Heavy Metal

Mega Colossus – Showdown Review

By Eldritch Elitist on January 26, 2024 in Reviews, Heavy Metal, Power Metal, 52 comments

“Mega Colossus has more fun than your favorite band. Not that it’s much of a contest given the typically joyless answers most metal fans give in response to the “favorite band” question in the name of cred preservation, but it’s true all the same. Nevermind that these North Carolina dudes can’t help but give the widest of grins in their promo shots; though ostensibly traditional metal, undiluted joy permeates their music on a level most power metal bands could not fathom. Unbridled exuberance seeps from every riff, lick, lyric, and vocal hook.” Mega fun, mega metal.

Show N Tell – The Ritual Has Begun Review

By Steel Druhm on January 25, 2024 in Reviews, Heavy Metal, Speed Metal, 42 comments

“I’m a child of the maelstrom that was 80s metal. I was learning what I enjoyed musically during the embryonic days of MTV, and in those early years that channel force-fed me a steady diet of Judas Priest, Iron Maiden, Saxon, and Def Leppard videos. The 80s metal sound is encoded into my DNA and if you hit me hard enough, old fanzine ink leaks out. This makes me the demographic for what Phoenix Arizona’s Show N Tell are selling on their The Ritual Has Begun debut. This is 100% unabashedly retro metal with a carbon date of 1983-84, when American metal acts were taking the NWoBHM sound and speeding it up.” Show me the METAL!

Kontact – Full Contact Review

By Dolphin Whisperer on January 19, 2024 in Reviews, Heavy Metal, Occult Rock, 32 comments

“When a band draws so clearly on an aged aesthetic, the results can be hard to parse as pastiche, worship, or otherwise. Even moreso in niche corners like the epic heavy metal crowd, where soaring vocals of varying qualities—all hoping to stick in your mind regardless—triumph alongside thick kicks, thicker riffs, and battle-tested builds, worshippers of the riff conflict with worshippers of the riffers. Enter Kontact, a young Canadian troupe whose 2022 release, the cheeky-titled EP First Contact, played tightly on the ideas set forth by the idiosyncratic but ever-mountainous Manilla Road, but with enough of their space-bound palette to paint a few stripes of their own.” Bad touch.

Saxon – Hell, Fire and Damnation Review

By Steel Druhm on January 17, 2024 in Reviews, Heavy Metal, NWOBHM, 89 comments

“Saxon is ageless. Saxon is inevitable. Saxon will be releasing albums when all of you are but musty tomb mold. This is the way of things and has been since 1978. In fact, Saxon’s been rocking and rolling so long, even Black Sabbath thinks their minds are gone. The elder statesmen of the NWoBHM movement, these crusty Brits just keep churning out the goods, and here comes their 24th album, Hell, Fire and Damnation.” Olde dogs, new bite wounds.

Scanner – The Cosmic Race Review

By Steel Druhm on January 12, 2024 in Reviews, Heavy Metal, Power Metal, 38 comments

“It’s an early-year surprise to be graced with a new album by Germanic power/heavy metal semi-legends Scanner. Early adopters of the Euro-power style created by Helloween, Scanner released two seminal albums at the start of their career. 1988s Hypertrace and 1990s Terminal Earth were rough and ready takes on the slick Helloween style and Scanner made their version extra interesting due to their more unhinged, raw edge. After the very good Terminal Earth, however, it took them until 1995 to drop a follow-up and by then much of the metal market had moved on to more extreme sounds or given up metal entirely and gone grunge.” Olde tech.

Ruthless – The Fallen Review

By Steel Druhm on January 9, 2024 in Reviews, Heavy Metal, Speed Metal, 42 comments

“Ruthless have ancient roots in the metal scene but haven’t been active enough to gain much notoriety. Their Discipline of Steeldebut was released way back in 1986 when a young undisciplined Steel was living for exactly the kind of US power they deliver, but tragically, our paths never crossed. Turns out they didn’t release a follow-up until 2015 and The Fallen is their fourth full-length.” Tough and Ruthless or rough and toothless?

Triumpher – Storming the Walls [Things You Might Have Missed 2023]

By Kenstrosity on December 21, 2023 in Things You Might Have Missed 2023, Black Metal, Epic Metal, Heavy Metal, Power Metal, 41 comments

“As a sponge, I am not usually picky about what music I absorb. I often find my way to liking anything if it clicks the right boxes. For some reason, though, I’m pickiest about traditional heavy metal, both classic and modern. I rarely like anything that falls under the stock “heavy” umbrella, instead preferring things that are hybridized with other, more extreme fare. Luckily for me, Triumpher are here to help raise my sword to full might with their immense, astoundingly compelling debut Storming the Walls, released in March of this year.” Triumph of the swordcore.

Legendry – Time Immortal Wept [Things You Might Have Missed 2023]

By Holdeneye on December 21, 2023 in Things You Might Have Missed 2023, Heavy Metal, Progressive Rock, Psychedelic Rock, 29 comments

“I had every opportunity to grab the promo for Time Immortal Wept, the fourth full-length release from Pittsburgh’s Legendry. Unfortunately, I was slated to cover two other albums for that release week, neither of which I actually completed. But for the last couple of weeks, I’ve been spinning this delicious morsel of Manilla Road-meets-prog/psych-rock, and it has been worming its way into my mind relentlessly.” Frosty the Swordman.

Theophonos – Nightmare Visions [Things You Might Have Missed 2023]

By Maddog on December 20, 2023 in Things You Might Have Missed 2023, Black Metal, Death Metal, Grind, Hard Rock, Heavy Metal, 27 comments

“Nightmare Visions is a blackened grindcore debut from Michigan’s Theophonos, the brainchild of Jimmy Hamzey (Serpent Column). If that genre label sounds unappetizing, don’t let that deter you. Theophonos took every hard rock and metal song released since 1967, crammed them all into a woodchipper, and assembled the mangled output into a blackened 30-minute hydra. Miraculously, it works.” NightmareER!!

The Night Eternal – Fatale [Things You Might Have Missed 2023]

By Steel Druhm on December 19, 2023 in Things You Might Have Missed 2023, Heavy Metal, 50 comments

“Sometimes we get a promo and for whatever reason, it languishes in the sump unloved and unexplored, and later on we find out we missed a real gem and feel collective shame. Other times we just don’t get the promo at all. The latter was the issue with Fatale, the sophomore outing by German goth/heavy/occult metal act The Night Eternal.” Fatale if swallowed.