This year’s Damnation Festival is the second since it has returned to its original home of Manchester after many years at the University of Leeds. The festival had outgrown the confines of its erstwhile venue and now takes place at Manchester’s Bowlers Exhibition Centre across three large stages. Continue reading
Invocation / Supplication (By Norse Music), the new offering from experimental cellist Jo Quail, is actually a compendium of two connected three-song cycles. The first, Invocation, features the contributions of Heilung vocalist Maria Franz, plus brass instruments, percussion, bass and a choir assembled from crowdsourced mobile phone recordings of individual syllables. Supplication, on the other hand, is a less embellished affair, with just vocals from Lorenzo Esposito Fornasari and Koen Kaptin’s trombone parts to augment Quail’s cello and sound design.
Kristin Hayter is perhaps better known by her erstwhile pseudonym Lingua Ignota, under which moniker she has released several albums that combine dark experimentalism with the influence of classical and folk music. Stating that it is “not healthy for [her] to relive [her] worst experiences over and over” through the music of her previous project, she has now recast herself as Reverend Kristin Michael Hayter, under which name her new album SAVED! (Perpetual Flame Ministries) arrives.
Death Mother (Church Road Records) is the debut full-length from Sweden’s Blodet, and it arrives after the tragic death of their guitarist Rickie Paleski-Östland, who contributed to the writing of the album. In spite of the inevitably difficult process of getting the record finished, it is nevertheless described as “cathartic”, “mesmerising”, and “alluring” by the press release which also draws comparisons to Chelsea Wolfe, Cult of Luna, and Sonic Youth.
Duncan Evans chatted with Matteo Rizzardo of Calligram! Their new album Position | Momentum is out now via Prosthetic Records! Duncan and Matteo discussed the formation of the band, the new album, what kind of “Black Metal” band they are, and more!
Satellite Aphrodite (Deathwish Inc.) is the debut album from Oklahoma’s Mad Honey, a four-piece who are variously described as dream-pop, shoegaze, indie and glitter rock (whatever that is).
ArcTanGent Festival, a yearly outdoor four-day fixture at Fernhill Farm near Bristol, attracts a devoted following to its niche yet eclectic lineups of artists who generally have an association with post-rock, progressive metal, or experimental rock. It’s “sort of” a metal festival, but the range of acts it showcases steers towards the more left-field and eccentric end of heavy music and at times stretches beyond what could reasonably even be labelled as “rock”.
Disharmonium – Nahal (Debemur Morti Productions) is the sixteenth full-length release from Blut Aus Nord, the enigmatic French avant-garde black metal band that have now existed for thirty years. Following on from last year’s Disharmonium – Undreamable Abysses, this new record also draws inspiration from H.P Lovecraft and is claimed by its accompanying press release to be “womb-like, detail-rich, disturbed and transformative”.
Singer-songwriter Ora Cogan, based in Vancouver Island, has been creating and releasing “cinematic compositions” since 2007. Her ninth album, Formless (Prism Tongue Records), presents a “bizarre sonic Venn diagram” of influences including gothic country, psychedelia, post-punk and more, according to the accompanying press release.
Jaye Jayle is effectively the solo project of Evan Patterson, and Don’t Let Your Love Life Get You Down (Pelagic Records) is his first offering since his divorce from Emma Ruth Rundle — a topic which seems to have informed both the title and the content of this new record.
