July always brings on a lot of time to reflect on the halfway mark of the year. And looking back, we’ve realized—to our complete surprise, I assure you—that we haven’t updated the Record(s) o’ the Month for April, 2023! Sure, this might seem predictable, but only one man—a man named Zadion—truly predicted it. So, good sir, feel free to bring that Golden Ticket to AMG HQ to collect your special prize (use the back entrance and don’t tell anyone where you are going).
Without further ado, let’s leave the summer heat behind and look back to ancient April, when many a good album were released. Here’s four endorsed by El Metalero Enojado himself.
Your surprise in this moment is precisely what happened to me last winter, because Anareta was utterly unexpected. In January, when I first started listening to Fear Not, I was literally the only person on Last.fm who had ever listened to the band. Soon thereafter, Dolphin Whisperer joined me, and we reveled in the band’s unique—idiosyncratic—approach to metal. In a field of rehashes, Anareta offered something meaningfully different—six tracks of melodic blackened, almost gothic metal with a motor powered on stringed, orchestral instruments, an approach the band has dubbed “chamber metal.” While still featuring guitars, bass and drums, Anareta features a cello, viola, and violin as pillars of their unique vision. The result of mixing these integrally into the music—rather than adding them as some kind of ‘orchestral’ addition á la … well, almost everyone1—is an album teeming with great ideas, beautiful songs and potential. The band’s strength is that, to quote the Orca Apologist, “there’s not a band out there that sounds like this.” These rookies “supply a narrative grime and entrancing allure that can only exist in this unique chamber music/black metal hybrid.” As of today, Anareta’s self-released debut Fear Not [Bandcamp link] is my favorite thing from 2023.
Runner(s) Up:
Fires in the Distance // Air Not Meant for Us [April 28th, 2023 | Prosthetic Records | Bandcamp] — Sadboi melodeath act Fires in the Distance showed plenty of promise on their 2020 debut, Echoes from Deep November, but it felt like they only partially realized their potential. On sophomore outing Air Not Meant for Us, however, their potential feels far more fleshed out and fully realized. Beautifully melancholy and highly polished, the material here shines with rich mood and deep emotion. It’s weepy and forlorn, but heavy enough to feel grounded and impactful, with melodies that really resonate. The nods to vintage Finnish melodeath are there, but Fires in the Distance have their own identity and style supported by prominent keyboards. The formula works and the album feels lush and vital. As a well-impressed Thus Spoke summarized, “Air Not Meant for Us is one of the most beautiful things I’ve heard this year, and it deepens and strengthens Fires’ yearning, invigorating foundation.”
Rotpit // Let There Be Rot [April 14th, 2023 | War Anthem | Bandcamp] — What happens when you take members of death-centric acts like Heads of the Dead, Wombbath, Just before Dawn, and Revel in Flesh and create a super-death project? You get the stinky, steaming pile of brilliance that is Rotpit. Rotpit cares not for technical, proggy ideas. Rotpit exists to batter and smash you with crusty old school death while making sure it’s catchy enough to be nigh irresistible. While offering nothing new to the academic community, Rotpit provides more caveman fun than a barrel of mutated leech monkeys.4 As Steel Druhm sagely observed, “There’s a specific lo-fi, filthy sound I want in my death metal, and Rotpit extract it from the moldy earth and shove that loathsome putridness right in your fat face.” And really, what more could you possibly want than loathsome putridness shoved right in your fat face? I can’t think of anything.
