Top Pick
Poppy – Negative Spaces (stanky metalcore, electrorock/pop)
Call it the "Knocked Loose Effect", but—whether they're the cause or merely the most noticeable symptom—mainstream metal has been getting a lot heavier lately, and only flourishing because of it. Then again band's influence on Poppy has been far more direct than most, but maybe it goes both ways, seeing as she provided the standout moment on the standout track on their massive mainstream breakthrough earlier this year. Whatever the catalyst, Negative Spaces sees Poppy completely doing away with the cutesy, "lol-random" style of her earlier albums and fully leaning into the modern metal side of her sound, while also refining the dark, electro-pop style she's been inconsistently developing over her past few releases to deliver what is easily her most consistent and compelling record to date.
Negative Spaces is most remarkable for its heaviness. "They're All Around Us" and "The Centre's Falling Out" go as hard as anything off You Won't Go Before You're Supposed To (2024) or any other modern metalcore album you want to name, but it's also kept refreshing by the interjection of memorable melodies and varying styles that bring to mind the likes of Bring Me the Horizon, Deftones, Hole and even Kylie Minogue at times. I feel like a bit of a parody of myself by picking the biggest, bounciest new release as my top pick, when there are a bunch of very good and much more extreme and avant-garde-leaning albums out today as well. Then again, I'd like to see those bands come up with a song as good as "New Way Out". Lord/Xemu knows Linkin Park can't.
Release Roundup
A La Carte – Born To Entertain (techish death metal)
Acherad – The Perpetual Katabasis (black metal
Acid Hags – Tempora Matantur (Oranssi Pazuzu at home)
Alkymist – UnnDerr (doomy black metal)
Apocalypse – Pandæmonium (deathy/doom/trad/viking metal)
Apocryphal – Facing The End (modern/melodic metal)
Aptorian Demon – Liv Tar Slutt (black metal)
Arkenath – Arkenath (brutal death metal)
Aversion – Futile Attempts To Reach The Light (posty mellowdoom)
Bayway – Bayway Takes Manhattan (hardcore, rap metal)
Black Widow Killers – The Soulless (weird/shitty metal)
Burial Oath – The Cycles Of Suffering (black metal)
Chelsea Wolfe – Unbound (acoustic, chamber folk?)
Chuzo – M.T.M.D. (deathened hardcore, melodeath)
Deadbody – Tribal Gaze (deathgrind)
Deprecation – Infected by Sexuality (slamming brutal death)
Despoil – Summon Your Hate (brutal death metal)
Deus Mortem – Thanatos (blackened death metal)
Dose Of Adolescence – Zircon Ave. (alt rock, pop punk)
Doubting Thompson – Lizard Brain Directive (crossover thrash)
Drive Your Plow Over The Bones Of The Dead – Tragedy As Catharsis (blackened mathcore)
Eddysss – Mirage Island (instrumental doom-metal)
Empires Of Eden – Guardians Of Time (heavy metal, power thrash)
Faüst – Death Galore (crusty death-thrash)
Fiasko – Amok ꓘoma (black metal)
Flaahgra – Plant-Based Anatomy (brutal death metal)
Forja – Món oblidat (power-folk)
The Foreshadowing – New Wave Order (goth doom)
Full Of Hell + Andrew Nolan – Scraping The Divine (crusty/blackish noise)
Furze – Cosmic Stimulation Of Dark Fantasies (shitty/phsychedelic doom-drone)
Gallóglaigh – Fall of Eternity’s Throne (black metal)
Gauntlet Rule – After The Kill (heavy/trad metal)
Gorging Shade – Inversions (progressive/jazzish blackened-death metal)
Gotho – Gothron Versus Fartark (psychedelic electro-rock)
Grylle – Egrotants, Souffreteux, Cacochymes, Covidards (folk/black metal)
Hoarding Corpses – Hoarding Corpses (deathcore)
HollowKin – Confessions & Failures (alt/groove metal)
Hrad – Leaving the Ancient Times Behind (noisy black metal)
Hraefn – Research Into Infinity (doom)
Internal Decay – Malformation of Flesh (shitty death metal)
Kromlek – III – III/Upphaf (folk metal, melodeath)
Less Than Jake– Uncharted (pop punk, ska)
Linkin Park – From Zero (nu scientology-core, who even listens to this?*)
*I know the answer is everyone but me. …But, like, y tho?
Lionville – Supernatural (sappy pop-rock, AOR)
Lurking Terror – A World Of Darkness (death metal/thrash)
Lying Figures – Inheritance (deathy doom)
Mammoth Grinder – Undying Spectral Resonance (death metal)
Miracle Blood – Hello Hell (post-hardcore, noise punk)
Monolithe – Black Hole District (melodoom)
The Mosaic Window – Hemasanctum (deathened black metal)
Mugger – Luck Forever (noise/crust punk)
Nekus – Death Apophenia (disso death-doom)
Nepenthe – The Fading Promise Of Tomorrow/Elegies Of Loss And Doom (post black metal)
Nuclearsaurus Rex – Operation Party Destroy (crossover thrash)
Obeyer – Chemical Well (progressive metalcore)
Objector – Slave New World (thrash metal)
Of The Sun – Pattern Rebirth (tech/prog death)
Ohen – Whispering Lies (symphonic black metal)
Opus Irae – Into The Endless Night (meloblack/death)
Ordinal Negru – Dodekatemoria (blackened mellowdoom)
Oriska – Oriska (black doom)
Phyllomedusa – Augmentation of a Neck (2024) (noisy goregrind)
Primal Code – Opaque Fixation (crusty death-doom)
The Rattlebacks – Sidewinder (hard rock)
Rebel Souls – Leviathan (death metal)
Reign Of Dystopia – Trump Is Gonna Die (groove metal, melodeath)
Scarecrow – Scarecrow III (doom-rock/metal)
Second Sun – Elektriska Mardrömmar (trad rock)
Septaria – Astar (progressive post-metal)
Sergeant Thunderhoof – The Ghost Of Badon Hill (progressive stoner-doom)
Shi – Pure Disgust (stoner doom/sludge)
Spider God – Possess the Devil (post-hardcored/hyper black-metal)
St. Vincent – Todos Nacen Gritando (indie/prog pop, electro rock)
Stahv – Sentiens Eklektikos (prog rock)
Starchaser – Into The Great Unknown (heavy/powerish metal)
Still – A Theft (noisy/dissonant post-metal)
Suicide – Devour The Fallen (progressive/disso-death)
Super Monster Party – Rage Quit (modern/groove metal)
Synthwailer – Cruciform (symphonic/power metal)
The Tale Untold – Counterculture (prog metal)
Thanatos – Four Decades Of Death (death metal/thrash)
Thrash Compactor – Thrash Compactor (death/groove thrash)
Thrown Into Exile – Passageways (modern/groove metal)
Thunder and Lightning – Of Wrath and Ruin (heavy metal)
Thy Catafalque – XII: A gyönyörű álmok ezután jönnek (progressive folky metal)
Tribal gaze – Deadbody (death metal)
Trollcave – Adoration Of The Abyssal Trespasser (funeral doom)
Trollwar – Tales From The Frozen Wastes (powerful/symphonic melodeath)
Tzimani – I Feel Fine (speed metal)
Veilburner – The Duality Of Decapitation And Wisdom (really weird blackened-death metal)
Veuve – Pole (alt-prog)
Violent Definition – Progressive Obsoletion (groove thrash)
Viscerous – Eviscerate (death metal, melodeath)
Voodoo Circle – Hail To The King (heavy/melodic metal)
Warfarer – A Tale Beyond The Pale (symphonic/blackened melodeath, folky/power metal)
Wildheart – Searching For Life Beyond Tragedy (post/alt-hardcore)
Wizard Must Die – L’Or des Fous (stoner prog)