Lists

The last time I saw Alcest live was March 2012. Neige and company headlined a show at Brooklyn’s Public Assembly (a more fitting setting for them than opening for Enslaved at the Gramercy Theater) and brought along Deafheaven and Vaura. Given the creative leaps both of those openers have made since then with their respective…

Consider this here, folks, as an unofficial, off-the-cuff (read: poorly researched and impulsive) addendum to Decibel #112’s Top 20 2014 preview. This being the Internet, consider the following dispatch to be largely free of firm facts such as album/song titles, empirical data (release dates), and official words to corroborate our conjecture as to when said…

East of the Wall dropped its fourth full-length a little over two months ago. But just because we’re a little late getting around to praising Redaction Artifacts doesn’t mean that we don’t hold a special place in our grim hearts for the New Jersey quintet, one that’s been ensconced there since The Postman Syndrome’s 2002…

** Every year we do it. Decibel assembles a list of killer albums based on a secret algorithm. This year, I wanted to add to our Top 40 list (as published HERE). Albums I felt were overlooked on our list. The artists and albums reflect my opinion only and weren’t subject to the secret algorithm….

Many of you might have noticed—If you listen to radio that is, but that’s another blog entirely—on Black Friday many U.S. radio stations flipped from their respective formats to Holiday. All across this great (not so great if you follow Glenn Beck and Sean Hannity with any seriousness) land of ours Adult Contemporary and Pop…

Enabler has had a pretty busy year. Amidst a slew of tour dates (including opening for Rotten Sound throughout the Old World), the group put out two EPs, the most recent of which it dropped last month. As if that wasn’t enough, according to Facebook, the Milwaukeeans are currently tracking their next full-length right now….

Wolvserpent was busy on the road in support of its recently released sophomore LP Perigaea Antahkarana, but it was guitarist/vocalist/keyboardist Blake Green’s other job that made him wary of even taking the time to put together a playlist for us. We’ll let the man himself explain the side effects–which, fortunately for us, he was able…

We presume they had some turkey and stuffing, but Drugs of Faith also celebrated Thanksgiving week by releasing the four-track EP Architectural Failures. The effort–the trio’s first since 2011’s Corroded full-length–is hopefully just a taste of what’s to come as the Virginians are set to drop their next LP in 2014. In the meantime, vocalist/guitarist…

By Whores (and not the kind you’re thinking of, you perverted bastards!) 5. Fight Amp – “Bad Listener” We met Fight Amp through a local Atlanta promoter when we first started out, and they have since become practically part of our extended family. They are one of the best working bands today, and I’d rank…

Last week, we brought you the first part of SubRosa’s playlist covering all things Salt Lake City. I could go on and on about how great their latest record, More Constant Than The Gods, is (one of the “exceptional candidates for the top spot” in this year’s top 40 according to the powers that be),…

We called the latest from Axeslasher a “straight-up thrash-terpiece” in a blurb on our Halloween must-haves list a few weeks back, but Anthology of Terror, Vol. 1 — available here for a cool $6.66 — is sick enough to warrant a bit more coverage. Thus, the following track-by-track, courtesy guitarist/vocalist Justin Lascelle… Mark of the…

I live a mere 2,200 miles due east of Salt Lake City, so needless to say I’m not too familiar with many musical happenings there (other than Gaza, RIP). Fortunately, Rebecca Vernon and the rest of SubRosa were more than happy to educate me about their hometown via the quintet’s SLC music playlist. I’ll let…

We’re all listed out after totalling up the scores for the albums of the year and putting together our Top 100 Black Metal Albums of All Time special issue. But author Dayal Patterson, a man in league with unfathomable evil, kindly dipped into his wellspring of arcane ancient darkness to muster the energy to give…

Given that fall is about halfway over and the weather, at least on the East Coast, is getting frigid, we thought it was a good time to present our second ever season-specific playlist. While Chris Alfieri’s “Song to Burn Leaves To: A New Englander’s Fall Music Companion” compliments Torche’s “Summer Fun” playlist quite nicely, Vattnet…

Dustin Boltjes has a lot of reasons to be pumped right now. His band Skeletonwitch released its fifth (and possibly best) full-length, Serpents Unleashed, on Tuesday (probably the most important item on this list). The Ohio quintet just kicked off a string of tourdates alongside The Black Dahlia Murder. Oh, and he and bandmate Chance…

Halloween is this Thursday. Decibel wants you to be ready. 1. Minor Threat-aping Texas Chainsaw Massacre T-shirt The genius behind this Salad Days EP cover re-imagining… …should start an agency with whoever came up with “Guilty of Being Dwight” pic below, stat: (Picture cribbed from the Salad Days: The D.C. Punk Revolution documentary Facebook page.)…

Back in the fall of 2010, we gave you an early double dose of Halloween and winter, courtesy of the Black Metal Hall of Fame special issue. Three years later, we’re taking our corpsepaint craving to the next demented level and unveiling the Top 100 Black Metal Albums of All Time. We corralled our staff…

Ihsahn–a man who needs no introduction around these parts–has certainly not been bereft of musical ideas lately. He dropped his fifth solo album (coming a mere 16 months after its predecessor) earlier this week and is already talking about its follow-up. To celebrate the release of Das Seelenbrechen, which Adrien Begrand described in our latest…

Dear Brent Burton or Scott Seward (I honestly can’t remember which one of you it was): Thank you for introducing me to Earthless all those years ago, back when our magazine still had its original logo. Not only have I been able to spend the intervening time enjoying the trio’s first two full-lengths and various…

Professor Pizza of AXESLASHER fame stops in this morning to give us four reasons why attending Denver Black Sky is a moral imperative… By Metalheads, For Metalheads Denver Black Sky was masterminded by Skinless vocalist Sherwood Webber. From the start, his goal was to give a collection of hand-selected bands a full professional production and…

In our September cover story, Erik Danielsson told J. Bennett that “it will be interesting to see people’s reaction to [The Wild Hunt].” Those comments were made shortly before Century Media hosted a pre-release private listening party, but Watain‘s frontman could have easily been talking about public reception, particularly now that his band’s fifth full-length…

If you read Jonathan Horsley’s interview with Ben Ward last week, you’d have learned that the dudes in Orange Goblin recently quit their jobs in order to commit full-time to the band. You’d have also read that the UK quartet was about to embark on a massive North American tour that starts tomorrow in New…

There are few guitarists on the planet that get the shredder’s studio worked up as much as former Asphyx and current Grand Supreme Blood Court guitarist Eric Daniels. He writes the riffs that awaken your inner caveman. Eric was kind enough to drop in from across the pond and tell us how he started playing…

It’s hard to believe (for me, at least) that God Is An Astronaut is already into its second decade as a band. In fact, the Irish post-rockers just dropped their seventh full-length, Origins, earlier this month. The record marks a return to Rocket Girl, which also happened to license the first album I heard from…

The dudes in Primitive Man spent much of the summer on the road in support of their debut, Scorn. Like any other touring band, the Denver trio–which features drummer Isidro “Spy” Soto, vocalist/guitarist Ethan Lee McCarthy and bassist Jonathan Campos–has a batch of go-to tunes when it comes time to traverse the good ol’ U.S….

So Randy Larsen and Bernie Romanowski from long-running noisecore antiheroes Cable launched a new project a little while back called Empty Flowers to explore 90s-style smart, seething gut-punch post-hardcore. And the mix actually works! Really fucking well! The band’s debut, Six, created some impressive atmospheres and undercurrents, but the sophomore release Five sees Empty Flowers…

Gorguts released its long-awaited fifth album today, the band’s first in over 12 years. To celebrate, vocalist/guitarist Luc Lemay decided to take a breather from death metal and reveal a little bit of his softer side, highlighting five songs/pieces of music that show the “beauty and poetry in music.” Once you’re done checking out Luc’s…

Matt Harvey is a fan of the San Francisco Giants. He shares the name of the NL East’s pitcher of the future (for the record, I wrote this before his injury and really meant it) who happens to play for a certain NY-based franchise. He also really likes Metallica. Some of us here may hold…

Given that Ulcerate is one of the more forward-thinking death metal bands around (as will again be evidenced on the trio’s upcoming album Vermis), it’s only fitting that drummer Jamie Saint Merat’s playlist fits his group’s modus operandi. As he explains, “Being a drummer, I figured it might be an idea to pick something that…

One-time cover stars Pelican hail from Chicago, metropolis of the Great Lakes states. While last year saw the departure of guitarist Laurent Schroeder-Lebec, new blood has brought new tunes beginning with the 7″ the band will drop next week. To celebrate, guitarists Trevor de Brauw and newcomer Dallas Thomas, bassist Bryan Herweg and drummer Larry…