I'll be honest with you, dear reader: I'm tired. I've obviously written this before many times on the blog but this time it feels worse. Putting aside the usual stuff, like work and just the state of the world, I have also been travelling a lot. And, on top of everything, I lost my dear dog, Chaucer, two months ago. I thought about his death a lot, even before he died; it happened suddenly but he was old and I knew it was coming (time and entropy being what they are, which is exceptionally cruel). And yet, I was not prepared. I was not prepared for how much of my life was built around him, around his presence, his schedule, and his needs.
I find myself, in all senses of the word, bereft. I've been listening to less music as a result as well, which is never good for me. I don't walk every day now because I don't need to walk Chaucer. It was a good chunk of my listening time. I'm working on fixing that because I need to get out and I also need to listen to music. But the New England winter is approaching and I am dreading the time in-doors without the force of a dog making me go outside. We'll see; for now, I am trying to reclaim thirty minutes every afternoon to myself, to walking and listening to music.
I need music more than ever because I need structure. I need something that exists outside of work, for its own right. And hey, look at that, this also describes the blog. I've written this on here before as well: keeping the blog running is really hard and is an active effort we all make every day. But now more than ever, I absolutely refuse to let it die. We will keep going as long as we can, writing what we can, focusing on reviews, premieres, and whatever else we can make happen. Thank you for reading and for maybe supporting us over on Patreon even though I can't bring myself to do anything for it or even post there (as always, I partially blame Patreon's horrid interface itself).
One of those things we will keep making at any cost is Editors' Picks because I genuinely love reading it and writing it. And so, here we are. Despite it all, we continue. Music is still out there and so we still answer its call and try to bring some of it, our favorites, to you. Thanks for still being here. Heavy Blog forever.
-Eden Kupermintz
The Ocean - Solaris
I had my work cut out for me with this month's Editors' Picks. There were just a lot of excellent albums for me to choose from, the majority of them release by bands I am known to love. But, more than any other album from September, I kept coming back to The Ocean's Solaris. Maybe it's because it "gives me back" one of my favorite bands or maybe it just stands on its own merits, enriched by the lineup changes into a truly wonderful piece of progressive metal. Another reason, underrated in almost every review I've read (including mine, to be honest) is how heavy the album can be.
To be sure there are albums released recently that are easily heavier than Solaris. But no album captures that specific, dark heaviness that The Ocean are so good for. Flip on over to "Belligerence". It starts with absolutely furious screams from both vocalists, backed up by some weird and excellently embellishing sonic scratches in the background. It also features some decidedly "The Ocean" riffs, with that groove they've become famous for. But later on it devolves into the kind of atmospheric build up, always with a catchy riff repeating through its background, that the band have perfected over their career. That contrast, between a melodic earworm and a heavy, pummeling intro (which of course returns near the end of the track) is exactly what I go to The Ocean for and what I was missing from their last release.
The entire album is filled with these moments and has more than rewarded the time I've spent unraveling its structure. It took over my listening time, demanding more and more spins to really get to the core of what's stayed the same in the band's sound and what's grown anew. At the end of it, I feel like both parts are what lends this album strength, both what we've come to expect from the band and what they've added in. Both make me want to return to Solaris again and again and I am happy indulge myself.
-EK
Noctule - Extinguish Thy Flame
Earlier this year sadly marked the end of one of my favourite bands, Svalbard. Their blend of blackgaze, crust, and post-hardcore was incredibly cathartic, full of passion and will be missed. Fortunately, since 2021 Serena Cherry, Svalbard vocalist and guitarist, has had a solo project exploring her more extreme metal roots. Extinguish Thy Flame is the second full-length from that project, Noctule. With this release we see lyricism shift from the Skyrim-theme of her debut to specifically Elden Ring this time around, and with it a shift musically from atmospheric black metal to a melodeath influenced black metal album. This is a strong contender to be the best melodic black metal album of the year.
Coming to this from a Svalbard fan, the biggest differences are simply that it's more metal. With less clean vocals and punk influences, it's more unrelenting, unforgiving, and head-bangable. The writing is more riff-driven rather than relying on mood and emotional connections. That said, there is still a lot of use of atmosphere here and dynamic swings. The shift however to a more Insomnium-styled melodic death metal influence was a great choice if anything due to how much more memorable this feels compared to the debut. Melodic black metal is a genre that has felt quite middling for some time. We’ve seen some rejuvenation in recent years with Stormkeep and Saidan, but overall it hasn’t seen a huge amount of evolution or standouts since Dissection’s classic Storm of the Light’s Bane. Bands have tried to replicate that sound here and there, but this is not that, and I think that's a good thing. It doesn't sound like it's trying too hard to be anything specifically, it's just someone with great blackened vocals and some mean riffs in her head, wanting to write some heavy metal and that is what you get here.
Extinguish Thy Flame is driven foremost by its engaging melodies and Serena’s ability to draw emotions from them in a way that feels sincere.Yet, this album shouldn’t be painted as being one-note. There is an adequate amount of tonal shifts here, from feelings of adventure, to anger, and melancholy and self-reflection, there’s a fine balance throughout reducing any burnout listening start to finish. Tracks like “Goddess of Rot” slow things down for what is essentially a post-black metal song with interestingly layered post-metal riffing and stretched-out atmosphere building. This is contrasted nicely with the very high tempo “Lament of the Omen King”, serving a healthy dose of blast beats and driving riffs. While “Become My Blade Once More “ showcases some of her more technical chops with some smooth sweep-picked soloing. Keyboards are used sporadically throughout heightening the cinematic experience, but I was thankful they weren't overdone or used cheesily. Through both her writing style and the production, this feels to be very much a fall or winter album, and it’s easy to picture yourself as a Dark Souls character wandering a snowy castle while listening to this, carrying some big ass sword of course.
-TB
Sigh - Goh-Ka
There isn’t another band in the world that sounds like Japan’s legendary black(ish) experimental progressive metal band Sigh. Since their fairly straightforward and grossly underrated debut Scorn Defeat, Mirai Kawashima has developed Sigh’s sound into an utterly singular entity, blending folk art with metal aesthetics in a manner that feels utterly unique, building a discography over 14 albums that sounds and feels like nothing else. Their latest release, Goh-Kah, does absolutely nothing to change the above narrative, and that’s a very good thing. It’s their best release since 2012’s modern classic In Somniphobia.
Those familiar with Sigh’s catalog should be aware that the band are no strangers to high concept art, and Goh-Ka is no different. Focusing on a Buddhist interpretation of the nine stages of the human body’s decomposition, Kawashima builds a soundtrack across the album that dives into this topic with thoughtfulness and vigor. These tracks are lush, filled to the brim with intricate songwriting and often beautiful instrumentation in a manner that envelops listeners in a sonic world that tackles the album’s thematic elements in as stately a fashion as the process of death itself. Opener “Kuso-shi 1, 2, and 3” embodies the above in full, with pounding rhythms and otherworldly riffs that ebb in flow in a way that makes for some genuinely exciting listening, showcasing the juxtaposition of majesty and madness that has become the band’s calling card. There are moments of psychedelic grandeur as well, like the Mikael Äkerfeldt supported “Unputenpu,” which is one of my favorite tracks on the record. There’s plenty of sonic awesomeness to sink your teeth into, as is tradition with a Sigh record.
As a standalone offering, Goh-Ka is a brilliant addition to Sigh’s already incredible body of work. As a borderline companion piece to 2022’s Shiki, it gains even more emotional and sonic depth, culminating in one of the band’s best releases in over a decade. Kawashima and friends continue to build an untouchable musical legacy in a sphere that feels wholly their own, and it’s a genuine marvel that they are able to create such emotive and conceptually powerful music this late in their career. Sigh is always fresh, and Goh-Ka is a sonic journey that in no way detracts from their previously established strengths as musicians and songwriters. It’s a beautiful and haunting album front to back with nary a weak spot to speak of. A full-throated recommendation is easy to give on this one.
-Jonathan Adams
Godflesh - Decay
The fact that music, and extreme metal in particular, is a deeply physical act for musicians feels too often overlooked. It’s a topic that I’m very unfortunately only reminded of when a vocalist loses their voice, or a lead guitarist experiences issues with their arms/hands. Godflesh, legends of the scene, provided us with a stark reminder of the physical toll that creating music takes on the artists themselves. In a heartbreaking statement released several months ago, Godflesh screamer and guitarist Justin Broadrick announced the end of his ability to perform harsh vocals due to a hernia surgery, marking an unfortunate (and second) eventual end to one of the most pioneering projects in the industrial metal space. Decay, the group's penultimate album, represents a curtain call for Broadrick’s days as a belter of feral nastiness. What a swan song it is.
Decay is a sonic heralding back to the days of Streetcleaner and A World Only Lit by Fire with a more hellish bent, slowly building its intensity in a manner that feels antithetical to the immediate tonal ripping of albums like Purge. Decay boils and roils with a seething wrath that represents the soul of Godflesh’s musical aesthetic. There’s an overwhelming sense of darkness and anger here, led primarily by the music itself this time as opposed to Broadrick’s vocals. But when those vocals hit, man oh MAN does context give them power. Recorded during the same sessions as their last record, each howl, bark, and yell feels like the ghost of an already dead relic, howling from beyond with unholy power and unbridled rage. Finale “Consume Me” is an absolute masterclass in the above-stated bent toward misery, representing a brutal final showcase of Broadrick’s power as an extreme vocalist. His presence as a musician and screamer is felt mightily throughout Decay, and its eventual absence will be deeply missed.
Context aside, on the whole Decay is my favorite Godflesh record since Fire, and a fitting capstone to the project’s extreme metal aesthetic. There will be more from Broadrick as time continues (he’s already announced several collaborations he is currently working on or part of), and his unrelentingly dark vocal stylings will stand the test of time without question. Just like the human body, Decay is a stark musical representation of all things eventually coming to an end. Our gratefulness for his contributions to extreme metal is boundless.
-JA
Further Listening
Uncle Acid & the Deadbeats - Shapes of Midnight
Holy moly the folks are back! While I haven’t kept up as thoroughly with Uncle Acid’s output since Wasteland back in 2018, Shapes of Midnight is a return to form that feels a lot closer to their Blood Lust/Mind Control era than anything since. Front to back this album rips, and if you’d given up on Uncle Acid I highly suggest you use Shapes of Midnight as your relaunch point. Great stuff.
-JA
Fluisteraars - Jacht der Mysteriën
Fluisteraars take atmospheric black metal to a dream-like state. This album was recorded as a live band in one take, and re-amped inside an abandoned water tower for an immersive, hypnotizing listening experience. Through the ambiance, and slight folk influence, it takes on an ancient mystical quality, like listening to something unearthed from a magical primordial forest.
-TB
False Body - Tomorrow Starts Without You
I can’t believe we got three Converge albums this year, and my favourite one isn’t even by Converge! Edmonton’s False Body make unrelenting, razor-sharp metallic hardcore that pierces into your heart in every way conceivable.
-TB
Dreadnought - Wars Of Spirit // Wards Of Light
It was matter of emotional inches that made me choose The Ocean over Dreadnought this time around. I feel like this new album is the start of a new era in the already veteran Denver band and I for one could not be more excited. There's everything I love about Dreadnought here and more - more freedom, more space, more attack, more presence, more compositional experience. Wars Of Spirit // Wards Of Light has become the definitive Dreadnought album for me against which I will measure all their future releases. I'm sure they will exceed it.
Crown Magnetar – The Hollowing Of Godlesh (death metal)
Love•Love•Love/Ølgod – Lovegod (crust punk, hardcore)
Midnight Prey – Jenseitsritt (post-hardcore)
Ordeathral – Medea (progressive melodeath, folk metal)
Protomartyr – Hotel Usona (weird/gothy post-punk)
Pure Reason Revolution – Terrifying Angels (prog rock/metal)
Krallice – Scour Order (progressive?/noisy black metal)
Runemagick – After Chaos: Nocturnal Vigil (progressive/folky death-doom)
The Spacelords – Uranus Omnibus Sanctus (stoner/psych prog)
Hubris. – White Shores (post-prog)
Raphael Weinroth-Browne – Empyrean (cello prog)
Judiciary – Stalagmite Angels (metallic hardcore, groove thrash)
Februus – Construction Of Conflict (prog death)
Acausal Intrusion – Vomit Meditations (noisy/blackened disso-death)
Chat Pile – Who Loves the Sun (industrial sludge)
Moon Destroys – Omni (grungy stoner-prog)
Pelegrin – The Curse Of Nephtar (stoner prog)
Sleep – Hempispheres (stoner doom)