I’ve never been on tour, but I’d imagine that being couped up in a car/van/bus with the same people for hours on end necessitates certain accoutrements. One of the most basic and relevant for our purposes, of course, is the car stereo. The AUX jack may put your entire library at your fingertips, but just…

Any time we receive a note promising music that “marries traditional coal mining songs with harsh, expansive black metal” we’re intrigued. And Panopticon’s “Kentucky” is sort of the metal equivalent of a William Faulkner novel: dense, multifacted but also soulful. The album, due in June from Handmade Birds/Pagan Flames, touches on the difficulty and despair…

Most of the Deci-faithful haven’t heard of prog wizards Mörglbl, but I’m sure there are a few who know guitar maniac Christophe Godin, who’s somewhere between legends Allan Holdsworth, Mattias Eklundh (of the underrated Freak Kitchen) or Steve Vai. Or, somewhere between the groove-thrash of Pantera, the zaniness of Primus, and Holdsworth’s fusion genius. Sans…

Seattle’s brutalest, techiest, deathgrindiest band in Seattle is going on tour. Theories (feat. members of Samothrace, Skarp and Scourge Schematic) is ravaging the west as they head to and from Chaos in Tejas, creating fans from whatever audience members don’t thrash themselves to death. They start in Seattle with a set opening for demi-gods Nasum…

We already had occasion to cream our jeans a couple weeks back in anticipation of this awesome Toxic Holocaust/Municipal Waste split 12″ on Tankcrimes Records, but now we have the pleasure of tantalizing you with two(!) tracks from said four-song EP. This nut-busting coupling of two of our favorite thrashers comes in a number of…

Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s wife is one thing, but a sexy little slip of tightly-grooved, undulating vinyl polymer? Altogether another. Or so we’ve surmised from the announcement that Divine Metal Distro — “the premier online source for Christian Hard Rock & Heavy Metal” — and Ultimatum — proud instigators of several crown of…

A meeting of minds between Opeth’s big chief Mikael Åkerfeldt and Porcupine Tree’s Steven Wilson, Storm Corrosion is a down-beat, atmospheric heavyweight that is the sort of Weird Science fantasy wet dream prog-heads have been jonesing for ever since Wilson took over production duties on Opeth’s groundbreaking Blackwater Park. Their eponymous debut eschews any of…

French/Finnish combo Deathspell Omega have taken black metal to its most mystical extreme. They decline interviews (only handful since forming in 1998), are extraordinarily camera shy, and wouldn’t be caught metaphysically dead performing live in front of an audience. Now, most of this is conjecture. They may do interviews—with each other—and they may have a…

So for his first solo album, YOB mainman Mike Scheidt has gone the way of Wino and like 57 percent of Neurosis and decided to showcase his sensitive singer-songwriter side.  This thing is unplugged all the way, and I would be lying if I said that it wasn’t the least extreme thing ever featured on…

“We want to get out there and pretty much destroy,” says Six Feet Under vocalist Chris Barnes in a Metal Blade press release. “We want to play to as many people as possible, and show all of the fans out there the new songs, and leave nothing but a trail of blood in our wake….