It’s quite astonishing that fourteen albums and thirty-four years into their career, Goth metal act Cradle of Filth are yet to produce something that could be overwhelmingly described as poor. At the top end of the scale we’ve got classics like Dusk and Her Embrace, Cruelty and the Beast, and Midian but at the other end, it’s more a case of least best, rather than worst with not a single St. Anger in sight. Some bands barely get to release two albums without the first rumblings of discontent but while hardcore black metal fans might still turn their noses up, the fact is that Cradle is as popular now as they’ve ever been. And it’s been that way for years. Continue reading
Tag Archives: music reviews
ALBUM REVIEW: Spiritworld – Helldorado
If you believe Hardcore has little to offer outside of the fairly narrow musical alleyway it usually occupies then today might just be the perfect time to take a listen to SpiritWorld. Combining Country Music and bedazzled outfits with Punk aggression and Thrash Metal riffs, the Las Vegas act are a sight to behold and they return with a vengeance on third full-length album Helldorado (Century Media Records).
EP REVIEW: Iron Form – Cut From Cold Blood – Church Road Records
The new EP from Church Road Records artists Iron Form titled Cut From Cold Blood is a five-piece band showing off their musical influences and technical merit. Another example of a band breaking through genres by just playing what comes naturally to them in their songwriting process.Continue reading
ALBUM REVIEW: Warbringer – Wrath and Ruin
Spring is coming to the Northern Hemisphere as the temperatures start to rise. The bar for the coveted Album of the Year continues to rise as more music is released weekly. Thrash stalwarts, Warbringer, take their shot at the crown with their seventh full-length, Wrath and Ruin (Napalm Records). Each album the California-based group releases builds upon their last release, continuously pushing the boundaries of their brand of thrash metal. For forty minutes, John Kevill and company command your attention as their riff-powered tank tramples the mangled corpses of the fallen.Continue reading
ALBUM REVIEW: Combust – Belly of the Beast
New York Hardcore is one of the most stand-out hardcore scenes, and it has a who’s who list of hardcore bands. Combust is a fast-rising group in that scene that eats, sleeps, and breathes New York Hardcore, and their latest album, Belly of the Beast (Triple B Records), is another big step forward. Between the guest appearances and the memorable riffs, each track has its own story to tell and energy to expel.
ALBUM REVIEW: Kazea – I. Ancestral
Formed by two former members of Orochen (Jonas Mattsson and Rasmus Lindblom) plus Daniel Olsson of Hellsongs, Kazea have existed since 2023, and I. Ancestral (Suicide Records) is their debut album.Continue reading
EP REVIEW: Swervedriver – The World’s Fair
Swervedriver were formed in 1989 and lumped into the Shoegaze genre, alongside Lush, Chapterhouse, My Bloody Valentine, Slowdive, and fellow Oxfordians Ride. The band’s catalogue is extensive and consists of six full-length albums and eight EP’s of which The World’s Fair is the latest; the latter following up from last year’s outtakes/ demos collection Doremi Faso Latido (aka CD3 of the band’s reissued-classic-99th-Dream). The band’s somewhat sizeable catalogue is impressive even taking into account the fact that they had disbanded for a period of eight years, 1999 – 2007 with frontman Adam Franklin going on to forge an equally productive solo career under his own name as well as part of the bands Toshack Highway, Magnetic Morning and the Sophia collective. Continue reading
ALBUM REVIEW: Dawn Of Ouroboros – Bioluminescence
Continuing their trend of incorporating album titles with color-inspired themes, Blackened Progressive Death Metal outfit Dawn Of Ouroboros follows 2023’s Velvet Incandescence with the equally magnificent effort, Bioluminescence (Prosthetic Records). Continue reading
ALBUM REVIEW: Destruction – Birth Of Malice
As if the past forty years hadn’t flown by quickly enough for German thrash titans Destruction, it’s already time to move forward from the anniversary celebrations of 2023 and get back to the bread and butter of studio recordings. On their sixteenth full-length release (fifteenth if you ignore 1988’s anomalous The Least Successful Human Cannonball), Birth of Malice (Napalm Records), the band’s founder member Marcel “Schmier” Schirmer looks to the past, present, and future for inspiration, reminiscing over old times as well delivering warnings and observations of a more contemporary nature.Continue reading
ALBUM REVIEW: Avantasia – Here Be Dragons
Tobias Sammet’s Avantasia new record Here Be Dragons (Napalm Records) continues their bombastic brand of Meatloaf Metal. It is the German metal outfit’s tenth album and it is typically intense and grand in scale.Continue reading