Category: Reviews
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Bastard Sapling – Instinct is Forever
I’d heard a lot of good things about Bastard Sapling’s debut album, Dragged From Our Restless Trance, but their newest offering, Instinct is Forever, serves as my introduction to the band. And what an introduction it is! The Richmond, VA quintet displays remarkable vision and execution on this sophomore effort. Working off a base of…
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Earth – Primitive and Deadly
I was certainly intrigued by this latest Earth album. Although their newer stuff has been more Americana—not that there’s anything wrong with that—advance singles offa this one indicate somewhat of a return to heaviness. And that includes not one but two guest vocalists, with one being Mark Lanegan. Actually, I’m not sure if they’ve had…
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Overkill – White Devil Armory
When you think of modern day thrash metal, which band represents the legacy that started back in the early eighties better than Overkill? This, their seventeenth studio album, is a follow up to their previous release, The Electric Age, in 2012. For some listening to Bobby Blitz and company has been something of a thrash…
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Transmaniacon – The Darkening Plain
Now, this is a band-name well chosen, for ‘Transmaniacon’ is a track from Blue Oyster Cult. Blue Oyster Cult are a criminally overlooked act in the inspiration stakes, with most people just knowing them for the track ‘Don’t Fear The Reaper.’ This is in part due to it being featured in films like Halloween (the…
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The Proselyte – Our Vessel’s in Need
In case you’re wondering, a proselyte is a new convert to a religion or a cause. Which is to say, this Boston-based outfit might have a few proselytes of its own after they hear this EP. Their press kit describes them as Torche meets the Melvins, and they certainly capture that lighter, almost poppier side of sludge…
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Gob – Apt. 13
As of this writing, it has been seven years since Gob‘s last album of new material came out. That’s a pretty long time to go with no new material for any band who likes to be seen as an enduring, creative entity but, for a pop-punk band like Gob, an absence so long might as…
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Norilsk – Japetus
This is an excellent three-track introduction to a very worthy band. On the title track and “Potsdam Glo,” the band show a talent for strong, original atmospheric doom. My only criticism is a constructive one: I’d like to see the vocal more forward in the mix. Interestingly, what sums up Norilsk the best is their…
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Sorxe – Surrounded by Shadows
Though I haven’t heard of them before, Sorxe is part of the same Arizona sludge scene as the likes of TOAD, Godhunter and North — not to mention the Southwest Terror Fest, which I hope to attend some day — so that’s good enough for me to give ’em a listen. “Steamroller” comes rolling out…
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Musk Ox – Woodfall
I’ve long been struck by the emotional heaviness that Nathanaël Larochette is able to wring from a single acoustic guitar. While Musk Ox’s genre classification is technically “neofolk,” I’ve always felt that this act in particular is an excellent aesthetic companion to extreme metal (quite similar, in fact, to the more minimalist offerings of bands…
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The New Jacobin Club – Soldiers of the Mark
The New Jacobin Club make the cast of the Rocky Horror Picture Show look like the Mormon Tabernacle Choir! For certain, their live shows must be out of this world, but what of the music? Is there substance to back up the style? Thankfully there is! Their PR describes this as something you’d like if…