Ask anyone to name their all time favourite Irish metal bands and Primordial will likely sit near the top, if not at the very summit of the list. Formed three decades ago but with roots that date back further to when they were known as Forsaken, the Dublin based act have only ever made the barest minimum of changes to their line-up over the years, their most recent move seeing them return to operating with four members after nearly twenty years as a five-piece.
The hope for a band to “return to their roots” is a phrase that has been thrown around so much in modern music, it has begun to lose its meaning. As with the roots of a tree, a band’s roots are always there, securing the foundation of their sound, no matter how many different directions it may branch out into.
When your first two albums are such bonafide classics as to not only launch you to rock fame but also firmly establish your sound and style in everyone’s conscience, it can be difficult to find the space to grow amongst the weeds and weight of expectation, particularly when your third album saw some of the earnestness and depth not quite sacrificed at the altar of “the commercial gamble” (one that paid off, whether or not you choose to blame it on the Boom Boom), but tempered in exchange for slick, rock arena fillers.
It has been six years since we last saw new material from Chris Grigg’s Black Metal outfit Woe, and on a global scale it has certainly been an eventful and ultimately catastrophic time in which humanity seems consciously hell-bent on self-destruction and that of the world itself. It is pretty easy to see therefore just where Grigg’s inspiration comes from in the overarching narrative of Legacies of Frailty (Vendetta Records), an album that holds the anguish of such at its forefront alongside a sound of striking ferocity.
A decade back, Heart of a Coward were one of the rising stars in the UK metal scene, having just released their second album Severance. The band were looked on to be the next big thing when it came to metalcore, and when they followed that up with the highly acclaimed Deliverance, these previous assertions felt cemented in. Alongside their peers in Architects, Bury Tomorrow and While She Sleeps, the stage was set for Heart of a Coward to join the ranks part of this leading new class.
Most of the world is oblivious to the fact nuclear war is closer to reality now than it was during the Cold War. Thus the increasing need for music that taps into the subconscious to remind us of the grim future looming. 3TEETH’s fourth album “EndEx” (Century Media) has all the End Times anxiety you want. The Los Angeles-based band remains consistent in their sonic vision. They work off of industrial strength grooves to pump the lifeblood of their sound to these songs.
Having reviewed Grave Pleasures‘ Plagueboys for Ghost Cult earlier this year, as a Mat McNerney fan I was excited to see he had another record out, this time via his folk-orientated project Hexvessel.
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).
When legendary New York Hardcore band Earth Crisis temporarily went their separate ways in 2001 Freya was born, formed by three members of EC, bassist Ian Edwards, guitarist Eric Edwards and vocalist Karl Buechner. Named of course after the Norse goddess, Freya picked right up where Earth Crisis left off and have released a plethora of music over the last two decades, blending their Hardcore roots with a good dollop of Thrash Metal, while often using mythology as a basis for their lyrical content.
Well into a decade now, Seattle, Washington’s Great Falls have perhaps been an underrated entity, but they certainly are a special one. Their sound embraces the arena around noise rock and post-hardcore, and they have proven to be a strongly emotive force. Some changes in personnel and a previous EP release in Funny What Survives created high expectations about a long-awaited follow-up album, if not quite preparing anyone for how quite distressing it would prove to be.