it is that it’s unpredictable. I wouldn’t call it innovation, so much as avid remixing, but I give ’em plenty of props for keeping me guessing, and keeping me entertained throughout. See the rest here
✦✦✦✧ If you’re already a PTH fan, this collection of songs will give you exactly what you already know to look for. Ridiculously blistering, convoluted riffs undergird Rody Walker’s distinctive and melodramatic vocals. And the musicianship is as flawless as ever, with new drummer Mike Ieradi and bassist Cam McLennan ably filling the busy shoes of Chris Adler and Arif Mirabdolbaghi, respectively. See the rest here
✦✦✧✧ Proving that they are still a band that marches to the beat of their own badly mixed drums, Metallica have filled this (their tenth studio album) with riffs and aggression “inspired” by their thrashier past. This is a welcome departure from the overarching theme of the band’s last few albums: ill-conceived experiments in audio engineering gone wrong. See the rest here
✦✦✦✧ This debut from underground noise rock darlings seems to hit all the right notes at first blush: feel-it-in-your-balls drums, screechy screams, maximized and compressed bass and guitar, tasty feedback doled out generously. There’s also a self-conscious and catchy winking quality here that occasionally threatens to undermine the band’s emotional effectiveness. See the rest here
✦✦✧✧ There’s a well-considered trajectory lurking within the formulaic confines of this sludgy album, almost bordering on the progressive side. Mostly, the plotted journey is a morose one, meandering awkwardly between Deafheaven and Isis. There are, however, tasty moments throughout that make it a worthwhile listen. See the rest here
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