Top Pick
Dreadnought – Wars of Spirit // Wards of Light (progressive post-metal)
Like Eden said, Wars of Spirit // Wards of Light is a more direct, yet still expansive album for Dreadnought, that blends the bassy, post-metal rumble of previous benchmark Emergence (2019) with the expansive, progressive soundscapes of their other, perhaps more progressive material. The way it balances all these elements is truly impressive, painting a lush soniscape that is at once oppressive and inviting, and the perfect backdrop for Kelly Schilling's Kate Bush-esque wails, which are themselves as equally unhinged-sounding as they are controlled.
This band might not seem like my usual cup of tea, but Dreadnought have always been exceptions to whatever rules you want to throw at them. when something is done with such obvious passion and mastery it's impossible to resist, and Wars of Spirit // Wards of Light might just be their best album yet.
Release Roundup
Archgoat – Nightbringer, Lightbringer (blackened death metal)
Avulsed – Nordic Embryogenesis (death doom)
Barkasth – Silent Torment (black metal)
Bocc – Demolarium (Night Terrors Records) [Death/Doom]
BOCC – Demolarium (sludge death/doom)
Bülent Ceylan – B.L.N.T. (euro metal)
Carbonic Fields – Spiritus Mentis (melodeath)
Cardinals Folly – Let the Posers Fall! (doom metal)
Cartilage – Operating Altar (death metal)
CoreLeoni – Generection (hard rock, heavy metal)
Crashdeath – Loverbone (heavy metal, goth rock)
Discouraged – A Farewell In Stages (black doom)
Distention – What Remains (death metal)
Downpour – The Search For Permanence (nu hardcore, metalcore)
Drown in Sulphur – Strix (nuish deathcore)
Epitaphe – III (funeral death-doom)
Eric Steckel – Sandstorm (stoner rock)
Everything Decays – Requiem II: We Will Slaughter the Lambs (groove thrash/death)
Exist Immortal – Afterglow (melodic metalcore)
The Fierce & The Dead – Regional Theatre (post rock, shoegaze)
Filth – Death Exhibition (death metal)
Fluisteraars – Jacht der Mysteriën (post-black metal)
Foreign Body – Libertine (postpunk, noisecore)
From The Vastland – Servant Of Ahriman (black metal)
Funus – Dreamless Water (post-rock/gaze)
Gammacide – Toxic Mercenaries (groove thrash)
Godslave – Godslave (heavy metal, thrash)
Green Lung – Necropolitan (increasingly naff doom metal) Review
Harlott – Exsequiis (thrash)
Hole Dweller – Long Road Home (ambient/dungeon synth, hobbit bullshit) Review
HKSPK – Heimkehr (black/death metal)
Hrafnablot – Guðlaugar Saga (power metal)
Hubris. – White Shores (post-prog)
Hunter Omega – Lake Of Death (heavy/speed metal)
In Contempt – Hope Is A Dead Language (crusty deathgrind)
Jasmeno – Assemblage Of Cinematic Idioms (prog metal)
Jess By The Lake – Human (rock)
Killer – The Grand Finale (heavy metal)
Killing of a Sacred Deer – Encephalic Angels (deathcore)
Knivad – Lilla vackra människa (meloblack)
Lýsis – At the Edge of Existence (djentcore)
The Medea Project – Kharon: Forbearance (black doom)
The Meffs – Business (nu sludge)
Megaton Communion – Three Of Cups (stoner rock/doom)
Mother Of Millions – T (post prog)
MP – Reborn (heavy metal)
Nervochaos – Chaosmongers (death metal)
Noctámbulo – Enigmática Incisión Del Umbral Interno (melodeath)
Offernat – The Ecstasy Of Death (progressive death metal)
Pâenil Era – A Wilting Fountain (post/melo black)
Raphael Weinroth-Browne – Empyrean (cello prog)
Scene Queen – Metalicious (y tho?)
Shrineburner – Hymns Of Despair (sludge doom)
Sistematic Coprophagia – Mausoleum of Consumption (brutal/tech death)
Slime Dimension – Slime Dimension (death metal, melodeath)
Slug Comparison – Cold In Cold Out (rock)
Sněť – V bažinách vědomí (death metal)
Space Chaser – Razorblade Bay (thrash)
Spacechaser – Razorblade Bay (thrash)
Sweet Electric – Something Something Disco (rock)
Til the End – Til the End (goth metal, melodeath)
Tygers Of Pan Tang – Electrifyed (heavy metal, hard rock)
Vingulmork – Barmhjertighetens fallitt (meloblack)
Vulgar Mephitis – From Dust (brutal death metal)
Vûlom – Love’s Lament (meloblack)
Whispered – Honorbound (melodeath, folk metal)
Wrong Man – Here's That Feeling (post-hardcore)
Wintering Grounds – Impasse (progressive death metal)
Worldsucks – Scorn for the U.S.A. (blackened grind)
Xion – When Stars Collide (heavy metal, thrash)