Mr eel
New Metal Irregular #1
She Said Destroy - This City Speaks in Tongues
In my opinion their last LP was seriously under-rated and this LP is even better. Mechanistic and limber, it’s fucking vicious. It’s got all your metal tropes, but is precise and emotive — a record of tightly controlled and clearly expressed rage.
I have to make mention of the production on this album; it’s fantastic. The drums in particular are excellently recorded and mixed. Rather than a low-end rumble of kick-drums, they’re mixed into the mid-range, which suits the fast and mechanical rolls across the toms, the punctuated kicks and blast-beats.
Agalloch - The Mantle
Many black metal bands have been open to traditional/folk influences and honestly, the results are usually complete shit. Agalloch have dodged that bullet here, by framing the integration of folk in acoustic-rock. Beautiful melodies and crisp guitar. It doesn’t have the form of black metal, but it certainly shares the spirit of much of it. Yearning and sorrow and loss.
I honestly didn’t expect to like this album so much, but it’s very good.
Menace Ruine - The Die is Cast
Traditional European music passed through the lens of black metal. Cold and bitter elegies smothered in distortion and pinned down by dim, cavernous blast-beats. It’s a bizarre but beautiful combination.
Mord - Christendom Perished
Basically these guys are fucking pissed off and hate everything. Not particularly innovative, but if you want some harsh and unremitting black metal, these dudes will sort you out.
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