This week's new heavy metal releases include Spanish metal legends, controlled chaos, haunted riffs, and more! To the metals…
Caligula's Horse – Charcoal Grace
Genre: Progressive metal/rock
Origin: Brisbane, Queensland, Australia
Label: InsideOut
Buy now on Bandcamp
One of modern prog's best is back with another win. Charcoal Grace is a fine balance of technicality, grand melodies, catchy earworms, and heavy grooves. There are also lots of self-referential Easter eggs in the record for the eagle…eared(?) listener.
Exocrine – Legend
Genre: Technical death metal
Origin: Bordeaux, France
Label: Season Of Mist
Buy now on Bandcamp
Want your tech with that catchy, melodic stuff toned down? Hop on this then. Legend, is an intense flurry of pummeling rhythms and just so many notes. Maybe all of the notes. It manages to include a variety of other influences which are nice breaks from the onslaught.
Hiraes – Dormant
Genre: Melodic death metal
Origin: Hanover/Osnabrück, Lower Saxony, Germany
Label: Napalm
Buy now on Bandcamp
Dig Arch Enemy and Amon Amarth but want some more modern flair? Well, great news for you and your very specific want. Hiraes have you covered. Rhythms are driving and the guitar work is catchy as hell. Very cool record.
Lucifer – Lucifer V
Genre: Heavy metal/doom
Origin: Berlin, Germany
Label: Nuclear Blast
Buy now on Bandcamp
Speaking of cool records, the latest from Lucifer is all swagger and doom. Johanna Platow Andersson's voice is the star as always, but the band really bring the smoky heavy metal jams in a great way. This would be a great one for bands eagerly awaiting the next Ghost record.
Mägo de Oz – Alicia en el Metalverso
Genre: Folk metal
Origin: Begoña, Madrid, Spain
Label: Warner Music Spain
Buy now on Amazon
We don't talk about Mägo de Oz enough and that's a shame. This is the band's seventeenth record of epic, folk metal and while the decades have done numbers on their lineup, this is still a solid entry in the catalog of these legends. Features new vocalist Rafa Blas, which might be an adjustment for some.
Slower – Slower
Genre: Doom Slayer covers
Origin: USA/Sweden
Label: Heavy Psych Sounds
You know those videos where it's like, "What would Slayer sound like as a doom band?" Well this all star collective set out to answer that question. Said band includes Esben Willems of Monolord, Peder Bergstrand of Lowrider, Scott Reeder of Kyuss, Amy Barrysmith of Year Of The Cobra, Laura Pleasants of Kylesa, and Bob Balch of Fu Manchu. Pretty solid selection of songs including "War Ensemble," "Dead Skin Mask," "The Antichrist," and more.
Vipassi – Lightless
Genre: Progressive/extreme metal
Origin: Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
Label: Century Media Records
Buy now on Bandcamp
In 2016 Vipassi quietly released one of the most interesting instrumental prog metal EPs in a while with Śūnyatā. It's been eight years since then and they're finally here with their first full record. This one is just as interesting. One can't help but hear Ne Obliviscaris in there, which makes sense with half the band being current or past members of NeO, but there are so many other layers to it. Jordan's full review is right here.
Vitriol – Suffer & Become
Genre: Death metal
Origin: Portland, Oregon
Label: Century Media
Buy now on Bandcamp
Wrapping this week with some death metal with just the right about of prog in there. Suffer & Become is the kind of record your family may dismiss as noise, but it's a perfect example of controlled chaos in a record. Every musician is at the top of their game here. Jeff's full review is here.
Also dropping this week…
- Alkaline Trio – Blood, Hair, And Eyeballs (Rise) – Punk
- Almost Dead – Destruction Is All We Know (Innerstrength) – Groove metal/thrash
- Any Given Day – Limitless (Arising Empire) – Metalcore
- Autumns Eyes – Grimoire Of Oak & Shadow (Self-released) –
- Bib – Biblical (Quality Control HQ) – Punk
- Blood Red Throne – Nonagon (Soulseller) – Death metal
- Emil Bulls – Love Will Fix It (Arising Empire) – Hard rock/heavy metal
- Byron – Chapter II: The Lotus Covenant (The Goatmancer Records) – Heavy metal/doom
- Carnal Savagery – Into The Abysmal Void (Moribund) – Death metal
- Cognizance – Phantazein (Willowtip) – Technical melodic death metal/deathcore
- Command – Resver (Jawbreaker) – Heavy metal
- Corax B.M. – Pagana (The Circle) – Black metal
- Cosmic Void – Subterranean Rivers (Self-released) Death metal
- Dead Poet Society – Fission (Spinefarm) – hard rock/progressive
- Dipygus – Dipygus (Memento Mori) – Death metal
- Dissimulator – Lower Form Resistance (20 Buck Spin) – Thrash/technical death metal
- Dreamworm – The Journey (Self-released) – Progressive metal/rock
- Dripping Decay – Ripping Remains EP (Satanik Royalty)
- Drowned – Procul His (Sepulchral Voice) – Death metal
- Dymytry – Five Angry Men (AFM) – Deathcore/groove metal
- Eye Flys – Eye Flys (Thrill Jockey) – Sludge/hardcore
- Forlesen/Lotus Thief – Split (I, Voidhanger Records) – Doom/ambient black metal
- Frank Carter & The Rattlesnakes – Dark Rainbow (Self-released) – Punk
- Funeral Winds – 333 (Osmose) – Black metal
- The Gems – Phoenix (Napalm) – Rock
- Ghost Atlas – Dust Of The Human Shape (UNFD) – Alternative rock
- Greengoat – A.I. (Argonauta) – Stoner metal/rock
- Guhts – Regeneration (Seeing Red) – Avant-garde post-metal
- Hearts & Hand Grenades – Where I Begin (Eclipse) – Hard rock
- Hellman – Born, Suffering, Death (Black Lodge/Sound Pollution) – Death n roll
- Hyloxalus – Make Me The Heart Of The Black Hole (Self-released) – Power metal
- The Infernal Sea – Hellfenlic (Candlelight) – Black metal
- Jenner – Prove Them Wrong (Fighter) – Speed metal/thrash
- Junta – Junta (Sentient Ruin) – Hardcore
- Kaonashi – The 3 Faces of Beauty: A Violent Misinterpretation of Morgan Montgomery (Equal Vision Records) – Metalcore
- Kalt Vindur – Magna Mater (The Circle) – Progressive black metal/doom
- Kill The Thrill – Autophagie (Season Of Mist) – Industrial/post-punk
- Knoll – As Spoken (Self-released) Grindcore.death metal
- Luciferian Rites – Oath Of Midnight Ashes (Moribund) – Black metal
- Manticora – Mycelium (Mighty) – Heavy metal
- Mega Colossus – Showdown (Cruz Del Sur) – Heavy metal
- Metalite – Expedition One (AFM) – Power metal
- Midnatt/Overture – Swedish Metal Splilt (Gates Of Hell/Jawbreaker) – Heavy metal
- Mountain Caller – Chronicle II: Hypergenesis (Church Road) – Progressive post-metal
- Necrotum – Defleshed Exhumation (Memento Mori) – Death metal
- New Model Army – Unbroken (earMusic) – Post-punk/folk
- Oberst – Invisible Hands (Indie Recordings) – Progressive/alternative metal
- Olhava – Sacrifice (Avantgarde) – Atmospheric/post black metal
- Rhun – Conveyance in Death (House of Inkantation) – Black metal
- Rituals of the Dead Hand – The Wretched and the Vile (Immortal Frost Productions) Black metal/doom
- Satyasena – Satyasena (Self-released) – Psychedelic heavy metal
- Static-X – Project Regeneration: Vol. 2 (Self-released) – Nu metal/industrial
- Stone Horns – Age Of Chimairas (Rockshots) – Groove metal
- Stuporous – Asylum's Lament (Void Wanderer) – Experimental black metal
- Tanin’iver – Dark Evils Desecrate (Morning Star Heresy) – Black/death metal
- Thunder – Live At Islington Academy (earMusic) – Hard rock
- Thunder – Live At Leeds (earMusic) – Hard rock
- Various Artists – Mesmerized – A Tribute To Celtic Frost (A Time To Kill) – Various
- Whitechapel – Live In The Valley (Metal Blade) – Deathcore
- Wizard Death – I Am The Night (Self-released) – Heavy metal
