Marissa Nadler’s 10th album, New Radiations (Sacred Bones Records), finds her stripping down to a more minimalist yet cinematic feel. It feels spacious, yep, with an intimate yearning. Her vocals are produced in a similar reverb-heavy manner. Her approach to vocals continues to expand the well-layered vocal harmonies. The harmonies are more prominent in the mix time, adding more depth in the absence of more Rock-oriented instrumentation. Continue reading
Tag Archives: music reviews
ALBUM REVIEW: Svartsot – Peregrinus
“Danish Folk Metal.” That was the promise. Svartsot delivered on the promise. Delivered splendidly. I’m not sure if Ghost Cult Magazine has a Danish-speaking reviewer on staff, because the thing’s not in English. There might be a song or two in English, but the vocals are gutteral-grunt incoherent-style Metalcore. So, after a brief discussion of the rather complicated story of this concept album about a Thirteenth Century Crusader, I’ll spend the rest of this talking about the music of Peregrinus (Mighty Music).Continue reading
ALBUM REVIEW: Blackbraid – Blackbraid III
The third chapter of Blackbraid is upon us! Blackbraid III (Self-Released ) has been released onto the world, continuing where the previous chapter ended. This installment in the series keeps all of the elements we have all come to love from Sgah’gahsowáh’s (Editor’s note: translated from Indigenous American for “The Witch Hawk”) solo project, with even more guitar leads to melt your face. A few ticks under an hour places Blackbraid III slightly shorter than its predecessor. It’s worth every minute, so keep that finger off the skip button.Continue reading
ALBUM REVIEW: Alice Cooper – The Revenge of Alice Cooper
The Revenge of Alice Cooper (earMusic) is the first album with the original Alice Cooper band since Muscle of Love. Making it the band’s 8th album together, and Cooper’s 30th. Bob Ezrin is handling production duties to help them remember what they did back in the day. It opens with the lead single “Black Mamba,” which is slinky and theatrical. Rather than try to recapture the fire that was burning when they recorded Muscle of Love, they are side-stepping this favor of touching on a more “Schools Out” style of borderline Broadway-drama mixed with the Garage Rock sound Cooper has been dipping his boots in the past few albums. Continue reading
ALBUM REVIEW: False Gods – Lost In Darkness And Distance
Long Islanders False Gods emerged in 2015 from the ashes of the well-regarded Skeletondealer! Prior releases include a trio of EP’s: 2016’s Wasteland; 2017’s Reports From Oblivion; and 2019’s The Serpent And The Ladde. Twenty-twenty’s full-length debut No Symmetry…Only Disillusion followed soon after, as did 2022’s Neurotopia and finally a 2023 split with Japan’s Abiuro. Continue reading
ALBUM REVIEW: Tar Pit – Scrying the Angel Gate
The sophomore album from Portland’s Tar Pit, Scrying the Angel Gate (Transylvanian Recordings), sets Lovecraftian themes against a style of doom that relishes the blues-based jams. An organ haunting the opening track from the back of the mix. The backbone of the song is a lumbering wall of fuzzed-out riffage. This song eventually builds the dynamic into a more metallic attack. Vocalist Don Gozalo brings an emotive howl to the songs. Unlike most doom frontmen, he is not as blatant an Ozzy disciple. This helps set their overall sound apart from their peers. Continue reading
ALBUM REVIEW: Umlaut – Désolé
Post-Mr Bungle’s dissolution in the early 2000s, Clinton “Bär” McKinnon relocated to Melbourne, Australia with stacks of material he’d written originally for the Eureka, California eccentrics. Thereafter, the formation of Umlaut followed, and a line-up that currently reads as the aforementioned McKinnon – Tenor Sax/Flute/ Clarinet/Keyboards/Guitar/Lead Vocals, Angus Leslie – Guitar/Backing Vocals/Keyboards, Bassist Shane Lieber, and recent addition Danny Heifetz (ex-Bungle) on Drums.
EP REVIEW: Phobetor – A Solitary Sigil
For Metal to feel its heaviest, it must also hold with the powerful attack of the guitar, a bleak emotional darkness to it, or it is just guitars beating your ears as fast as they can.
Phobetor has succeeded in finding the sweet spot here with their new album, A Solitary Sigil (Black Jasper Records).
ALBUM REVIEW: Scalp – Not Worthy Of Human Compassion
If the name doesn’t give it away already, Scalp is your one-stop shop for anything and everything devastating enough to rip the top of your dome clean off.Continue reading
ALBUM REVIEW: Hell – Submerus
On Submerus (Sentient Ruin Laboratories/Lower Your Head for digital), his fifth full-length from Hell, the sludge project leans into a nasty wall of downtuned rumbling. This wall of rumble is set behind the tortured screams of someone who’s more intent on losing their mind than adhering to the bounds of songwriting. It feels more like someone who create art from a dense heavy sound, that is impressive due to it’s sheer heaviness, but in consuming an album the goal would be for the music to hook you in rather than a test of endurance as to what you ears can stand at high volumes, though not to kink shame anyone who is into sonic masochism.Continue reading