You ever go to your parents’ house, watch football all Sunday, and forget to feed their dog? Week 2 in the books. Let’s do this. Skinhand I met Ryan Wolfe, drummer of Richmond doom band Windhand, back in 2012, when I booked his band the first time they came through Chicago. After load-in, he asked me if…

Anaal Nathrakh doesn’t — or at least shouldn’t — require much of an introduction — the ridiculously consistent Birmingham black metallers are simply one of the most utterly fearsome and inventive outfits currently operating in the modern extreme metal scene. Elite level mind-fuckers. Aural devastators. Masters of what the band’s new Metal Blade bio calls…

Peaceville: the venerable label is home to some of Decibel‘s all time favorites: Darkthrone, Autopsy and My Dying Bride. Lest you think the label is resting on their laurels they continue to push bands out into the extreme universe. Today we’re streaming some Peaceville-approved symphonic metal: “A Prisoner Unleashed” from the forthcoming White Empress album…

When a veteran band finds its second wind working with a certain producer, it’s totally understandable if they decide to stick to that same collaboration for an extended period. Cannibal Corpse went through it in the wake of the stunning success of 2006’s return-to-form Kill; realizing they had found a perfect partner in producer Erik…

The Spanish answer to Behemoth, Noctem have been slamming out blackened death metal since 2001. Their third full-length, Exilium, drops today, and it sounds pretty damn evil. Of course, like many bands in the style, Noctem are big fans of symphonic bombast. In fact, one of the bonus tracks for the album is an orchestral…

If there’s a select group of people responsible for Decibel becoming the magazine it is today, one of those people is undoubtedly Katherine Ludwig. Why? Because as the founding editor of Metal Maniacs magazine, she helped spearhead extreme-music journalism. Unlike the more popular Metal Edge, a sort of US Weekly of hair metal bands, Metal…

Hope you’re ready to get dirty this morning, people — the super-pissed self-titled EP from Wilmington, North Carolina hardcore upstarts Society Sucker streaming below is rife with gloriously grimy grooves, rancid earworm riffage, and nasty, nasty straight-from-the-gutter breakdowns. Officially out on September 16th, preorders for Society Sucker are on seafoam green, gold/yellow clear or black…

Medusa Records is a label most metalheads won’t recognize. Based in Culver City, California, the label had a decent stint from 1986 to 1990, releasing a cadre of thrashers from Wrath and Wasted Youth to Christian metal acts Barren Cross and Vengeance Rising (remember their inexplicable inclusion in Hard ‘N Heavy’s Grindcore Special Issue VHS?)….

Isn’t this supposed to be a good time of year for releases?  Hmmm… well, there are SOME things. Welcome, oh ye Wizards of Gore. CANNIBAL CORPSE are back at it with A Skeletal Domain.  And what’s to be said about the 12th release by a forerunner in the genre of death metal? Well, if you’re not familiar…

We at Decibel Magazine wish to apologize for not doing enough to support the development and dissemination of grind.  By including occasional articles about other forms of heavy music, some of which include discernible tempos and recognizably human vocals, we have polluted the “scene” (which died 15 years ago, though our anger about it keeps…