RECENT ALBUM REVIEWS
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CORRODER – Both Feet in the Grave
RELEASE YEAR: 2023 BAND URL: https://corroderofficial.bandcamp.com/album/both-feet-in-the-grave I friggin’ love these maniacal thrash metal bastards from Trondheim, and this vicious new slice of harsh and punishing music of theirs is even better and more focused than anything that came before, which is saying something. As much as I dig the Tombs of Terror EP (and I still…
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HEATWAVES – Kappa
RELEASE YEAR: 2023 BAND URL: https://heatwavesbergen.bandcamp.com/album/kappa Released in late June by the ever-reliable Apollon Records and containing some of the coolest vibes and most inviting atmospheres that I have come across lately, this eclectic disc is a strangely beguiling affair that weaves indie pop, psychedelic rock, and jazz-like elements together to great effect. Actually, that description…
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OMNIUM GATHERUM – Slasher
RELEASE YEAR: 2023 BAND URL: https://facebook.com/omniumgatherumband While most bands either break or make it by their third album, few drop a debut near masterpiece (Spirits And August Light²⁰⁰³), remain puzzingly average and underdeveloped for the next three albums (Years In Waste²⁰⁰⁴, Stuck Here On Snakes Way²⁰⁰⁷, The Red Shift²⁰⁰⁸)and just when you’re about to give…
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END REIGN – The Way of All Flesh Is Decay
RELEASE YEAR: 2023 BAND URL: https://www.facebook.com/theendreign This utterly fierce and cleverly written debut offering by End Reign not only boasts excellent musicianship but also a compellingly dark atmosphere that is unlike anything else that I have come across. Featuring members of Scour, Fulgora, Pig Destroyer, Exhumed, and Misery Index, and citing influences from thrash metal, hardcore,…
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INFERNAL TENEBRA – Origins Of Hate
RELEASE YEAR: 2022 BAND URL: https://www.infernaltenebra.com/ I’ve either never had or haven’t had in a while a close 5.5/6 which ended up a 5/6 in the end, subsequent revolutions to clarify the matter failing to deliver. The Croatian melodic death groove metallers Infernal Tenebra’s pre-pandemic predecessor As Nations Fall²⁰¹⁶ was an easy 5/6 but not…
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HOLLOW ILLUSION – Invisible
RELEASE YEAR: 2023 BAND URL: https://www.hollowillusion.com/ Norwegian hard rockers Hollow Illusion are undoubtedly good musicians, but their previous offerings have failed to truly impress me; they had plenty of promise and potential as well as some good ideas without being solid or thoroughly enjoyable affairs. The latest output, Invisible, is definitely a marked improvement on its…
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NEAL SCHON – Journey Through Time
RELEASE YEAR: 2023 BAND URL: https://www.facebook.com/schonmusic/ This mammoth 3CD/DVD set captures legendary Journey guitarist Neal Schon and his friends live on stage in San Francisco back in 2018 when they did a charity gig to raise funds for victims of the fires that had ravaged the North Bay area of the San Francisco region in late…
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HEAVENS EDGE – Get It Right
RELEASE YEAR: 2023 BAND URL: https://www.facebook.com/heavensedgeband/ The American hard rock act known as Heavens Edge made a name for themselves back in the late eighties and early nineties and released some quality stuff then, but they kind of dropped off the radar shortly after, and I will be the first to admit that I was rather…
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BLAZE BAYLEY – Damaged Strange Different and Live
RELEASE YEAR: 2023BAND URL: https://www.blazebayley.net/ The ever-reliable and inspiring Blaze Bayley never ceases to amaze me, nor does he ever deliver a lukewarm or lackluster performance, which is perfectly illustrated by this sharp and potent 9-track live document of his that is set for release in early July. With that strong and powerful voice of…
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SCREAMACHINE – Church of the Scream
RELEASE YEAR: 2023 BAND URL: https://www.facebook.com/screamachineofficial I have a thing for this Italian heavy metal outfit and found their previous self-titled offering pretty darn entertaining and packed to the rafters with big, meaty riffs the size of a skyscraper. These dudes are anything but subtle, and the influence from Judas Priest is to be found in…
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ENSLAVED – Heimdal
RELEASE YEAR: 2023 BAND URL: http://enslaved.no/ Whereas E²⁰¹⁷ was a sore disappointment after the phenomenal In Times²⁰¹⁵, the former seemingly ending the string of top shelf material from Axioma Ethica Odini²⁰¹⁰ and Riitiir²⁰¹², Utgard²⁰²⁰ was a notable, if a partial return to form. I remarked similarly in my review of the album (5/6) where I…
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CRY OF DAWN – Anthropocene
RELEASE YEAR: 2023 BAND URL: https://www.facebook.com/cryofdawnmusic/ The Swedish melodic rockers known as Cry of Dawn, which is fronted by the talented Göran Edman, serves up eleven catchy and easily digestible tunes that harken back to the 80s and contain more than a cursory nod to AOR ala Journey. This sophomore album of theirs is a well-produced…
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SWEET & LYNCH – Heart & Sacrifice
RELEASE YEAR: 2023 BAND URL: https://www.facebook.com/SweetLynch/ Heart & Sacrifice is without doubt an output that a lot of fans and listeners have been looking forward to. The two previous records by George Lynch (Dokken, Lynch Mob) and Michael Sweet (Stryper), namely Only to Rise (2014) and Unified (2017), gained a lot of positive feedback and some…
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CIRCUS OF ROCK – Lost Behind the Mask
RELEASE YEAR: 2023 BAND URL: https://www.circusofrockofficial.com/ King Company drummer Mirka Rantanen impressed me a couple of years ago by means of his Come One, Come All album under the Circus of Rock banner, and this latest effort of his very much follows in the footsteps of its predecessor, which means that you get ridiculously catchy hard…
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TRIBULATION – Hamartia
RELEASE YEAR: 2023 BAND URL: https://www.tribulation.se/ I remember once listening to The Formulas Of Death²⁰¹³ and later The Children Of The Night²⁰¹⁵ (which came out after The Horror²⁰⁰⁹, the debut after 5 years from Tribulation’s conception) and praising the melodic death metal the founders Johannes Andersson (bass, vocals) and Paul Adam “Zaars” Zars (guitars) then…
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OVERKILL – Scorched
RELEASE YEAR: 2023 BAND URL: http://wreckingcrew.com/ Overkill or Over Kill? Looking at the covers of the 30 (!) full lengths by the New York and New Jersey thrash and groove metal legends it seems more the former but the name is actually one word: Overkill, just like Motörhead’s second album it was named after in…
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WINGER – Seven
RELEASE YEAR: 2023 BAND URL: https://www.wingertheband.com/ The American hard rockers Winger are back with an incredibly inspired and lively offering that sees the talented Kip Winger and his cohorts deliver some of the outfit’s most powerful and irresistible tunes to date, which is merely another way of stating that Seven is a fabulous slab of arena-sized…
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TSJUDER – Helvegr
RELEASE YEAR: 2023 BAND URL: https://tsjuder.bandcamp.com/album/helvegr Norwegian black metal stalwarts Tsjuder have been at it for thirty years and show no sign of letting up or losing creative steam, which is perfectly illustrated by the band’s upcoming barrage of harsh and gut-piercing sounds of darkness entitled Helvegr. Comprising nine compositions that encompass the cold and raging…
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ENFORCER – Nostalgia
RELEASE YEAR: 2023 BAND URL: https://www.enforcerofficial.com/ There’s a mildly funny personal story connected to this 6th album by the Swedish speed and traditional heavy rock and metal quartet Enforcer. I had heard of them before with the Death By Fire²⁰¹³ album review by a former ET reviewer Matt Coe but had never actually took the…
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HOUSE OF SHAKIRA – XIT
RELEASE YEAR: 2023 BAND URL: https://www.facebook.com/HouseofShakira/ These melodic hard rockers from Sweden impressed me with their Radiocarbon LP from 2019, and I was curious as to what this brand-new opus of theirs would be like and whether it would sound like the natural successor to the aforementioned record and be just as cool and exciting as…
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MICHAEL THOMPSON BAND – The Love Goes On
RELEASE YEAR: 2023 BAND URL: https://www.facebook.com/MichaelThompsonBand/ To state this as succinctly and concisely as I possibly can, the Michael Thompson Band is just the thing if one is on the lookout for melodic rock and AOR performed by world-class musicians and superb songwriters as evidenced by the overall quality of The Love Goes On. With…
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WAKING DREAMS – Sliding Lines
RELEASE YEAR: 2023 BAND URL: https://thewakingdreams.bandcamp.com/album/sliding-lines My good friend Otto-Egil (Apollon Records) recently handed me a copy of this deeply evocative, emotionally charged, and beautifully written album by the duo known as Waking Dreams, which features the amazing and utterly haunting vocals of Angela Chambers, and I am forever grateful to him for doing so. …
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UNEARTH – The Wretched; The Ruinous
RELEASE YEAR: 2023 BAND URL: https://unearthofficial.com/ When the official Century Media Records release calls the Boston, Massachusetts quintet Unearth “nothing short of standard-bearers and keepers of the faith for American metalcore” it’s not just a suave public relations rhetoric. As metal was largely losing its raison d’etre at the dawn of the XX Century, Unearth…
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ENFORCED – War Remains
RELEASE YEAR: 2023 BAND URL: https://enforced.bandcamp.com/ When I reviewed At The Walls²⁰¹⁹ (5/6), the debut album from the Virginian thrash crossover metallers I called it a mix of co-precipitated aluminium salts of naphthenic and palmitic San Francisco Bay Area thrash acids with crossover hardcore petrol of Cro-Mags, Biohazard and Hatebreed for the most volitile devastation…
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STRANGE HORIZON – Skur 14
RELEASE YEAR: 2023 BAND URL: https://strangehorizon.bandcamp.com/album/skur-14 The previous album titled Beyond the Strange Horizon by this fabulous Norwegian outfit impressed this scribe greatly, and their lively, exciting, and organic mixture of heavy metal, stoner rock, and doom metal worked like a wicked charm and had instant appeal to these ears. This upcoming LP of theirs, Skur…
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LEPER COLONY – Leper Colony
RELEASE YEAR: 2023 BAND URL: https://lepercolonydm.bandcamp.com/ The mighty death metal warrior Roger “Rogga” Johansson (bass, guitars) whose musical contributions to the genre run for four lines on Encyclopedia Metallum, is back with another slab of classic extremity, here infused with substantial amount of doom, thrash, groove and even traditional metal, joined by Marc Grewe (vocals)…
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DEAD SOUL ALLIANCE – Spiraling To Lunacy
RELEASE YEAR: 2023 BAND URL: https://dsadeath.bandcamp.com/ It’s a good feeling to be able to rest from a genre, in this case melodeath, and take in some good old classic death metal in the vein of the first two Paradise Lost albums, early Hypocrisy, Immolation and Death, with a few surprising twists courtesy of the Canadian…
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NECROPANTHER – Betrayal
RELEASE YEAR: 2023 BAND URL: https://necropanther.bandcamp.com/ Yet another melodic death metal release on my plate, the Coloradan quartet featuring Paul Anop (guitars, vocals), Joe Johnson (guitars), Marcus Corich (bass), Haakon Sjoegren (drums), is actually quite a genre hopper on their 4th (after the eponymous²⁰¹⁶, “Eyes Of Blue Light”²⁰¹⁸ and “The Doomed City”²⁰¹⁹ with a couple…
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MIKE TRAMP – Songs of White Lion
RELEASE YEAR: 2023 BAND URL: https://www.facebook.com/MikeTrampOfficial/ Renowned Danish guitarist/vocalist Mike Tramp recently released this wicked 12-track offering via Frontiers Records, and as the title of the record signifies, this one is rather special in that it sees Tramp interpreting (or rather re-imagining, I suppose) the songs of glam metal outfit White Lion, i. e. his former…
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MELT MOTIF – Particles. Death Objective
RELEASE YEAR: 2023 BAND URL: https://meltmotif.bandcamp.com/album/particles-death-objective The brilliant Norwegian/Brazilian purveyors of melancholic textures and soundscapes known as Melt Motif impressed me greatly last year by means of their uniquely crafted A White Horse Will Take You Home. This latest slice of experimental excellence sounds like the logical next step, or the natural successor to the aforementioned…