From Dutch Prog to Ukrainian Precision: A Night of Controlled Chaos in Oslo Full photo gallery here: Photos: Andrea Chirulescu Text: Jonathan Mazin The evening opened with Dutch progressive metal outfit Textures, who leaned heavily into intricate prog structures from the first note. Very proggy, highly technical, with clear djent elements driving much of the…
RELEASE YEAR: 2025BAND URL: www.beforethesirens.com The British metalheads in Before the Sirens are back with another EP, ready to impress audiences around the world with their take on a well-established formula. They offer a form of melodic metalcore that might appear a bit generic at times, but it works surprisingly well. It has a universality to…
RELEASE YEAR: 2025BAND URL: https://gerseydeoful.bandcamp.com/album/november-ending-fire Immensely raw and unfiltered yet soaked in an autumnal atmosphere and possessing a strangely appealing sense of twisted grandeur, this wicked little 5-track EP by the US black metal force known as Gersey Deoful, which contains a handful of covers of Glenn Danzig-penned songs from the Samhain days, sees the band…
RELEASE YEAR: 2025BAND URL: https://apollonrecords.bandcamp.com/music Originally released twenty-five years ago, what better way to mark the occasion and celebrate its anniversary than having Jacob Holm-Lupo remaster the material and release it on vinyl and digitally via Apollon Records Prog for the first time ever?! Inspired by the likes of Camel and Uriah Heep, this self-titled offering…
RELEASE YEAR: 2025BAND URL: https://www.facebook.com/grahambonnetofficial/ The legendary Graham Bonnet (whose highly productive career in music has lasted for more years than he probably cares to remember himself) is set to release this cool-looking live album just in time for Christmas, and it is a robust-sounding affair all around. Bonnet is arguably best known for his work…
RELEASE YEAR: 2025BAND URL: https://www.slashonline.com/ This is something quite different yet very refreshing; a collection of classic blues tracks recorded by a wicked band comprised of Teddy “ZigZag” Andreadis (keyboards, harmonica, and vocals), Tash Neal (rhythm guitar and vocals), Johnny Griparic (bass and backing vocals), Michael Jerome (drums), and then obviously the maestro himself on the six-string, the legendary Slash. Not exactly…
RELEASE YEAR: 2025BAND URL: https://goatmilker.bandcamp.com/album/goatmilker From the wonderful albeit rain-soaked city of Bergen comes a strangely invigorating and energetic outfit named Goatmilker, and if for some reason their charming moniker is not enough to convince you that these chaps are fucking cool then their songs undoubtedly will. Somewhere between raw and catchy stoner rock and progressive…
RELEASE YEAR: 2025BAND URL: https://www.facebook.com/vintersorganic/ The first time I came across Vintersorg main man Andreas Hedlund’s fabulous singing was when I saw Borknagar perform live in Aalborg, Denmark, on the back of their splendidly melodic Quintessence album in what seems like another lifetime. But that was then, this is now, and the first new material by…
RELEASE YEAR: 2024 BAND URL: https://www.fourstrokebaron.com/ After carving out a niche with their theatrical blend of heavy progressive rock and ’80s-inspired new wave with Four Stroke Baron²⁰¹⁴ EP, and King Radio²⁰¹⁵, Planet Silverscreen²⁰¹⁷ (debut for Prosthetic) as well as Classics²⁰²¹, Nevada trio Four Stroke Baron returned with last year’s May 31st Data Diamond²⁰²⁴, their fourth…
RELEASE YEAR: 2025BAND URL: https://honeymoonsuiteband.com/ These immensely talented Canadian rockers impressed me last year by means of their melodically rich and gorgeously crafted album titled Alive, so my hopes were high for this brand-new opus of theirs. Although lacking a bit of the vigor, energy, and immediacy that made its predecessor so memorable, “Wake Me up…
RELEASE YEAR: 2025BAND URL: https://lnk.to/nihilist Following a rather obnoxious and pointless intro piece, the French underground black metal constellation known as Myrkvid launches into a full-frontal attack on the senses and delivers its potently bleak and destructive old-school madness in a convincing manner. What we have here is called Nihilist and harkens back to the mid-90s in terms…
RELEASE YEAR: 2025BAND URL: https://www.francisrossi.com/ Francis Rossi of Status Quo fame recently released this seventeen-track compilation of various demo versions and alternate takes – many of which relate to his work with and songwriting contribution to the aforementioned Quo – and it is a rather intriguing album in many respects. Some of the ideas presented on…
RELEASE YEAR: 2025BAND URL: https://omnibuspress.com/products/smile-the-rise-fall-and-resurrection-of-brian-wilson-published-10th-october-2024 Noted author and filmmaker David Leaf not only wrote the magnificent God Only Knows: The Story of Brian Wilson, the Beach Boys & the California Myth, which remains one of the best books on the subject ever conceived, but he also directed the moving and heartfelt documentary titled Beautiful Dreamer: Brian…
RELEASE YEAR: 2025BAND URL: https://www.facebook.com/RobinTrower/ The renowned and skilled Robin Trower (formerly of Procol Harum) has been rather prolific these past ten years or so, and this upcoming eleven-track effort of his sees the blues rock veteran deliver a solid and enjoyable set of catchy tunes. With his lovely laidback and occasionally restrained vocals on top…
RELEASE YEAR: 2025 BAND URL: www.unboundedterror.com The vibrant Spanish Palma Mallorca scene connected to guitarist/bassist Vicente Payá released three albums recently: Golgotha’s Spreading The Wings Of Hope²⁰²⁴ , Holycide’s Towards Idiocracy²⁰²⁴ and, just in, the death metallers’ Unbounded Terror’s 4th full length, Something Is Rotten In Humanity²⁰²⁵, out since April 1st (April 11th on vinyl)…
RELEASE YEAR: 2025BAND URL: https://www.facebook.com/TheBandBigDeal/ The Big Deal hail from Serbia, and “immediately accessible” would be an apt description of what the quintet delivers on this twelve-track opus of theirs. They have certainly progressed as musicians and songwriters since the last time I listened to their stuff, which would have been the First Bite LP from…
RELEASE YEAR: 2025BAND URL: https://www.facebook.com/labyrinthitaly Truth be told, I was never really a huge fan of this Italian progressive power metal outfit as I found many of their earlier discs somewhat lacking in substance and longevity, or at least that is how it was for several years from my perspective. Having said that, their 2021 opus…
– VENUE: Oslo Spektrum – DATE: 12th March 2025 – ORGANIZER: FKP Scorpio On March 12, 2025, Oslo Spektrum became a portal to another age as Heilung took the stage. The Danish-German-Norwegian collective is known for their immersive and theatrical performances, and this night was no exception. As the lights dimmed, the sounds of the…
Full photo gallery from the concerts can be seen here: – VENUE: Rockefeller – DATE: 8th of March 2025 – ORGANIZER: All Things Live Some concerts are merely performances, while others feel like full-fledged rituals. The collaboration between “Witch Club Satan” and “MoE” was unmistakably the latter. From the moment the first notes rang out,…
RELEASE YEAR: 2024BAND URL: https://godzovwarproductions.bandcamp.com/album/malignancy Malignancy is quite possibly one of the most inhuman and raw-sounding musical documents that I have come all year, and I am perfectly okay with that, thank you very much. The guitar tone is akin to slime and immediately establishes an atmosphere that can only be described as utterly unpleasant.…
