Holdeneye throws his weight around with a hefty Top Ten(ish) list. Can you move it? Likely not.
Wachenfeldt
Heavy Moves Heavy 2022 – AMG’s Ultimate Workout Playlist
“Four mighty contributors shaped Heavy Moves Heavy 2022. Ferox, Thus Spoke, Holdeneye, and Steel Druhm each chose the ten songs released this year that dominated our respective workouts. The resulting playlist is appended to this article. Play it straight through or set it to shuffle; HMH is designed to work either way.” Go heavy because there is no going home.
Behemoth – Opvs Contra Natvram Review
“While I don’t consider myself to be a huge Behemoth fan—in fact, I haven’t even listened to all of their releases—I rather enjoy most of the band’s albums with which I’m familiar. Demigod is a blackened death classic, and I like The Apostasy quite a bit too—and not just because it features an appearance by my beloved Warrel Dane (R.I.P.). The Satanist had some great moments, but the amount of pretense on display was a bit unnerving. And that sense of foreboding was ultimately justified with the release of its follow-up, the at times cringy I Loved You at Your Darkest. While initially hesitant to cover that album’s successor, I was overcome by curiosity.” Curiosity and the beast.
Wachenfeldt – Faustian Reawakening Review
“Just over three years ago, I lost my damn mind over Wachenfeldt’s debut album The Interpreter. I gushed so mightily over its symphonic, thrashened, blackened death metal that hazardous material mitigation crews are still working around the clock to clean up the contamination. That record executed its dark mission so well that it eventually became my Album ‘o the Year for 2019, so if I said that its successor was my most anticipated album of 2022, it would be a gargantuan understatement.” Fanboys awaken.
Grand Harvest – Consummatum Est Review
“Ostensibly labeled as “death-doom,” Grand Harvest plays a powerful mixture of styles that includes but transcends such a label. Each of the record’s eight proper tracks displays its own unique personality while still fitting nicely within the band’s core sound. Combining the rhythmic barbarism of Bolt Thrower or Asphyx with the introspective atmospheric black metal of a band like Eneferens, Grand Harvest is able to convey their esoteric message while covering a wide swath of emotional territory.” Harvesting of sorrows
Wombbath – Agma Review
“Wombbath is a band that seems ruthlessly intent on making up for lost time. Lying dormant for 20 years after an initial run in the early 90s, the project was revived in 2014 by longtime guitarist Håken Stuvemark and the omnipresent Jonny Pettersson. Two albums saw the light of day in the band’s first four years back together, but then things went into hyperdrive following the additions of drummer Jon Rudin and guitarist Thomas von Wachenfeldt.” For Womb the bell tolls.
Holdeneye and Cherd of Doom’s Top Ten(ish) of 2020
Holdeneye and Cherd of Doom made these long-winded lists and now they’re your problem. No trade backsies!
Wombbath – Tales of Madness Review
“Heeeere’s Jonny! Again! I’m not sure how many albums Jonny Pettersson has released in 2020, but this is the third I’ve covered, and the second by his Wombbath project. The band released the sprawling, mostly compelling, Choirs of the Fallen back in March and have since signed with Transcending Obscurity Records. Not wanting to wait to see where this new partnership might take them, Jonny and co. are releasing Tales of Madness, a collection of several rerecorded demo tracks from the band’s pre-Jonny past.” Womb service.
Reek – Death Is Something There Between Review
“Cometh the year, cometh the man. Rogga Johansson is once more pillaging our pages with yet another death metal project (1 of the 73,832,799 death metal or death metal-adjacent albums to which he has contributed), this time with a band called Reek.” Smell the Rogga.
Wombbath – Choirs of the Fallen Review
“Not long after the release of Internal Caustic Torments, Wombbath went on indefinite hiatus for two decades, only to be resurrected by one Jonny Pettersson. For those not in the know, Pettersson is to Swedeath what Rogga Johansson is to… well, Swedeath. Playing a role in over a dozen active bands to include Heads for the Dead, Gods Forsaken, and Just Before Dawn, Pettersson is a necromancer advancing upon the outskirts of civilization with a horde of stinking, rotting death metal bands, ready to add yours to his ever-growing army.” Womb metal.
