Stortregn produced my favorite record of 2021. Impermanence stands as what most Tech Death, and even fewer Melodic Death, Metal bands could not achieve—a Progressive album without using any of the tropes of the genre, forming instead full songs of smaller themes and motifs. I couldn’t tell you what the album was about—the cover art displaying Girardi’s patented space-bunghole lost all meaning years ago—but I surely felt it, on an emotional and intellectual level alike. Drink deeply of death metal and cosmic anus.
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Arborescence of Wrath – Inferno Review
Arborescence of Wrath, a band adorned with members of Origin and Marduk, ventures into the realm of Technical Brutal Death Metal with their debut. Will their music soar above the sea of mediocrity, or drown into the pool of lacklustre blastfests?
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Seraphic Entombment – Sickness Particles Gleam Review
Even when Seraphic Entombment can´t break out of their own framework within a song, there is some slight variation and mood shift. Particularly the two shorter songs breathe some life into the album in how they seem faster and more riff oriented. Maybe some additional CPR is required.
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Steven Wilson – The Harmony Codex Review
What makes much of this material stick is that Steven Wilson is meticulous at sound production and getting a live feel out of the instruments. Mixing this with the Electronic focus of many of these songs makes for some music that operates, production-wise, on a level that is unusual today. Sometimes the future doesn’t bite.
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Shining – SHINING Review
Depressive explorations of death is nothing new for Shining, but there lies a somber feeling over SHINING that is hard to miss: the growing isolation of age and eventual death of everything you know. A shining example of depressive extreme metal.
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Disfiguring The Goddess – The Brutal Machine Review
It is no surprise to me that an album like Disfiguring The Goddess’ newest, The Brutal Machine, has not made waves. The concoction of popular electronic music with Deathcore doesn´t really seem like the thing that the most kvlt among metal elitists would champion, even though it appears similarly extravagant. Time for some brutal reviewer machine.
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Solipnosis – Síntesis Silenciosa Review
The Chilean metal scene is an underrated gem. I’m constantly discovering bands that put a unique spin on genres such as Black Metal, Death Metal, and yes, even Thrash Metal. Solipnosis is one such band, and their take on Blackened Speed/Thrash might be the most out there version I’ve heard yet. The Chilean is out there!
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Cannibal Corpse – Chaos Horrific Review
While most of the band seems to just deliver about the bare minimum, George “Corpsegrinder” Fisher’s minimum is still higher than what most vocalists deliver. Fisher is not the flashiest vocalist and has a certain tone he sticks with, but it is his delivery and phrasing as a kind of master of ceremony that elevates some songs. Enjoyment horrific?
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Putrascension – Forever Below Review
The real highlight on this album is easily Michael Gonçalves (Replicant, Windfaerer). His vocals are absolutely unhinged, giving him a demonic edge that works so well in this style of music. His rabid shrieks, howls, and moans are reasons why it’s easy to come back to the album time and again. A few shrieks to cure the mid-week blues.
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Crypts of the Unknown: Animosity – Animal
