The past is the future. This is only too true for Doom Metal bands, many of whom still fawn over Black Sabbath with all the passion of a jilted lover. But once in a while, the love is returned, and one of the original line-up blesses a band with their presence. This time around, it’s Swedish legends Candlemass’s turn to blag a Sabbath cameo, in the form of Tony Iommi riffing himself silly on their new album, The Door To Doom (Napalm Records).Continue reading
It’s a curious business when an album isn’t bad, isn’t great, or isn’t even average either. How to review it? Give it a proper slagging? This is the challenge Vol. 6 (Artofact Records), by Vancouverian Doom Metal peddlers Seer, poses this critic. In a sense, it’s hard to fully categorize. Listening to this album is like appraising a beautiful ice sculpture, only it’s a little too far away to see, it’s snowing, and you’re only wearing your underwear. This is a roundabout way of saying that the album is very easy to admire, but very hard to actually like.Continue reading
Look, it’s as cold as a witch’s tit, and I’m not talking about the variety that likes PVC. With that in mind, here are seven attempts by the underground Metal scene to raise the temperature. As it were. (Come on, give me that one. I have an A-Level in English, and everything).Continue reading
In a sense, this review finds itself in an onerous position. Recorded in the wake of Finnish singer Aleah Stanbridge’s death, its subject marks the return to the music of her partner, Juha Raivio, and his Epic Goth Metal band, Swallow The Sun. In fact, the press release goes so far as to describe the new album, When A Shadow Is Forced Into The Light (Century Media), as being “fuelled by personal loss and powered by the will to continue.”Continue reading
Sometimes Black Metal is just a mess of clichés – unreadable spiky fonts, unhinged teens in corpsepaint, blizzards… Yet Belgians Saqra’s Cult treads a different path. As their new EP, The 9th King (Amor Fati Productions), demonstrates, you can still breathe life into the old werewolf. In this case, the band draws deep from the Incan pagan heritage of their guitarist, and some strong yet original Black Metal results.Continue reading
In a sense, Mourning Sign has already achieved more than most bands ever do. After all, in the wake of 24 years in the business, this Swedish ‘gloomy progressive Death Metal band’ must be doing something right to have carried on so long, right?Continue reading
Jarboe, or Jarboe La Salle Devereaux as she is known to her accountant, is also the other founding member of the legendary Swans. So, no pressure there, then. She’s also shockingly busy, with a looooong discography, and a new ambient/experimental rock album, Cut Of The Warrior (Translation Loss Records) out this month. But is it her swan song, or will it break this reviewer’s arm?Continue reading
Pause for a moment, dearly beloved, and check out THAT COVER. See it, feel it, breathe it in. It is Ian Miller at his gothic grotesque best like someone crossed a lurid creepy crawly with a bad trip in a fin de siècle opium den. It’s got one of Lovecraft’s Elder Thing exploding with mouths, beaks, eyes and profane wind instruments, striding through a cancerous landscape full of writhing horror and grandeur. It is also my laptop’s Christmas wallpaper.Continue reading
You know you’ve got a chuckle fest on your hands when an EP opens with samples from Darren Aronofsky’s movie, Requiem for a Dream (just save yourself some time and watch a few baby seals being clubbed to death: same effect.) And so it proves to be the case with Resilient (Prophecy), the four-track comeback release from Black Metal happy campers Nachtmystium.Continue reading
As EPs go, this release by Birmingham doomsters Alunah is perhaps a necessary one. In the wake of their founder/head vocalist Sophie Day leaving the band last year, the need to establish her replacement, Siân Greenaway, as quickly as possible means Amber & Gold (self-released) has a purpose, if nothing else.Continue reading