Hey there headbangers!
Bit of a mixed bag this round, although the Big Four is solid as always. I'm sticking with the quarterly format for now, but if thrash bands could try and space their albums out more a... Read More...
Editor’s Note: Longtime reader Remi VL is a regular guest contributor to our Release Day Roundup posts! He submitted several of the albums listed below. Join his Facebook group for more recommen... Read More...
Howdy Headbangers,
Dropping another top ten list seemed a tad redundant, given that I've picked out a "Big Four" for each quarter of the year. Put those together and you effectively have a "Top 16" of 2020.... Read More...
It hasn't been too long since we told you about Turin's Ultra-Violence, a band approaching thrash metal from a clever and convincing perspective. The secret to the formula was injecting it with plenty of heavy metal influences, found on emotional outros, killer bass lines and larger than life choruses. Seeing as the band hail from what we'd consider a "musical periphery" and don't exactly conform to many of the habits of the more mainstream and settled scenes of metal, digging into their influences presented us with a tantalizing opportunity. And thus, we are proud to present to you today a host of interesting picks from Loris Castiglia (vocals/guitars).
What goes around, comes around. What’s old is new again. People say this shit all the time because it holds so true. We’ve seen it with just about every style of music, and metal has gotten some real good out of it (see: re-thrash, “occult” metal). While I don’t know exactly what constitutes a genre “revival,” I do know is that if my limited awareness tells me anything about a recent “nu-metal revival,” it’s safe to assume that a “NWOAHM revival” is just around the corner... or emerging. If we are in fact uber-predictable creatures of habit, Nashville’s Dark Hound might be a harbinger of the return of trucker hats, studded belts, and Jagerbombs.
Due to the way we’ve decided to divide up the time zones, correspondence with an international audience from the humble southern continent of Australia often feels akin to looking into the past. Yet, despite this perceived futurism, Australian culture often trails its American and European counterparts by some distance. So it is that, while the northern thrash revival has come and (more-or-less) gone, the Australian metal scene is currently experiencing the biggest genre boom it has undergone since thrash metal originally emerged in the mid ‘80s. Back then, we brought our own quality acts to the fold, most notably in the form(s) of Mortal Sin and Hobbs Angel of Death, and the Allegiance in the '90s. Yet, while the style had effectively remained dormant since then, the last five-to-ten years have seen an explosion in the amount of world-class thrash metal bands to have emerged from these southern shores.
It is held by many a fan and critic that thrash metal was merely a necessary transition for the global metal movement, a rite of passage if you will, from metal's crude foundations that still carried the musky ... Read More...
Evile are one of those bands that have always been around but I've never given enough time to. Hell, I was even at the gig that apparently got them signed to Earache and I still managed to somehow pass on it... Read More...
I have to wonder sometimes whether we really are in 'the age of the digital download' or 'the age of the streaming service', because it seems to me that the spoils of victory of this era will go to those who ... Read More...
Here's an interesting measure of how tr00 you are. Think hard --- when, exactly, was the moment that Metallica fell from grace?
If you said "Never! They're so consistently good!" then dear god, learn to resp... Read More...