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Not only did Intronaut just release its fourth full-length, Habitual Levitations (Instilling Words With Tones), on Tuesday, but the band also recently wrapped up a tour in support of Meshuggah. Needless to say, the quartet probably spent quite a bit of time driving from show to show. Sacha Dunable was kind enough to pass along…

Immolation’s been kicking the death metal coffin for longer than most of you—they formed in 1988—have been alive. Go back a few more years when the Yonkers troupe were Rigor Mortis (not to be confused with the Texas-based Hall of Famers Rigor Mortis) and before that Defcon, well, it’s fair to say the surviving members…

I have a pet hamster. His name is Ozzy. He is adorable but terrified of everything. However, over the course of his cohabitation with me, he’s become acclimated to the sounds of heavy metal, probably due to the fact that I play it for 16 hours a day. I’ve discovered that he actually has quite…

It’s funny, the press releases that accompany doom records are unlike any of your typical puff-sheets, the purpose of which, of course, is to sell you on the record. No, the doom press release always comes with the caveats abound, stressing the oppressive track lengths, moribund subject matter, and advising helpfully that “it’s not for…

5. Loudblast – Sublime Dementia 1993 (Semetary) Appearing with three tracks on Century Media’s cool In The Eyes of Death compilation in 1991, Loudblast were virtually unknown outside the four corners of France even though they’d released two full-lengths and a string of demos prior to Sublime Dementia. Loudblast twisted Schuldiner’s brutal/melodic idiosyncrasies (from Human)…

Welcome to Tales From the Metalnomicon, a twice-monthly column delving into the surprisingly vast world of heavy metal-tinged/inspired literature and metalhead authors… Though perhaps currently better known as one of the most innovative and imaginative artists currently plying his trade in the world of heavy metal design, Joshua Andrew Belanger also happens to be an…

Attn: London’s Live Evil Festival 2013 has just announced a bunch of bands, and as you’d probably expect from the underground’s most, uhh, kvltly curated festival, with 100% of the line-up endorsed by Fenriz’s Band of the Week blog, they are all 100% poseur-free and awesome. Legendary Chilean death-thrashers Pentagram will be joined by: Arkham…

To paraphrase my favorite comic, Mitch Hedberg (R.I.P.), Semantik Punk is a Polish experimental punk outfit that people will either love or hate, or think they’re okay.  They’re hardcore enough to sound like a badly scratched Converge or Dillinger Escape Plan CD that won’t stop skipping to random spots on the disc; they’re rock enough…

If you’re a fan of Lightning Bolt’s immensely quirky, insanely loud, outsider extreme music, then the name Brian Chippendale is probably very familiar to you. He’s the dervish behind the drums, often seen wearing a sock on his head with a microphone sewn into it as he seemingly grows three extra arms so as to…

BATILLUS kicked off a month of shows in support of its latest record, the awesome Concrete Sustain, at the end of February. The trek has seen them scoot across the Midwest, over to the left coast and, most recently, Pitchfork’s Show No Mercy SXSW showcase in Austin, TX (check out the band’s remaining dates below)….

The latest inclusion in the Shredder’s Studio was inevitable. Kurt Ballou is no stranger to the Dec-faithful; he played on Hall of Fame and top album of the 00s certified masterpiece Jane Doe; laid down riffs on last year’s best record and helped close out our 100th issue party. Mr. Ballou is writing the kinds…

There are times when you just want to forget the world around you and just cut a Persian rug. Great rock records were made without worrying what Tom, Dick, and Harriet Tubman were up to and how they perceived a sound, a scene, a recording technique, or a pair of pants. Sweden’s Spiritual Beggars have…

My first exposure to Maserati came when they opened for Mono a few years back. I had no idea who they were or what their deal was, but as soon as they kicked into their post-rock-meets-80s-motorik groove, I was sold. In fact, compared to them, Mono were positively soporific. I’ve made a point to try…

This morning Decibel is pleased to bring you an exclusive stream of the latest slab of uber-brutal, raw-as-fuck experimental noise metal from the true (and truly bizarre) power trio Terminator 2. It’s drawn from the Handmade Birds cassette series and it is nuts. Here’s what the label has to say about the release: We know…

“RICHIE HAWTIN is someone that I got exposed to when I was maybe seventeen or eighteen, at an age when I was most into the metal scene, and something just clicked with me. He had these records that were so trancey but trance in the sense of trance-inducing not trance dance music. You just get…

Now, you might be thinking, “Oy, what’s this Cauldron song doing as a Deciblog premiere?!” We realize Cauldron’s new long-player hit the streets—in the UK and Europe at least—last autumn, but this is the first time the Canucks have Tomorrow’s Lost available to North American hesher fiends without the import price on new Earache venture…

ANTHRAX are back at it and because Worship Music wasn’t that bad, this bird brain had high hopes for the EP Anthems. Then I saw it was a covers EP. Oof. This thing stinks more than a pile of homeless people fighting over a bag of buttholes. You really want to hear a bunch of…

So, you’ve been hunting for a specific Decibel back issue, but the webstore says it’s sold out. Short of the advent of time travel, we can’t help you with procuring a print edition, but now that Decibel is available in the iTunes Store, you can revisit your favorite extremely extreme magazine in digital form. Away…

I like the new October Falls record.  How much do I like it?  You’ll have to wait for the next issue of Decibel to find out exactly, or you could completely ignore me (I would) and just listen to the album right here before you can buy it.  If you’re familiar with Mr. Lehto’s expressions…

As if you needed any more incentive to attend this year’s second annual Decibel Magazine Tour—featuring not only headliners Cannibal Corpse, Napalm Death and Immolation, but rotating openers Beyond Creation, Cretin and Magrudergrind—it gives us great pleasure to announce eight one-off openers for select locations. Blast beats, please: MAMMOTH GRINDER May 10 / Houston, TX…

Last year, Torche was so stoked about the coming of summer that it passed along a “summer fun” mix. To help get ready for the warmer weather this year, we enlisted the assistance of Inter Arma guitarist Trey Dalton to tell us about some albums to spin once “spring has come and it’s time to…

Quick test: go check your music shelf or your iTunes. How many metal albums have some kind of mention of the Devil? A third? How did that symbolism get there in the first place? Why is it so powerful, and so enduring? In the second installment of blues into metal, we’re honored to have bluesman…

The last time HOD made album-related headlines was with 2009’s Serpent on the Ibex Moon label. Well, denizens of death, destruction, and ophidian-related apocalypse scenarios, San Antonio-based HOD have prepared the The Uncreated Demo, as a stop-gap EP between Serpent and as-yet-label-signed long-player, Book of the Worm. Self-described as “real fucking metal,” HOD—not to be…

As much as I swore I was never going to do a blog post about goddamn Metallica, when Bazillion Point Books contacted me about doing a spread celebrating the 30th anniversary of Cliff Burton’s first show with Metallica (March 5, 1983, for those of you who aren’t so good with math) – featuring actual photographs…

Bombay metal stalwarts Bhayanak Maut — “terrible death” in Hindi — are a groove n’ grind powerhouse. That much is beyond dispute. But listening to the band’s latest EP Metastasis, one nagging question did arise: Say Decibel gets all fired up and flies halfway around the world to see a Bhayanak Maut home country performance…

When Horror Pain Gore Death’s commander-in-chief sent through IMPALERS‘ debut LP Power Behind the Throne it really looked like the email concerned some band called Impalas. Swear to God. And how cool a band name would that be? Okay, when they’re leaping around the savanna Impalas come across too cutesy for old-school thrash metal, but…

5. Thou Art Lord – Thou Art Lord’s first logo was sort of a cross between the Mysticum and Mayhem’s logos. Not sure why they changed it—several times, in fact—to a dumb font or a hand-scrawled atrocity, but the Greek supagroup got it right. Just look at it! It’s Christ’s greatest foe. The symmetry and…

Welcome to Tales From the Metalnomicon, a twice-monthly column delving into the surprisingly vast world of heavy metal-tinged/inspired literature and metalhead authors… Though the teeming masses may not have caught on quite yet, Dark Discoveries has long been one of the absolute best magazines for lovers of horror fiction/culture, casting an aesthetic net wide enough…

Early in 2011, I was floored by a band I had never heard before making noise I never knew I always wanted to hear.  They’re from Finland, so, yeah.  Duh.  At this point I expect sweet Finnish lullabies to kick my ass and melt my face. The phrase “Wisdom through Agony into Illumination and Lunacy”…

My blog post this week was supposed to feature an interview with…someone. Someone – well, more like some band – who bailed on my exquisite line of questioning at the last minute. Which is fine when compared to the other ass hats who agreed to take their place and assume their position in internet history…