Top Picks Blind Guardian – The God Machine (power metal, thrash) Blind Guardian are back, with their best album since (at least) 2006’s severely underrated A Twist in The Myth.

2 years ago

Top Picks

Blind Guardian – The God Machine (power metal, thrash)

Blind Guardian are back, with their best album since (at least) 2006’s severely underrated A Twist in The Myth. The God Machine is a huge return to form that trades in the progressive and symphonic experiments of the German titans’ last few releases for the frantic thrash of their early career. This latest release has far more in common with the band’s pre-Imaginations output than anything they’ve put out for the past two-and-a-half decades and they sound all the more re-invigorated for it.

While The God Machine lacks the storytelling scope of Blind Guardian’s classic material, or the massive melodic hooks that I still think make A Twist in The Myth a standout of their career, what they bring in absolute spades are the riffs, which (along with making the new Megadeth record look even more slack by comparison) grant the album an energy and aggression that’s been sorely lacking from their sound over the last decade. The God Machine isn’t another Nightfall in Middle Earth or Imaginations from the Other Side (and certainly no Night at the Opera), but it’s a surprisingly strong and vital offering that reminds people why Blind Guardian are widely considered the best power metal band to ever lay axe to page.

-Josh

The Callous Daoboys – Celebrity Therapist (mathcore)

One of the most anticipated releases of the year (for mathcore fans at least) is here! The follow-up to 2019’s bonkers Die On Mars takes everything great about that and makes it even better. Tighter production, tighter riffs, more experimentation, this is everything great about mathcore all in one digestible meal-replacement-size energy bar.

Tantalizing chaos abounds. The Callous Daoboys have moved beyond being a mere early-Dillinger-worship clone into a true force of their own. As frantic and unpredictable as their songwriting can be, it still manages to be impressively memorable and oddly sophisticated for a band obsessed with puns. Teeming with eclectic, infectious energy from start to finish, Celebrity Therapist is sure to challenge for the tops of many AOTY lists. Catch them on tour right now with Rolo Tomassi and Cryptodira.

See Also: Sunflo’er – all these darlings and now me (mathcore, southern hardcore)

More mathcore! This time with a good ol’ fashion southern rock ‘n roll twist.

-Trent

Release Roundup

156/SilenceNarrative (hardcore, metalcore)

Aeternam Heir of the Rising Sun (symphonic blackened death metal)

AetherWave Malevolance (metalcore, nu-metalcore)

Amongst Liars Amongst Liars (alt rock)

And Now The Owls Are Smiling Epitaph (atmospheric black metal)

Andy Gillion Arcade Metal (instrumental prog metal)

ArgashUnleash (blackened death metal)

Asylum Tyrannicide (thrash)

Blissing Stratus Towards The Lonely Wind (blackgaze, post-black)

Canyoneer You, Only To Scale (prog metal, post-metal)

Carnal Ruin Soulless I Remain (blackened death metal)

Defacing God The Resurrection Of Lilith (blackened death, melodeath)

Ensanguinate Eldritch Anatomy (blackened death thrash)

Ensanguinate Eldritch Anatomy (death metal)

Feather Mountain To Exit A Maelstrom (progressive metal)

Gallia – Obscura (symphonic power metal)

Gone Cosmic Send for a Warning, the Future’s Calling (psychedelic stoner rock)

The Great Conjuration Heads for the Dead (death metal)

The Hu Rumble Of Thunder (folk metal)

Humanic Until the Light Fakes Us (progressive death, tech death)

Imperivm Ex Mortis Gloria (death metal)

King Buffalo Regenerator (psychedelic rock)

Kings X Three Sides of One (hard rock, prog rock)

Life Of Crime Street Gospel (metallic hardcore, beatdown)

Mantic Ritual Mantic Ritual (thrash)

Megadeth The Sick, the Dying… and the Dead! (thrash, xenophobia)

Miss May I Curse Of Existence (metalcore)

Nidhög Fjord (melodic black metal, prog black)

Novelists Deja Vu (pop metalcore)

Oceans Ate Alaska Disparity (deathcore)

Pilgrim’s Dance Sonder Inc. (progressive melodeath)


Reincarnated Of Boötes Void Death Spell (atmospheric death metal, death-doom)

See Through You Hollowed Out (metallic hardcore)

Sobriquet Apotheosis (post-hardcore)

SOMA – If You See Me… (Let Me Be) (screamo)

Symbiotic – Ars Moriendi (progressive death metal)

Tau Zero – The Monolith (instrumental tech metal, progressive metal)

Trial – Feed the Fire (heavy metal)

Vermin Womb – Retaliation (grindcore)

Xenobiotic – Hate Monolith (progressive deathcore)

Youth League – Somehow Those Were Days (post-rock, midwest emo)

ZeTa – Binary Enigma (progressive death metal)

Joshua Bulleid

Published 2 years ago