Tombs — Monarchy Of Shadows
✦✦✧✧ Doom doom doom doom doom doom doom doom doom doom doom doom doom doom doom doom doom doom doom doom… Doom doom doom doom doomy doomy doom doomy doom doom doom doom doom doom doom. See the rest here
First Listens With Two-Star Ratings
Trivium — What The Dead Men Say
✦✦✧✧ This is a bit of a step down from predecessor “The Sin And The Sentence,” but there’s still plenty of the band’s metal-for-the-love-of-metal all over the album. There’s also a conspicuous accessibility in a lot of the material here that might excite the SiriusXM metal crowd, but doesn’t really do much for me. See the rest here
Vader — Solitude In Madness
✦✦✧✧ Thrashy death metal from this long-lived band. Fast and blistering from the jump, but there’s something doggedly retro about this sound that fails to inspire true ferocity. Oh well; at least every song on this album is less than 4 minutes long. See the rest here
Kirk Windstein — Dream In Motion
✦✦✧✧ Crowbar’s founder and frontman finally puts out a solo album, to… free himself of the shackles of accessibility? I kid, because this is actually a really interesting and cohesive album that’s more experimental and emotionally well-rounded than you might expected, coming from a sludge standardbearer. See the rest here
Old Man Gloom — Seminar IX: Darkness Of Being
✦✦✧✧ Be careful what you wish for: Seminar IX does indeed have less noise-filler and more musical content, but the songs here are not as solid as the ones on Seminar IX. It also feels less like OMG and more like, well, Mutoid Man or Cave-In, frankly. I can respect the band’s commitment to underdeveloped song ideas; it’s just not for me. See the rest here
Old Man Gloom — Seminar VIII: Light Of Meaning
✦✦✧✧ Seemingly reusing the same template that they used for The Ape Of God, OMG released a pair of companion EPs last week. Seminar VIII (the first of the pair) is both surprisingly listenable and excruciatingly tedious, with winsome songs bookended unnecessarily by noise that doesn’t seem particularly connected to the music. See the rest here
Suicide Silence — Become The Hunter
✦✦✧✧ Fairly standard fare for this deathcore outfit. If you were already into them, you should be relieved to know that this is a marked improvement from their previous album. If you’re not already into them, I doubt this would sway you, though. See the rest here
Five Finger Death Punch — F8
✦✦✧✧ I was prepared to thoroughly hate this, give FFDP’s most recent missteps. But this groove metal album is the least offensive thing the band has made in years! It’s too manicured to evoke real rage, but it’s appropriately big and epic, albeit overlong. Give it a shot, I say; you might be surprised! See the rest here
Annihilator — Ballistic, Sadistic
✦✦✧✧ It’s not fair to label something as rethrash when it comes from a 34-year-old thrash band, but the polish and crispness here definitely feels like it. If you’re in the mood for old-style thrash with a modern sheen, you may get a kick out of this. See the rest here
Jasta — The Lost Chapters Volume 2
✦✦✧✧ This reminds me of that Roadrunner United album that came out in 2008. Not only is it full of uninspired songs as platforms for guest musicians, but the kind of metal here also feels at least 15 years past its prime. See the rest here
