Melissa

Castle – Under Siege Review

Castle – Under Siege Review

“At the crossroads of retro/occult metal, doom and throwback vest metal, sits Castle like some sort of big…castle. These San Francisco rockers exploded onto the doom scene with their punchy In Witch Order début and immediately carved a niche for themselves among contemporaries like Jex Thoth and Occultation. Blacklands took things to the next level by incorporating strains of epic metal and black metal riffery and the result was quite heady, unpredictable and fun. Now we get Under Siege, which once again rejiggers the Castle sound as the band evolves and matures with grace and dignity.” Have you heard these guys yet? If not, Steel Druhm thinks less of you.

In Solitude – The World. The Flesh. The Devil. Review

In Solitude – The World. The Flesh. The Devil. Review

Steel Druhm likes his old Mercyful Fate. Yep, those first two albums and the early EPs were pure metal magic and some of the best stuff the genre every coughed up. Needless to say, I support the sudden wave of Mercyful Fate influenced retro metal that’s been popping up of late. We have Ghost, Hell and now you can add In Solitude to this heady witch’s brew with their second release The World. The Flesh. The Devil. Along with fellow Swedes Ghost, these gents are shamelessly robbing the graves of the Melissa and Don’t Break the Oath albums and trying to bring some of that ancient black magic into 2011. While Ghost took elements of the Fate sound and added poppy, catchy hooks, In Solitude stays much closer to the source material. They actually sound A LOT like the great Fate as they trot our their own tales of demons, devil worship and all things malevolent. So, does their similarity to a Mercyful Fate tribute band necessarily mean I love them too? In this case, yes, yes it does. I love them and I’m man enough to admit it!