Candlelight Records

The Sanity Days – Evil Beyond Belief Review

The Sanity Days – Evil Beyond Belief Review

“Just a quick glance over The Sanity Days’ lineup, featuring members who have all, at different points, been part of Onslaught, will make you think you’ve got their style all figured out. It must be aggressive, speedy, killing thrash that they play! And yet, their music has got nothing to do with that.” We like a good surprise. Less so the bad surprises. Which one lurks behind the Sanity Curtain?

Ethereal – Opus Aethereum Review

Ethereal – Opus Aethereum Review

“I’m just going to come out and say it. I enjoyed Dimmu Borgir’s big-assed Puritanical Euphoric Misanthropia. Yep, I said it. Haters be a hatin’ but its elements of bombastic orchestration and “beauty and the beast” vocals introduced a balance of demonic and angelic qualities that expanded on a style bands like Emperor and Limbonic Art had/have nurtured for years.” Don’t hate the keyboards, hate the player.

Voices – London Review

Voices – London Review

“If you’re anything like me, you’re super awesome. But more to the point, you would have been saddened by the split of blackened death metal troublemakers Akercocke a couple of years ago. Perhaps the UK’s most consistently entertaining extreme metal act of the last decade, they seemed to improve on every album, reaching a pinnacle on 2007’s Antichrist.” The band is gone, but the legacy lives on in a disturbing new entity.

Winterfylleth – The Divination of Antiquity Review

Winterfylleth – The Divination of Antiquity Review

“The way the English media tends to hype up their musicians is simultaneously cute and annoying. Whether it’s an indie rock group or, in this case, a black metal act, they never fail to hail almost every other band as “the next big thing.” Manchester’s black-metal-meets-paganism-and-folk quartet Winterfylleth had the luck (or misfortune) of being one such band.” What’s wrong with some homer press love for local bands? The overhyping, that’s what!

Orange Goblin – Back From the Abyss Review

Orange Goblin – Back From the Abyss Review

“The pub gremlins known as Orange Goblin are back and once again, they’ve been fed after midnight and doused with way too much cheap beer and rotgut whiskey. For the uninitiated, that means more rowdy outlaw biker rock filled with southern blues, doom and stoner influences that all get sent crashing into the rocks of macho bravado and testosterone. Following up 2012s enjoyably soused A Eulogy for the Damned, Back From the Abyss keeps the sketchy pool hall chic intact and adds more dumbbells, prison tattoos and Lemmy-isms for a potent potable of in-your-face, no bullshit biker metal.” Grab the moonshine and the brass knuckles, the Goblins are back in the bar!

Retro-spective Review:  Funeral – From These Wounds

Retro-spective Review: Funeral – From These Wounds

“Classic doom metal is wrought with tragedy. Whether it’s the loss of a loved one, the pain of watching one’s dreams turn to dust, or just lamenting something that was never there to begin with, great doom metal can be both depressingly cathartic and strangely uplifting in its dirges and sadness. In fact, a series of tragedies would befall a very young doom band from Norway rightfully named Funeral.” This is a sad tale, my friends.

Falloch – This Island, Our Funeral Review

Falloch – This Island, Our Funeral Review

“With Scotland potentially poised to proclaim independence from English rule in a very un-William Wallace fashion (ballots instead of broadswords), it seems only fair to highlight some Scottish music for a fookin change, eh? Today’s subject is Falloch, a folksy, relentlessly bleak post rock outfit that takes elements of traditional Scottish music and blends them with healthy doses of melodic, vaguely blackened metal. I suppose their sound could be described as Eluvilite mixed with Primordial and Agalloch, with some Enya thrown in for haggis and giggles.” Remember, they may take your dignity, and they may take your lunch money, but they’ll never take…your AMG!