When doing reviews here at Ghost Cult, we try to keep things subjective, rather than injecting how we feel about an artist. Sometimes, when an artist becomes entrenched in your identity to the point where your friends hear said artist, it makes them think of you. This goes past the point of subjectivity and becomes more personal.
Let’s hope the Acid Bath reunion shows, bring more attention to Dax Riggs’ solo work. It’s been 13 years since his last release, and Riggs finds himself. Reigniting his songwriting magic on 7 Songs For Spiders (Fat Possum Records). This time around Dax is backed by a three-piece band of grooving Cajuns who slither through these songs with a melancholic pulse, taking things back to his darker roots. The opening track “deceiver” finds a dream-laden haze hovering over his soulful speculation. It’s almost like gospel music for someone whose acid trip has been tempered by opiates. It picks up closer to what “We Sing of Only Blood or Love” let off, though more sonically layered. His trademark croon sounds as good as ever. Continue reading
In this episode, Ghost Cult’s Tom Omsman interviews Manual Gagneaux of Zeal & Ardor! Their new album “Greif” is out now! Together they explored the origins of the style of the band, his relationship with Metal as a genre, if “avant-garde” is too pretentious a term, and the new album! Continue reading
Hailing from the Swiss city of Basel, Zeal & Ardor are an Alternative Metal act that have always well and truly had a sound of their own. Initially, a one-man studio project from the extraordinary musical architect Manuel Gagneux, Zeal & Ardor dropped into our speakers with thei debut album Devil Is Fine in 2016. Providing a highly experimental blend of Black Metal and Delta Blues, before exploring the sound further two years later with record number two – Stranger Fruit. Continue reading
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.
Fifteen unfinished chapters don’t combine to make a novel.
A New Tomorrow, the debut long-player from eclectic power-violence outfit Zulu (released via Flatspot Records), feels too much like a compendium of skeletal songs that largely fail to take off to truly work. Three of the first four tracks – the exception being the introductory ‘Africa,’ a piano and strings-infused number – start off heavy and emphatic, but they all conclude with a divergence. ‘For Sista Humphrey’ turns gospel; ‘Our Day Is Now’ descends into sound clips; and ‘Music To Driveby’ is marred by soft singing.
Twenty-five years plus into his career, Marilyn Manson continues to be an enigma, wrapped tight inside a riddle, not wishing to be fully known. By never making the same album twice with his namesake band, he continues to defy expectations, and be equally loved and hated. While his early albums are masterworks that others from the 1990s would kill to rest their reputations on. However, as the rockstar gains on years and gets further away from his early years, he has transformed into a much more interesting character than when he was freaking out pastors and scarring moms and dads.
Epic heavy gospel blues artist Zeal & Ardor has released a new single today, ‘Built on Ashes’. The track comes from his forthcoming new album, Stranger Fruit, due out on June 8th via Radicalis / MVKA. Continue reading
The snow has melted away, the evenings are brighter and lighter, and over here in the good old UK we’ve even had a couple of days without rain. suggesting the summer is well and truly on its way. So, there couldn’t be a more perfect time for Kentucky quartet Black Stone Cherry to lazily unfurl their sun-kissed sixth album Family Tree (Mascot).
Much darker in tone than its ethereal predecessor (both Century Media), The Banished Heart is no less beautiful in its execution. Where Winter would often soar, this record looks inward and deals much more heavily with personal, introspective feelings of heartbreak and loss.Continue reading