Top Picks
Unearth – The Wretched; The Ruinous (metalcore, melodeath thrash)
Unearth are the Testament of the NWOAHM/metalcore movement, which is to say that, while they may not have enjoyed the same level of commercial success as some of their peers, they've remained heavier, better and more consistent than pretty much anyone else in their given genre. Like Testament, Unearth's more recent material also ranks among their best. Ir received a mixed response upon release and doesn't seem to be held in particularly high regard by the band themselves, but 2014's Watchers of Rule is undoubtedly their best album to date; an absolute powerhouse of an album that stands out as a recent genre highlight as well as the pinnacle of Unearth's already impressive catalogue. It's follow-up, Extinction(s) dropped much of watchers more frantic and technical thrash approach for a punishing, overtly Will Putney-fied deatchore style, and although certainly a solid release in and of itself, it failed to live up to the lofty benchmark set by its predecessor (call it Unearth's Dark Roots of Earth if you will). The Wretched; The Ruinous, on the other hand, picks up where Watchers of Rule left off, delivering another late career standout containing some of the best and most dynamic material the Boston bruisers have ever concocted,
The Wretched; The Ruinous brings together everything that ever made Unearth so great to begin with. The album is overflowing with turbo-charged thrash riffs, catchy choruses, memorable melodeath melodies, devastating death metal drumming and massive metalcore breakdowns. All of these elements have been accentuated throughout different stages of the band's career, but they've never been as balanced as they are here, nor matched with such memorable songwriting. Every track on The Wretched; The Ruinous boasts a vocal hook that will bore itself into your skull with all the force of the instrumentation behind it. This is easily their second best album in my eyes, and perhaps even outclasses Watcher of Rule in terms of instantaneous and memorability. Maybe I'm just a mark for this kind of thing, but an achievement like this shouldn't go unrecognised just because this type of music isn't part of the popular zeitgeist anymore. If you're someone who only know Unearth for The Oncoming Storm (2005) or In the Eyes of Fire (2006) and dropped off after that, now would a great time to jump back in and discover what you've been missing.
Countless Skies – Resonance: Live from the Studio (progressive melodeath)
I didn't really get the hype around Countless Skies previous record, Glow (2020), but these cello-infused "live in studio" reworkings have me fully converted to the cause. For those unfamilliar, what we have here is something akin to a mix of Devin Townsend and Opeth at their most expansive with the grandeosity of a band like Wilderun or even Ne Obliviscaris but with actual compositional progression, rather than bloated repetition. It makes perfect sense that these guys are named after a Be'Lakor song and, for me at least, this puts that band's more recent material to absolute shame. It's also oddly soothing. So often I've found myself pleasantly drifting off when I've put this on, only to be immediately transfixed by some of the harder hitting moments. There's a lot of masterful musicianchip and compositional intricacy to appreciate here, but—in this form at least—Countless Skies are more of a "vibes forward" proposition, and I appreciate that.