It's world 🌍 #WayneRooney Day 🍷🥂🍾🍿
#Happybirthday, 40 birthday
Wayne #Rooney is a professional football manager and former player
#HBD #bahdlex 👑🍰🎉💕🥂🍰👑✨ #Bahdlexbirthday #october #October2025 #October24 #Oct24 #footballplayer #CelebrityBirthday #birthdayboy
It's world 🌍 #FMurrayAbraham Day 🍿🍷🍾, 🎉🥂
#HappyBirthday to F. Murray Abraham!
Happy 86th birthday 🎉 #FMurrayAbraham
#HBD #bahdlex 👑🍰🎉🎈💕🥂🍰👑✨ #Bahdlexbirthday #october #October2025 #October24 #Oct24 #bahdlex #birthdayvibes #CelebrityBirthday #birthdayboy
#VoteTheBejaysusOutOfTthem 💚✨✊
#galwayforcatherine #gaillimhdochatherine #CatherineConnollyForPresident
Record(s) o’ the Month – October 2024
By Steel Druhm
Mere weeks remain before the big holiday events befall us. Of course, I’m speaking about the AMG Listurnalia, but yeah, Christmas, Hanukkah, and New Year’s are coming too. Before these festive occasions distract us, we must churn out several belated Record(s) o’ the Month features because running them in 2025 would be really tacky. And so we come to the now distant month of October and the fruits it bore us. Eat well, but save room for figgy pudding!
Finnish atmo-disso-death act1 Devenial Verdict greatly impressed parts of the AMG staff back in 2022 with their Ash Blind debut. It had a rich sound that created sweeping vistas with grim but epic atmospheres. Coming into 2024, their follow-up was eagerly anticipated and great expectations were cultivated. Blessing of Despair—released October 4th from Transcending Obscurity Records [buy it on Bandcamp!]—could easily have been a letdown but it equaled and possibly exceeded its predecessor. Moody, ominous, relentlessly dark, but with moments of real beauty, Blessing is extremely well crafted. It’s also a very diverse record with peaks and valleys of extremity and emotion.2 The quiet, introspective moments aren’t all that far removed from Opeth, but when the hammer comes down, it hits hard. As Thus Spoke ably summed up, “Being consistently this strong is no mean feat. Anticipation rewarded with this catharsis of forward-thinking, stellar atmospheric death metal is a blessing.” Bless us all, every one.
Runner(s) Up:
Blood Incantation // Absolute Elsewhere [October 4th, 2024 | Century Media Records | Bandcamp] — Blood Incantation’s brand of progressive death metal has long divided death metal fans. Their latest oddball opus may not have done much to unify opinions, but Absolute Elsewhere is a fascinating collection of odds and sods nonetheless. While Blood Incantation toyed with synth soundscapes in the past, they go all in here, smashing familiar death metal tropes headlong into Pink Floydian progressive rock, electronica, synth wave, and ambient noodling. This blend takes time to absorb and process, and those looking for a caveman beatdown will be sorely disappointed. Often funky and sometimes clunky, it doesn’t always work, but in the end, Absolute Elsewhere is a big statement on the boundaries of progressive death metal. Our man Saunders put it all in perspective this way: “A true headphones album to get lost in, Absolute Elsewhere feels like a death metal love letter to prog nerds.” In a nutshell: NERDS!
Iotunn // Kinship [October 25th, 2024 | Metal Blade | Bandcamp] — This here blog has a long and shameful obsession with Jón Aldará and his various projects.3 We lavish praise on all of them and generally embarrass ourselves in the process. With a new outing by his Iotunn entity upon us, why should we regain our dignity now? Their proggy melodeath formula remains strong and Kinship shows off Aldará’s considerable vocal talents as expected. Long songs deliver bombastic fare with exhilarating highs and lows, taking the listener across the star-ways to witness strange sights. Balancing heaviness and beauty, Iotunn cleverly tinkers with moods while offering surprising twists and turns. A well-impressed GardensTale expressed that Kinship “combines a deeply compelling sense of melody with fluid, progressive songwriting and an overwhelming sense of grandeur that nonetheless evades pretentiousness.” We wish we knew how to quit you, Aldará.
#2024 #AbsoluteElsewhere #BlessingOfDespair #BloodIncantation #DevenialVerdict #Iotunn #Kinship #Oct24 #RecordSOTheMonth
Deathrite – Flames Licking Fever Review
By Alekhines Gun
Written By: Nameless_N00b_85
Sometimes it’s not about the brutality or the speed, it’s about the pizzazz. German band Deathrite began life as OSDM worship in 2010, before attempting to make their own mark by incorporating more punk riff simplicity and black metal atmospheres into one vile brew. Now, they stand poised to deliver their fifth outing, the oddly titled Flames Licking Fever, and the idea of such a trifecta of sounds certainly tickles the earballs. Do the ingredients come together in a potable stew, or should these flavors remain separated from each other for good?
Flames Licking Fever is drowning in atmosphere which lends it a clear auditory identity, and any one song, chosen at random, would convince you that you’d stumbled on something special. The slightly reverbed vocals and spaced instruments give it a flavor adjacent to the Icelandic black metal scene, particularly Svartidauði. This gives the more punk-flavored riffs an engaging auditory palate, particularly in the stuttering echoes and classic rock-tinged twang of “Gallows Trail.” Solos, when present, are engaging and enjoyably shreddy and vocalist Tony Heinrich howls with a more clean, thrash-oriented tone, which is well-suited to the echoing nature of the production. The whole package makes for excellent background music while cleaning or spending time with friends with its accessible tones, mid-paced chugs and gentle echoes, and if that sounds like a good time for you, this might be up your alley.
If you, however, think “excellent background music” is damning with faint praise, you are right on the money, as Flames Licking Fever is catastrophically boring. The entire compositional backbone of Deathrite consists of taking the more mid-paced heft of Mammoth Grinder or Genocide Pact and riding simplistic grooves well past their expiration point. Every song here except “Misanthropic Rush” is played at the same “brisk walk with a loved one” tempo, with minimal variations of bpm or rhythmic progression to keep things interesting. Opener “Crippled Ego” briefly deceives with its almost industrial-like intro of blast beats and cold, computer-like guitar tones, but this, alas, turns out to be one of the very few moments of energy in an otherwise morose presentation. From time to time a tired, trem-lead rears its head, but is invariably swallowed up in the atmosphere of the album due to its exhausted-sounding, bleary pace.
It doesn’t help that compositionally, Flames Licking Fever has precisely two tricks to keep the listener engaged: the occasional time signature shift, and an almost Beethoven-esque affection for trills. Making the strange track sequencing/compositional choice to end a song with a slow, boring chug or riff, only to open the very next song with an equally boring chug or riff, Deathrite compensate by attempting to trick the listener into thinking something interesting is about to happen by deftly switching from a 2/4 to a 3/4 time (“Flames Licking Fever,” “Bottomless Graves”), and crescendoing just a bit. Alas, each of these builds invariably return to more boring riffs. The riffs themselves are often punctuated by trills, most egregiously in “A Slave to a Poisoned Soul”, which neatly divide measures without adding anything to the overall composition. Eventually, the listener realizes this is the only musical flourish waiting for his ears, and the trills wear as thin as the riffs themselves. There’s certainly nothing wrong with time signature changes or trills, and many bands use them to great effect. However, the abominable simplicity of Deathrite’s toolkit only exacerbates the equally abominable simplicity of their riffcraft.
Like a water balloon being tossed at a brick wall, Flames Licking Fever comes and goes into our lives without leaving any real impact. There is no standout moment here; no particularly great riff, no song worth rewinding over, no air guitar-inducing enthusiasm or grunt-along-in-the-shower vocal phrasing, and beyond the excellent artwork, certainly no pizzazz. There is instead a collection of mid-paced, okay-caliber death adjacent punk riffs. Other than their efforts at a “grand finale” of a closing track, you could even consume the album on shuffle and not dramatically change the listening experience. If you need something peaceful to enjoy while doing your dishes or unwinding after a hard day at work, you might have found a winner here—otherwise there isn’t anything recommending this album over the rest of this year’s releases.
Rating: 1.5/5.0
DR: 8 | Format Reviewed: 320 kb/s mp3
Label: Into Endless Chaos Records
Websites: deathrite.bandcamp.com | de-de.facebook.com/deathrite666
Releases Worldwide: October 18th, 2024
#15 #2024 #Beethoven #BlackMetal #DeathMetal #Deathrite #FlamesLickingFever #GenocidePact #GermanMetal #IntoEndlessChaosRecords #MammothGrinder #Oct24 #OSDM #Punk #Review #Reviews #Svartidauði
Veonity – The Final Element Review
By Steel Druhm
Written by: Nameless_N00b_90
Do you believe power metal has become “too soft and synth-based?”1 Then Veonity has the solution for you—their sixth full-length album, The Final Element. These Swedes have been offering up their brand of late ‘90s power metal since 2013.2 And in 2020 Twelve covered their fourth album, Sorrows, noting that it was “a solid and enjoyable slab of power metal.” Veonity has undergone some crucial changes since they last graced these hallowed halls, notably the addition of vocalist Isak Stenvall (Lancer), which allows former vocalist Anders Sköld to focus solely on guitar. With the extra firepower that Stenvall provides, Veonity hopes to get you pumped up for their epic saga of power metal anthems.
The Final Element tells an epic fantasy tale, and the focus on narrative drives the album’s tone. Much of the story has the protagonist overcoming an obstacle or finding success, and the rousing music mirrors these themes. There’s a joyful mood reminiscent of what Fellowship plays on The Saberlight Chronicles. Some of these good feelings come from guitar riffs playing high, uplifting notes (“Carry On”, “Heart of a Warrior”). Stenvall is the main driver of these good feelings, though. He sings with such gusto on “Chains of Tyranny” that you can’t help but feel your spirit soar with the cry “Together we’ll break the chains of tyranny.”3 While Veonity isn’t billed as a Christian act, Christian imagery dominates much of The Final Element, which explains why Stenvall sounds so blissful relaying “My sacrifice will fulfill my destiny” and later invoking a Christ-like figure who will “Forgive all… sins” (“The Fifth Element”). He sounds downright angelic as the album reaches its conclusion, and he’s eventually backed by a choir that evokes the pearly gates of heaven.
The introduction of Stenvall as lead vocalist brings a significant change to Veonity’s sound. While Stenvall lacks Sköld’s vocal diversity, he’s a much better singer. His higher register is reminiscent of Fellowship’s Matthew Corry,4 and it brings a bouncy lightness to The Final Element. It’s not just the singing that’s improved, but Sköld and Samuel Lundström’s guitar work feels more energetic. They often let loose with furious shredding à la Dragonforce, setting a stirring tone early on and keeping a rollicking melody to accent Stenvall’s singing. Joel Kollberg’s double-kick drumming has some serious punch, turning your head into a speed bag when the pace grows frenetic. The bass (Kristoffer Lidre) sadly gets lost in the mix, but it sometimes rears its groovy head, like early in “Warrior’s Code.” Outside of the synths in the brief intro track, this is no-frills, meat ‘n’ taters power metal.
Veonity relies heavily on traditional song structures. It’s as though they’ve studied Songcraft 101 in as much depth as I’ve had to study Angry Metal Guy’s Guide to Not Sucking Anymore.5 All songs follow a classic (if formulaic) intro, verse, chorus, bridge, and finally, the chorus repeated a whole bunch. Writing within a time-tested formula isn’t necessarily bad, but it does put some constraints on the music. For one, Veonity heavily reins in their solos during the bridge, and while this helps fend off bloat, I miss the extended wankery that noted wanksters Ascension and Dragonforce employ. Cutting at least one rendition of the chorus in favor of lengthier solos would help the songs feel less repetitive. However, The Final Element has plenty of catchy choruses, and the use of a repetitive formula builds stronger anticipation when the songs hit their peaks. Writing within rigid structures also keeps the album nice and tight at 44 minutes.
At the conclusion of his review of Sorrows, Twelve wrote that “Veonity have a lot to offer the wonderful world of power metal.” Four years later, that’s even more true. Veonity has successfully revitalized its sound with fast and furious energy, vigorous guitar solos, and a fresh vocalist. The Final Element proves that you can stick to the moist bread-and-butter basics and still have a good time. Veonity may not top the masters of joyous power metal, but at least they give impatient Fellowship fans something to tide them over until The Skies above Eternity drops in late November.6
Rating: 3.5/5.0
DR: 5 | Format Reviewed: 256 kb/s CBR MP3
Label: Scarlet Records | Bandcamp
Websites: veonity.com
Releases Worldwide: October 18, 2024
#2024 #35 #Ascension #DragonForce #Fellowship #ItalianMetal #Oct24 #PowerMetal #Review #Reviews #ScarletRecords #TheFinalElement #Veonity
By Ferox
Written by: Nameless_N00b_89
Deivos is probably not the band you think of first when it comes to the vibrant Polish death metal scene. Vader? Sure. Behemoth?? Of course! Decapitated?! Absolutely–Winds of Creation is one of the best death metal debuts on record. I was surprised, then, to discover that Deivos has also stalked the scene for over 25 years, starting in 1997–and that Apophenia is the band’s seventh album since debuting Emanation from Below in 2006. Deivos is not a stranger to AMG, however. The mighty and missed Kronos reviewed their 2015 release, Theodicy, with little to say about any positive aspect of the album. Amply warned, and with six previous efforts from which to draw comparisons, I dove into Deivos’ catalog to see if Apophenia signaled a sign of evolution.
Deivos plays a form of death metal rife with rote brutality, which might explain their tenured anonymity. Tomasz Kołcoń’s and Piotr Bajus’ combined guitar assault, which drinks from the fount of headless brethren Decapitated, provides the requisite palm-muted chugs, infernally speedy riffs, frenetic soloing and squeaky pinch harmonics to warrant Deivos’ genre tag. Hubert Banach’s brutally gruff growls channel his inner Corpsegrinder effectively, while Stadnicki’s bass lurks beneath, surfacing with Obscura-like, low-end melodicism. Both complement the capable drum work of Krzysztof Saran, who blasts, bashes, and crashes his way through the nine tracks. While Apophenia doesn’t push the envelope or test any boundaries, there are some interesting glimmers within.
Deivos differentiate themselves by employing a sonic anomaly—the cowbell. No genre staple, this quirky bit of percussion features prominently on “Maelstrom of Decay” yet never disappears entirely, popping up here (“My Sacrifice”) and there (“Revelations,” “Persecutor”) throughout Apophenia. It’s an endearing aspect of the Deivos sound. The guitar work on opener “Feretory” sounds like an inverted take on Brodequin’s main riff from “Diabolical Edict” and makes for a compelling listen. At the same time, the bendy riff work, echoey solos, and background synths give “Sermon of Hypocrisy” a Morbid Angel feel. All things coalesce on the title track, “Apophenia,” with its sludgy, crunchy mid-section brutally bookended by pounding riffs, crushing drums, bestial vocals and two of the album’s better solos, which shred-fully shepherd the track through its pace changes.
If death metal was made of moist dough, Deivos would be the tool that cuts the cookies. Their career-encompassing aversion to adaptation and strict adherence to formula casts an “All-these-albums-sound-the-same” shadow on the catalog. Long-form songwriting is not where Deivos shines, but even when honing compositions within their three-to-five-minute wheelhouse, Deivos struggles to provide satisfying song arcs. Lackluster solos that feel tacked on (“My Sacrifice,” “De Materia Turpi”) or do nothing to move the song forward (“The Great Day of His Wrath”) further frustrate. Writing solid finishes is also something Deivos wrestles with. Tracks with abrupt endings conjure strong ‘this-seems-unresolved’ feelings (“Maelstrom of Decay,” “My Sacrifice”). At the same time, several tracks lean on the dreaded ambiently industrial outro to bring resolution (“De Materia Turpi,” “The Great Day of His Wrath,” “Persecutor”). These outros are my biggest nit to pick, not only because they take up two of the scant thirty-three minutes of the album but because they murder much of Apophenia’s momentum in the process.
Diehard Deivos fans may crown Apophenia as the band’s masterwork, and they might even be correct based on everything I’ve listened to. Deivos has certainly upped their game on Apophenia, even incorporating Lewandowski’s fantastic Angel of Death III painting as the cover art. Ironically, this decision aesthetically fits those pesky outros more than the band’s music, which still delivers a tight, brutally performed death metal package, rote as it may be. While I probably won’t return to it after I’m done here, I appreciated my time with Apophenia. I certainly enjoyed this more than Kronos did Theodicy. Two things I’d impart to Deivos: drop the superfluous industrial ambiance and, per the wise words of Christopher Walken, “I gotta have MOAR cowbell, baby!”
Rating: 2.5/5.0
DR: 7 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps mp3
Label: Selfmadegod Records
Website: deivos.bandcamp.com|facebook.com/Deivos
Releases Worldwide: October 18, 2024
#25 #2024 #Apophenia #Behemoth #Brodequin #DeathMetal #Decapitated #Deivos #MOARCowbell #MorbidAngel #Obscura #Oct24 #PolishMetal #SelfmadegodRecords #Vader
Blackevil – Praise the Communion Fire for the Unhallowed Sacrament Review
By Felagund
I’ve long been a fan of blackened speed (speedened black?1) metal, with some of my favorite releases over the past few years falling into this most ferocious of subgenres. Bavaria’s own Blackevil scratched that specific itch with their sophomore effort Forever Baptised in Eternal Fire back in 2020. Thankfully, the mighty Holdeneye’s flowery prose perfectly captured my feelings about that record, and I’ve spent many an hour since then spinning that blasphemous little bundle of joy. This go-round, Holdy was gracious enough to offer me the opportunity to review Blackevil’s third release, the succinctly titled Praise the Communion Fire for the Unhallowed Sacrament. While I can’t be sure, I’m convinced I’m only writing this because our resident beefcake is busy bulking in anticipation of his winter hibernation. But I’m not one to look a gift blackened-speed-metal-album in the mouth!
For the uninitiated, Blackevil churns out a potent blend of melodic black metal and savage speed metal, interspersed with glimmering veins of thrash and traditional heavy metal for good measure. There are Iron Maiden-inspired gallops and searing solos, a crispy char of tremolos and blast beats, and a thick layer of blackened melody, with plenty of infernal shrieks to spare. But what’s perhaps most notable about their latest outing is just how much speed metal Blackevil have excised from the sound, opting instead for increasingly epic, mid-paced arrangements. This change more than any other sets Praise the Communion Fire for the Unhallowed Sacrament apart from Forever Baptised in Eternal Fire, and it’s a creative decision that has a dramatic impact on the entire album as a result.
Praise the Communion Fire for the Unhallowed Sacrament kicks off with “Timeless Throne,” a workhorse of an opening track if there ever was one, setting the tone for what ends up being a pretty consistent release. “Timeless Throne” boasts decent riffs, a reliably impressive vocal performance by frontman and bassist Abyss, and an overall approach that is neither flashy nor bold, but serves as an effective introduction to Blackevil’s sulfurous waters. The remaining six tracks each possess their own attention-grabbing characteristics, even if they are all variations of a theme. There are the pugnacious, harder-edged tracks with just the right amount of pummeling speed (“Divine Forces,” “The Gladiator”), mixed in between the more atmospheric tunes that prize mood over ferocity (“Beneath this Pentagram,” “Praise the Fire for the Sacrament”). These tonal shifts notwithstanding, it’s very clear that Blackevil is intent on streamlining their sound this time, and it’s a gutsy gamble that doesn’t always pay off.
This new streamlined sound is perhaps best embodied in Praise the Communion Fire for the Unhallowed Sacrament’s closing track “Towards the Carpathian Winter Battle,” a title Abbath is already kicking himself for not using. This nearly 11-minute behemoth features moody orchestration, trudging riffs, acoustics, and a build that never quite delivers. It’s a well-constructed, well-performed piece of music that nevertheless overstays its welcome while also lacking much of the essential dynamism that made Blackevil’s second album such an idolatrous joy to behold. It seems that in their eagerness to grow beyond the confines established by Forever Baptised in Eternal Fire, the band cast off much of the energy and immediacy that first set them apart. The feeling of homogeneity is further pronounced due to some unfortunate bloat. While this album and Forever Baptised in Eternal Fire both clock in at about 45 minutes, Praise the Communion Fire for the Unhallowed Sacrament is two tracks shorter. The result is a significantly weaker musical approach that can’t quite support the weight of longer songs.
If my criticisms seem unduly harsh, it’s important to mention that Praise the Communion Fire for the Unhallowed Sacrament remains an enjoyable, albeit flawed, listen (spin the penultimate track “Unknown Hands” if you don’t believe me). Because I know how capable Blackevil is of delivering the goods, I come away more frustrated than anything with this new musical direction. While I can’t fault a band for attempting to grow creatively, it’s unfortunate that in doing so, Blackevil felt the need to jettison so much of what made the band unique. Is the sound on Praise the Communion Fire for the Unhallowed Sacrament so dramatically different from Forever Baptised in Eternal Fire? On its face, no. But what was eliminated I’d deem essential, and dolling out a rating without considering that context seems borderline sacrilegious. May Holdeneye forgive me.
Rating: 2.5/5.0
DR: 7 | Format Reviewed: 320 kb/s mp3
Label: Dying Victims Productions
Websites: dyingvictimsproductions.bandcamp.com | instagram.com/blackevilmetal
Releases Worldwide: October 25th, 2024
#25 #2024 #Abbath #BavarianMetal #BlackMetal #Blackevil #DyingVictimsProductions #IronMaiden #Oct24 #PraiseTheCommunionFireForTheUnhallowedSacrament #Review #Reviews #SpeedMetal
Sleepless – Through Endless Black Review
By Dolphin Whisperer
Bands who seek to echo heavy metal’s past walk a fine line between regressive repetition and studied homage. Consequently, in a world where source material for these sounds spans the course of decades, the tag indicating this new wave of traditional heavy metal remains wide in scope. Motorcycles? Loin cloths? Swords and dragons? What shall the recipe of hairy-chested riffs and wailing mic blowouts spell? In examining Oregon-based Sleepless’ sophomore outing, Through Endless Black, it’s at least clear that two things are true: the power of riffs indeed compels this collection to rock, and an urgent vocal identity fills its chest proudly. But the question still looms around what brand of traditional showmanship Sleepless displays.
Whether Sleepless knows it or not, their sound on Through Endless Black plays close to the weird power-leaning doom of the ’90s Swedish underground in its manner of rockin’ trad riffs that swing to crawling, soaring choruses. We talk about a lot of things around the water cooler at Casa AMG1, and though many of us don’t see eye-to-eye on the world at large, at least the great Steel and I can agree on one thing: too many bands ignore the potential to copy peak Tad Morose. Determined to set my heart aflutter, melodic leads that drop into heavyweight drags scattered throughout Through Endless Black recalls both the slower cuts of Tad Morose or the more traditional gallop of the similar-minded Memory Garden. Main mind Kevin Hahn, holding chops both in the grip of a traditional axe and tastefully reverbed mic, has spent a lot of time both on the cover band circuit2 and at the engineer’s seat, so I’m not sure that exactly his aim with Sleepless. But different paths can always lead to similar results.
Except not every track across Through Endless Black reeks of that same stench of doomy power, with Hahn’s vocal prowess serving equally as blight and boon. Simple and fluffy rock riffs, the kind that present themselves in the AOR-assisted jams of cruise groove like Fifth Angel, already pull attention away from muscular crushes at the least effective moments (“Cult of the Narcissist,” “Lessons in Tongues”). And in these same gentler excursions, Hahn’s clear and breathy tenor aids further in distancing his performance from the subtle grit and chesty bellow that he displays in horn-raising, fist-pumping amp-shakers (“Consumed by Vengeance,” “Dreams of Mortal Ruin”). Hahn has amazing range, and an incredible ability to lay down harmonized solos in a big Scorpions way, but it really does feel like he’s packing too many contrasting ideas into Sleepless.
However, many of Sleepless’ ’80s and ’90s traditional genre worship excursions come across in a more flattering manner. The best cuts across Through Endless Black lead with refrains drenched in guitar drama, dark synth play, and full volume chord swells, all resolving in well-framed choruses (“Call to the Void,” “Where Fear Lives,” “Dreams…”). And slipping well into the sleaze and heavy metal fervor of the grand and gruff W.A.S.P., Hahn loads an extra venom and swagger into his barking verse work and sliding wails (“Exist Another Day,” “Transcending the Obsidian Throne”), even landing in a ripe pseudo-ballad cheese with the opening chime and croon of “Lost Star.” The supporting rhythm tones aren’t quite what one would expect in this lane, relying less on spacious chords and reverb, and more on compressed guitar crackle and a low-end lurch, but that at least helps pull Sleepless away from pure homage and into foraging a sound in reverence.
Despite the success that Sleepless finds throughout Through Endless Black, a certain lack of wildness—of rugged bravado—holds it back from turning its glory into grandiosity. Steeped in studied sounds, Sleepless never feels wanting in execution. Though some of that same polish leads Through Endless Black to engorge with a textbook battlefield vigor, that same educational approach does not lead to many surprises and allows the lesser sputters present to pull down the total experience. I do have high hopes for Sleepless though, as a sophomore cobbling of this quality shows, potential, promise, and perhaps a sword simply too deep in its sheath.
Rating: 2.5/5.0
DR: 8 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps mp3
Label: Metal Warrior Records
Websites: sleeplessmetal.bandcamp.com | facebook.com/sleepless
Releases Worldwide: October 31st, 2024
#25 #2024 #AmericanMetal #FifthAngel #HeavyMetal #MemoryGarden #Oct24 #ProgPower #ProgressiveMetal #Review #Reviews #Scorpions #Sleepless #TadMorose #ThroughEndlessBlack #WASP_
Blasphemous – To Lay Siege and Conquer Review
By Alekhines Gun
Have you ever looked back on the grander, moister bands of yore and thought “Man, I sure do wish Immortal and Angelcorpse did an album together”? That’s okay, neither have I—apparently we have no imagination. Luckily, New Jersey blackened death outfit Blasphemous is prepared to uncork its fourth album, To Lay Siege and Conquer to show us what we’ve been missing. After releasing a pair of albums before breaking up in 2013, Blasphemous reformed with a refreshed lineup for 2018’s Emerging Through Fire, an album that seemed poised to make serious waves in the underground before a certain disease strolled up and ruined things for everybody. Fortunately, band founder/vocalist RK managed to keep the group together through the pandemic and got back to writing, and you can be assured the perpetuated lineup has paid serious dividends.
The first thing that caught the ear’s attention was how much better To Lay Siege and Conquer sounds than its predecessor. Whether by artistic intent or budgetary limitations, Emerging Through Fire had a much more raw, tinny, and thin approach, emphasizing the blacker half of the band’s sound at the cost of weight and power. To Lay Siege and Conquer has no such problems, crushing the listener with a modern productional heft worthy of Watain or Decrepit Birth and giving it the power of modern death without sacrificing an ounce of its blacker, acid-drenched melodies. Absolutely everything here is militant and bombastic, from the abused bass rumblings (“Son of the Forsaken”) to the attacked-by-killer-bees solos (“Spiritual Enslavement,” “Martyr Complex”), to RK’s constant vocal conducting, which rides atop but never drowns out the music. His performance in particular holds the album together, sounding like a much younger, far more pissed-off Thomas Lindberg (At the Gates), and though his vocal range may be a bit limited, his pitch manages to maintain its power and clarity without ever stagnating or growing boring.
To Lay Siege and Conquer is no vocalist’s grandstanding album, however, as Blasphemous takes a SWAT team approach to songwriting, with a “get in, wreck stuff, leave” mentality. Melodies and moments rarely repeat beyond their shelf life, instead evolving gradually around their melodic theme. The album’s title track is a prime example of this, with a rolling tank of a groove uncorked by Steve Shreve and Hal Microutsicos that alternates between rapid-fire tremolos and half-time chugs while drummer Mark Vizza adjusts his blasts to a thicker barrage to compensate. The drums are arranged to punctuate shifting riffs and intensity. Mark’s toolbox doesn’t really expand beyond the “blast, gallop, and groove” trifecta, but he masterfully ebbs and flows, pulling back into tasteful cymbal tempo-keeping as easily as uncorking an expected avalanche of snare abuse under leads that range from razor-sharp blackened harmonies to vaguely eastern flair (“Curse of the Witchchrist”) To Lay Siege and Conquer doesn’t want for a variety of engaging moments.
The only real flaw facing Blasphemous is consistency. Instead of being customarily frontloaded and fizzling out, To Lay Siege and Consquer is refreshingly bookended by its highlights, with the first and last two songs being the most engaging, while the middle stretch turns into a bit of a drag. Some of the slower moments (“Dead and Still” and “Martyr Complex”) remind of the punkier sounds of Sons of Northern Darkness without ever building to any kind of climax or theme, while “Spiritual Enslavement” can’t seem to decide what flavor it wants to be, causing otherwise effective riffs to lose momentum before the song suddenly ends. Still, Blasphemous wisely errs on the side of brevity, keeping things at a lean 29 minutes, before closing the album on a note of triumph with the anthemic closer, “Neverborn.”
To Lay Siege and Conquer is an enjoyable carpet bombing of riffy,[Ah yes, who doesn’t love a good… carpet… bombing? – AMG] throwdown, brodown blackened death goodness. Lovers of the style will undoubtedly find much to enjoy here, and Blasphemous is knocking on the door of something special. Maintaining the lineup has improved its cohesion and confidence, and the production highlights the power of the performances, ensuring many of the songs will level bars across the nation when played live. Keep an eye out for their fifth album to see if they can unlock the next gear in their compositional skills, and for now, enjoy laying siege to your neighbors.
Rating: 3.0/5.0
DR: 7 | Format Reviewed: mp3
Label: Adirondack Black Mass
Websites: blasphemousphilly.bandcamp.com | facebook.com/blasphemousmetal
Releases Worldwide: October 25th, 2024
#2024 #30 #AdirondackBlackMass #AmericanMetal #Angelcorpse #BlackMetal #BlackenedDeathMetal #Blasphemous #DeathMetal #DecrepitBirth #Immortal #Oct24 #Review #Reviews #ToLaySiegeAndConquer #Watain
Bahdlex
Claire McNab
Angry Metal Guy
