Ceremony of Silence – Halios Review

Opening with a swarm of discordant riffs on “Primaeval Sacrifice”, the listener must adapt to Halios’ rapidly advancing tide or give in to the swallow of the maelstrom. Formerly a duo, Ceremony of Silence has now become a trio. And combined with a sleeker, fuller production, Halios sounds a lot more polished and a lot more mean than 2019’s Outis ever could.

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Maere – …and the Universe Keeps Silent Review

The best works of dissonant avant-garde metal shed the harmonic framework of power chords, blues scales and chord-scale approaches to soloing to explore something else. Maere, however, do not manage the feat of deconstruction, an approach that, after the old structures have broken down, needs something additional in the new space. That is to say, the fancy prance of a young buck isn’t always enough to sway our Goat.

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