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...
Heavy Pod Is Heavy Cast! This week we talk about a bunch of new music. Post-humous Static-X, Oceans of Slumber, Exist, The Fall of Troy, Enslaved, Gargoyl, Ihsahn, Unleash the Archers, and Enterprise Earth. Also live stuff from Trivium and Between the Buried and Me. Then, cool people time with Ghost of Tsushima and how Dispatches From Elsewhere broke us. Enjoy!
It’s been such an incredible period for death metal’s expansion and proliferation over the past five years that one could be forgiven for just now entering the field and discovering bands that have long been h... Read More...
There are a few things I'm excited to accomplish with this post, beyond highlighting yet another couple of excellent death metal releases. First, from a practical standpoint, this is an efficient means of cove... Read More...
A Gift to Artwork, taken from the Caligula’s Horse song “A Gift to Afterthought”, breaks down and analyses your favourite album artwork. The first time an album’s name appears, it will link to a large and (whe... Read More...
The progressive metal "scene" has become more and more insular over the past decade or so as it's risen to prominence. While the higher profile has lead to more diversity among bands who can reach an audience, as with additional size comes additional bulk, the definition of "progressive" has become blurrier as more bands incorporate elements from the sound into their toolkit, forcing the genre to define itself by contrast. Complexity, self-seriousness, "enlightenment" and a gratuitous focus on music theory and pseudo-intellectualism have become pervasive. While the counter-movement of doubling down on "ignorant", more streamlined music has also fostered, it's become easy to be stuck between two extremes. As such, being able to find music that doesn't stick to tropes has become increasingly difficult. Enter Exist, a progressive metal band that's almost anti-prog. They take the intricacy of bands like Cynic and their predecessors in Death and combine it with sarcastic disrespect towards prog conventions. The end result is their sophomore release, So True, So Bound, and it's a clever combination that is confusing in an intriguing way.
In case the title wasn't clue enough, this week we have Max Phelps of Exist, Defeated Sanity and Death to All (also ex-Cynic) as our guest! We discuss his creative process, touring with Gorguts, and of course, the upcoming Exist album So True, So Bound, which comes out this week! We also discuss new music from Origin, Bloodshot Dawn, Rings of Saturn, Vintersorg and more! We also discuss Fredrik Thordendal's hiatus(?) from Meshuggah and Per Nilsson of Scar Symmetry replacing him. Finally, we talk about how Spotify artist payments have been decreasing despite their financial growth. Enjoy!
This was a week of diversions. Eden is back in his land, and I've seen Metallica live and am super amazed by them. Also, new music by Exist, Origin, Steven Wilson, and Rings of Saturn. Then we talk about some happenings. The shitshow surrounding The Faceless missing their New Zealand tour, Chester of Linkin Park telling fans to stab themselves in the face, and the sexual assault allegations leveled against PWR BTTM and the implications of that. Then Eden recommends some music - Brutus, Subetroth, and Arcadea featuring Brann Dailor of Mastodon. We then go into a cool people section discussing Get Out, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2, and Horizon: Zero Dawn. Then, just as we're about to finish up, Eden mentions his Re:publica experience, and we go into an extended discussion about the ethical responsibilities of the tech industry to explain themselves. Enjoy!
This week we get hyped about announcements of albums and new music. Enslaved, Vintersorg, Exist, Schammasch, the Babymetal backing band's project Kari Band. Oh, Decapitated and Dying Fetus also have n... Read More...
Welcome to another edition of Connecting the Dots, and today we will be focusing on one of the most influential extreme metal bands of all time - none other than the legendary Cynic! Evidence of their influence... Read More...