“When thinking of how to describe Soothsayer’s primitive sound, I thought if the band were a people, they’d be advanced enough to build a pretty mean henge, but they’d definitely still be eating their enemies to steal their battle ability, and if a farmer brought their shaman a vegetable that grew weird, they’d probably worship it.” Protoculture.
“In November 2019, I picked up the Midnight Odyssey-reviewing baton from a tired and broken Dr A.N.Grier, who had aged a number of cat years during his time with the 160-minute beast, Shards of Silver Fade. By contrast, I was able to listen to its successor, and first episode in a planned trilogy, Biolume Part 1: In Tartarean Chains, twice through and still have time for a 15-minute power nap, in the time it took poor Grier to labor his way through Shards. For anyone who thought this was a sign that Australian gloomster and one-man Odyssey, Dis Pater, had learned to curb his more expansive tendencies, however, Pater has all 102 minutes of Biolume Part 2: The Golden Orb to tell you otherwise.” Maximum adventures.
“Seattle rock legends Alice In Chains may not strictly qualify as metal, but they are widely regarded within the metal community, especially compared to the other big name bands of the famed grunge era, which tend to polarize metalheads. Perhaps it’s the blanket of sorrow and darkness enveloping their sound, coupled with the sludge and doom influences, that compliment their hard rock core and melancholic acoustic forays. Although Alice In Chains are still chugging along admirably to the present day, it was the band’s ’90s heyday and era with doomed frontman Layne Staley that remains the classic and defining era of the band.” Alice lives.
“When non-Poles think about Polish metal, we usually think of the black variety. Well, that and a metal front-man with an absolutely enormous forehead. More of a fivehead, really. What we don’t think of, when we think of Polish metal, is atmospheric post-metal. Since 2014, Warsaw’s Sunnata has been trying to change that. Will their fourth full-length win them a share of the evil coffee market?” Post sells, but who’s buying?
![Ivan – Silver Screens [Things You Might Have Missed 2020]](https://www.angrymetalguy.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/Ivan-SilverScreens01-768x768.jpg)
“For those few keeping track, 2020 has been an exceptionally solid year for funeral doom. Convocation, Atramentus, Drown, Mourners and Lone Wanderer all put out top shelf bottles of distilled despondency, while golden boys Bell Witch returned to collaborate, mostly successfully, with Aerial Ruin. While each of these albums occupied a slightly different niche of the style, none wandered so far afield with such thrilling results as Australian duo Ivan on their fifth release Silver Screens.” Strange screenings.
“Drawing on both the atmospheric doom of Black Sabbath and Witchfinder General’s stoner rock, Laser Dracul deal in dirty, lo-fi, rolling riffs, underpinned by the rumbling bass and rough, hollow cleans of Michael Brander. Sounding a bit like Dozer run through a Sleep filter, there is something oddly comforting about the sludgy rock on show on Hagridden.” Of lights and undead lords.
“Upon entering the kitchen the camera pans to a large, oily hole in reality. You can see time/space bend and slip at the edges. Jonathan and the woman stare into the nothingness and grow pale. A spackle knife is slowly being pulled into the vortex center, languidly circling between worlds. Jonathan turns to the woman. ‘You’ve got Void Rot.'” Pillars of the community.
“The core of Hymn’s sound is sludge doom, but with the intensity turned up to 11. There are riffs and enviable guitar tone enough to check the usual genre boxes, but the forceful drumming of Markus Støle and the vein-popping delivery of vocalist/guitarist Ole Ulvik Rokseth conjure the image of Thou as interpreted by 90s hardcore stalwarts Snapcase.” Breach party.
“Look, I’m not saying I judge books records by their covers but, come on, everyone likes nice artwork, right? When I’m plumbing the murkier depths of Bandcamp, a cool cover can lure me into that one extra purchase that I swore I wasn’t going to make. It’s just as well for Te Whanganui a Tara, Aotearoa (or Wellington, New Zealand) trio Unruly then, that I didn’t see the cover of their self-titled debut before I hauled it out of the promo pit.” Ugly is as Unruly does.
“French trio Stonebirds formed back in 2008 and have three LP’s under their belt, prior to the release of their latest opus, entitled Collapse and Fail. This is my first taste of the band’s work, and based on the music contained within their fourth album, Stonebirds specialize in an atmospheric, post-metal tinged form of emotive, dark sludge and doom. Throw in some generally lengthy song structures, a heaping dose of melancholy, and mixture of heavy, grinding riffage and quieter passages of introspective post-metal, and you get a basic idea of what Stonebirds are all about.” Failure as art.
