“Montreal’s mega-heavy death metal merchants Phobocosm have a distinguished track record here at AMG, scoring high marks both times they were featured. It’s been a long time since their last appearance for 2016s Bringer of Drought, which Lord Kronos himself blessed with a righteous 3.5. He appreciated their nods to Incantation and Ulcerate and the no-nonsense way they steamroll and crush the listener with grim atmospheres and a massively heavy sound. Not the most productive of acts, nearly 7 years have creaked by since then, but we’re finally poised to receive third album, Foreordained.” Fear of caverns.
Neurosis
Phantom Winter – Her Cold Materials Review
“Seldom does artwork perfectly embody a band’s sound, but Phantom Winter’s four-album streak of black-and-white portrayals of the horrific and fantastical is dead-on. While lightless and unceasingly dreary, there is a stillness that silences the cacophony. Like a barren forest in the last sigh of winter, Her Cold Materials is a scream receiving no echo, the soft “thump” of a body in the snow, the mockery of the woods’ constant and uninterested witness. In the bleak model of consistency, Phantom Winter once again proves the grit of its mettle in a frostbitten silence that proves less is more.” Winter is coming (soon).
Bolt Gun – The Tower Revew
“The Tower feels like ascent. You’ll feel light as air, floating upon the ether in warm sunlight, only to crash to earth in plummeting gravity. While journeys are not uncommon across metal’s many weathered and storied expanses, Australia’s Bolt Gun offers a vertical trek. Its experimental fervor, blackened climaxes, and monolithic weight, and above all, the emphasis on atmosphere, offer scenic vistas and groveling earth alike, hurtling towards the summit and the zenith. Always majestic, as if in reverence to the colossal structure always in view, The Tower feels like a chronicle: a breathing, organic, but dense legend.” Climbing creativity.
Rorcal – Silence Review
“Rorcal’s approach to auditory darkness is nonetheless unmistakable, post-hardcore and post-metal coursing through every vein. Dissonant and ominous, tar-thick slogs of drone/sludge contrast mightily with raw wounds of blackened shreds with impeccable balance.” Silent but deadly.
Chained to the Bottom of the Ocean – Obsession Destruction Review
“Massachusetts quartet Chained to the Bottom of the Ocean (who, I assume, take their name from the 2007 song “Fucking Chained to the Bottom of the Ocean” by Louisiana sludge legends, Thou) have made a bit of a name for themselves on the sludge scene, despite having only one (short) LP to their name, 2017’s Decay and Other Hopes Against Progress.” Chained by an anchor?
Milanku – À l’aube Review
“Gentleness is a trait rarely exhibited in extreme music – perhaps for obvious reasons. The petals of flame that flutter to the earth are too often wrenched by relentless gravity, dream worlds meet their end with violent sound, and meditation that offers healing is ripped open like a scab. Therefore, gentleness is a scar for Milanku, a weariness with the wounds suffered and a soundtrack of healing – of a busted bone never set quite right.” Beauty in the darkest places.
Entropia – Total Review
“By my own admission, post-metal – especially where it crosses into sludge – is not my typical jam. So much is it not my jam that CERTAIN INDIVIDUALS on staff receive much hate for their love of sludge. But a favorable, if not effusive, word from the elusive but expressive Kronos is all I need to take a band seriously, and so it was with Poland’s Entropia.” Filthy recommendations.
Dirge – Dirge Review
“Apparently, I’m the only one ’round these parts who gets excited to see the band Dirge in the same sentence as “post-metal.” I’m like, “they’re back, baby!” and I lose my goddamn mind. The French masterminds of such classics as Elysian Magnetic Fields and Wings of Lead Over Dormant Seas were a force to be reckoned with, but then I realize: this is the other Dirge, the one from India.” International doom.
They Grieve – To Which I Bore Witness Review
“To Which I Bore Witness implies an event, a singular cataclysm. Whether it is one as violent as an earthquake, or as quiet as the beating of a butterfly’s wing, it is nonetheless devastating. We bear witness to the aftermath of this event, the unfolding and the trauma – the hushed whispers of the failing light. They Grieve offers us post-apocalypse in all its majesty and melancholy.” Tunes for the Great Doom.
Grymm’s Top Ten(ish) of 2022
Grymm has tidings of musical wisdom in his Top Ten(ish) of 2022. Partake of it.