Top Picks
Frozen Crown – War Hearts (shreddy power metal)
Why have just two guitarists, when you can have three?!?! Iron Maiden might not made the best case with the addition/retention of Janick Gers but, with War Hearts, triple-headed Italian power metal outfit Frozen Crown make a compelling argument that more is always more!
The band draw heavily upon the strain of hypermelodic, overblown power metal made popular by the likes of Dragonforce and Hammerfall in the early 2000s, to about as successful a result as anyone else that's taken on that particular style since then. Although the Italian battalion have been around for a while, the recent additions of shredmaidens Fabiola Bellomo and Alessia Lanzone to their ranks has helped kick proceedings into serious overdrive, while the added smattering of symphonics and their thunderous thrash metal core ensures their strikes are honed for maximum lethality.
If you buy into War Hearts' overblown premise, then there really isn't that much to complain about. Giada Etro's vocals, while perfectly sold, somewhat lack the extremity and theatrical flair of the surrounding instruments, and the cover art is in serious need of an overhaul, but that's about it. The album's excesses start at a 10 and only escalate from there, and there are two weaker tracks in the middle—"On Silver Wings" and "Edge of Reality"—that perhaps could have been cut to help curb and exhaustion that might be incurred from its unrelenting assault. But if you can stomach stuff like Oranssi Pazuzu then you should be able to handle War Hearts in all its glory, and if you can't then you might just need to grow a pair. ...or three.
Seeds of Mary – Love (progressive grunge-metal????)
I don't know if Love is necessarily the best album released this week, but it's probably the most interesting. The combination of band name and album title—not to mention the burning, cheetah-print heart on its cover—are heavily suggestive of some seriously hairy glam metal content. Upon pressing play, however, I was greeted with some off-kilter, alt-leaning prog metal that reminded me of the following artists: Alice in Chains, Maylene and the Sons of Disaster, doom metal, matchore, Zao, Stone Temple Pilots, drum and bass, sludgy Pantera, Radiohead, Muse, Pink Floyd, mariachi, Mastodon, Gojira, Leprous, rap-metal and Moon Unit. That last one is perhaps most representative of the album overall, albeit with that band's irreverent, nu metal flair replaced with a sludgy grunge-metal style that isn't that far away from what Jerry Cantrell is serving up below, and which only becomes more prominent as the album progresses. My first encounter was baffling and—several listens later—I still don't know exactly what to make of it all, but I'm certainly intrigued.
Release Roundup
Aethyrick/Marras – A Union Of Spectres Split (black metal)
Aggresion – Covil de Feras (black thrash)
American Football – American Football (Covers) (indie rock, covers)
Apex Fallen – Sum Of It All (nu tech-metal?)
Aries Descendant – From The Ashes Of Deceit (melodic/powerish metal)
The Armed – Everlasting Gaze (hyper-punk, indie rock)
Arrow Valley – Embodiment (melodic prog-metal)
Ashen Tomb – Ecstatic Death Reign (death metal)
Astral Doors – The End Of It All (power metal)
Black Elephant – The Fall Of The Gods (fuzz rock)
Black Pus – Terrestrial Seethings (weird eletro-rock)
Bon Iver – SABLE (boring/indie folk)
Bonjour Tristesse – The World Without Us (black metal)
Camos – Hide From The Light (black/speed metal)
Capilla Ardiente – Where Gods Live And Men Die (shitty doom-metal)
Carnosus – Wormtales (progressive death metal, melodeath)
Chrysalid – Breaking The Chains (heavy/power metal)
Common Wounds – All Night Blood (post-hardcore)
Contrition – Pariahs (blackgrind)
Cortez – Thieves And Charlatans (stoner rock/doom)
Crest Of Darkness – My Ghost (black metal)
Cursed Cemetery – Magma Transmigration (blackened death-doom)
Dawnwalker – The Unknowing (posty prog-rock)
Dea Velata – Dea Velata (symphonic metal)
Dead Posey – Are You In A Cult? (goth rock/punk)
Deathrite – Flames Licking Fever (crossoverish/crusty black metal)
Deivos – Apophenia (noisy/brutal disso-death)
Deserts Of Mars – Dead Planet Exodus (stoner-doom)
DGM – Endless (prog metal)
Disentomb – Nothing Above (brutal/dissonant death metal)
Ensiferum – Winter Storm (power metal)
Fate – Reconnect N’ Ignite (melodic/prog metal)
Feral – To Usurp The Thrones (deathgrind)
Five The Hierophant – Apeiron (progressive sax-doom)
Forn – Repercussions Of The Self (weird/noise-doom)
Frost* – Life In The Wires (mathy prog-rock/metal)
Funeral – Gospel Of Bones (symphonic/funeral doom)
Ghostheart Nebula – Blackshift (gothic/funeral doom)
Gorebringer – Condemned to Suffer (blackish death metal, melodeath)
Grand Magus – Sunraven (heavy metal, power doom)
Harsh Realm – Death Carries On (death metal)
Harvestman – Triptych: Part Three (post-folk)
Hatchet – Leave No Soul (thrash)
Hell Valley High – Welcome To Hell Valley (blackened punk-doom?)
High Vis – Guided Tour (indie punk)
Holy Dragons – Ветер крепчай (heavy/power metal)
Hypertonus – Gravity Unmapped (post-rock)
The Hypothesis – Evolve (prog metal)
Immortal Bird – Sin Querencia (progressive/blackened sludge-death)
Japandroids – Fate & Alcohol (alt/indie rock)
Jerry Cantrell – I Want Blood (hard/sludgish grunge)
Jewel Throne – Blood Vultures (black thrash)
Kaivs – After The Flesh (black/death metal)
Kerretta – Angelm (post metal)
Korkvak – The Hermetic Ritual (black metal)
Kreyl – Obscure Rise Of Ancient Eulogy (black metal)
Kylie Minogue – Tension II (increasingly gay dance-pop)
Luusäkki – Luusäkki (black metal)
Maatkare – Rise To Power (melodeath)
Machine Girl – MG Ultra (drum and bass, breakcore)
MC5 – Heavy Lifting (great-grandpa garage rock)
Misanthropic Aggression – Insect Politics (blackened death-crust)
Misanthropic Aggression – Insect Politics (crust)
Mother Of Graves – The Periapt Of Absence (melodeath-doom)
Mystyc Blade – The Master Is Inside (heavy metal)
Nationwide – Echoes (melodic rock, AOR)
Never Obey Again – Trust (electro-metalcore)
Obnoxious Youth – Burning Savage (shitty/blackened speed metal)
Onslaught Kommand – Malignancy (death metal, goregrind)
Oryx – Primordial Sky (sludgy death-doom)
Ottone Pesante – Scrolls Of War (“brassmetal”)
Outworld – Way of the Samurai (industrial power metal)
Persecutory – The Glorious Persecution (blackened death metal)
Pinhead Gunpowder – Unt (alt punk)
Profane Serenity – As I Breathe for the Last Time (doom)
Psychotic Outsider – 6 (black metal)
Regicide/Bloodrust – Through Death We Reign (death metal, melodeath)
Royal Glam – Shields Ain’t Gunna Save Ya (heavy/hairiy metal)
Ruin Dweller – Apocalyptic Ruin (death metal)
Saddayah – Lila (techish death metal)
Seid – Hymns To The Norse (black metal)
Sex Messiah – Sexus-Mortem Ouroboros (sexy black metal)
Slim0 – Forgiveness (weird noise-doom/drone)
Stage Of Reality – Digital God (prog metal)
Starcrazy – Starcrazy (hardish/garage rock)
Sun & Sail Club – Shipwrecked (crossover stoner-doom?)
Swallow The Sun – Shining (gothy melodoom)
Tim Heidecker – Slipping Away (comedy? Folk)
Tribe Of Ghosts – City (groove death)
Vanik – IV (thrash)
Veonity – The Final Element (power metal)
War Dogs – Only The Stars Are Left (trad/speed metal)
Weeping – Spiritual Barbarism (brutal deathgrind)
Whispering Void – At The Sound Of The Heart (folk/chamber prog?)
Winding Road – Fill My Sails (AOR)
Winter Lantern – Hymne To A Dismal Starre (black metal)