Panopticon — The Rime Of Memory
✦✦✧✧ I refer to you perhaps my most beloved piece of critical writing ever, my previous Panopticon first listen. See the rest here
Category: First Listens
Immortal Guardian — Unite And Conquer
✦✦✧✧ This is catchy enough for power metal, almost shreddy enough for speed metal, and not nearly interesting enough for progressive. See the rest here
Suffocation — Hymns From The Apocrypha
✦✦✦✧ Unrelenting tech death… you can really feel that Long Island rage! More than ever, this album has something old and something new for you. New vocalist Ricky Myers does a fantastic job filling Frank Mullen’s nasty shoes. There aren’t that many earwormy hooks on this album… but honestly I’m just saying that because I can’t think of anything else to criticize here. See the rest here
Prong — State Of Emergency
✦✦✧✧ At last, a pretty solid album from Prong! Tommy Victor is an excellent form as ever. The songs are more reminiscent of Beg To Differ than anything else they’ve put out in the last decade, and that’s for the good. So what if some of the songs sound like Black Label Society, or Biohazard, or Body Count? See the rest here
Spiritbox — The Fear of Fear
✦✦✦✧ On this EP, Spiritbox wheel between ridiculously heavy djent and radio-friendly metalcore. The real standout track is “The Void,” in which the band successfully marries aggression and catchiness. Solid and eminently relistenable. See the rest here
Cannibal Corpse — Chaos Horrific
✦✦✧✧ Solid OSDM from the fucking champs. Expect the expected! See the rest here
Blut Aus Nord — Disharmonium – Nahab
✦✦✦✧ This is BAN at their most discordant, most troubling, and ultimately most successful. Sure, their brand of avant-garde music is by now reliably atmospheric, but on this album they seem to really gotten much closer to the crawling chaos than ever before. Catchy, this is not, but I don’t think you want this nightmare fuel rattling in your head any more than the runtime requires. See the rest here
Code Orange — The Above
✦✦✧✧ I will give this much to Code Orange: they’re certainly not resting on their laurels. Unfortunately, their experimentation here feels like it never fully pays off (with results ranging from “almost” to “oh no thank you”). Also, with this album the band have gone so far post hardcore that they somehow created a wormhole and punched right back through to nu metal. See the rest here
Night Verses — Every Sound Has A Color In The Valley Of Night: Part 1
✦✦✦✧ Gorgeous, shreddy, and downright proggy instrumental post-metal. Think of a more exciting and interesting Intronaut (or a less obnoxious Polyphia) and you won’t be far from the mark. Stick around for the cameo from Tool’s Justin Chancellor in the closing track! See the rest here
Dødheimsgard — Black Medium Current
✦✦✦✧ Surprisingly accessible, as far as avant-garde black metal goes. The album’s experimentation comes at you as curveballs without warning; while not every bet pays off, there are definite rewards here if you’re patient enough to receive them. Vicotnik’s vocals are a conspicuous letdown when compared to the lush production, instrumentation, and expansive songwriting. See the rest here
