★☆☆☆ This album is a who’s who of metal, assembled to apparently churn out a lot of derivative and dated material. To me, this sounds not unlike Spin̈al Tap’s overproduced second album. To be clear, nothing here is overtly terrible in the David Draiman sense, and the musicianship is as good as you’d expect from the pedigree… but there should’ve been a higher bar set on this album than “Sound like another Roadrunner United release.” See the rest here
★★★☆ Sweet, sweet technodeath. Although perhaps death jazz is more like it. This is BTBAM with less carnival, more progginess (if that’s possible), and a distinctly European sensibility. When it works, the music is stunning. That’s certainly not guaranteed on this album, and the band not infrequently careens into self-indulgence… but at least the album’s failures are always fascinating. See the rest here
★★★☆ This is perhaps the heaviest album I’ve heard all year. It’s also bleak, and harrowing, and nihilistically listenable. Here, the band weaves together thin tendrils of thrash and djent into their otherwise devastating slab of doomcore. This album is not the world’s easiest listen, but its power is undeniable. See the rest here
★★★☆ On their third album, Deafheaven turn up every conceivable figurative dial. And happily, that includes turning up The Metal. Technically, Deafhaven are as black and shoegazey as they’ve ever been. But there’s also something new here: crisp riffs occasionally bobbing on the surface. This album is also 15 minutes shorter than their last effort, which works in everyone’s favor. See the rest here
★★★☆ FFAA are an early candidate for Most Improved this year. Unlike their previously self-disinterested album Hellbound, this one most certainly has a plan for itself and for the listener. The opener takes a minute to get going, but that’s pretty much the only break you’re going to get. The rest is brutality, like a batshit insane cross between Gojira and Job For A Cowboy. See the rest here
★☆☆☆ This album has a tendency to sound like a hybrid between Static X, Hatebreed, BABYMETAL, Arch Enemy, and Oingo Boingo. At least it’s an interesting carwreck. See the rest here
★★☆☆ This album is a bit better than the band’s first attempt with vocalist Todd LaTorre, in two key areas: production and ambition. Everyone is in top form performance-wise, with the big prize going to LaTorre; he manages to both sound exactly like Geoff Tate when he wants to, and to self-assuredly avoid that trick when he doesn’t. See the rest here
★★☆☆ The band continue to show off their knack for creating catchy, meaty metalrock tunes. A few tracks here are slightly djentier than anything on Cold Day Memory or Black Out The Sun, and it works. However, it’s hard to imagine anything from this album becoming a band classic; at best, a couple of tunes rise to the level of reminding me of “Decay.” See the rest here
★☆☆☆ This death metal album makes the tactical mistake of starting with a slow dirge. Not an instrumental intro, but a full five-minute mood piece. Unfortunately, that is one boring mood, and no amount of energy that the following tracks spews can completely shake free of it. There are still glimmers of the once-mighty Malev magic here and there, but those are tempered by unsuccessful attempts to sound like Slayer or Cannibal Corpse. See the rest here
★★★☆ Your very first instinct will be to write off this album as unimaginative grindcore, perhaps with some more Ballouesque tendencies. This is perhaps understandable, considering the lo-fi production values or the fact that we start off with blast beats. But what follows is a wide-ranging collection of songs that are surprising, progressive, novel, and above all brutal. See the rest here
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