More New Metal for Your Listening Pleasure
Wednesday, October 26th, 2011 by steffmetal
Phew! I don’t know about you, but October has been a crazy month for me. I’ve travelled across New Zealand and back – twice, slept for four days in a Viking tent, interviewing metal bands, running Metal Guitar Week on my blog, being interviewed on Rock n Roll bride, planned my Halloween costume, ran a photo shoot and worked on the launch for my new heavy metal webcomic – Corpsepaintkitty.com!
With all this going on, the only thing keeping me sane is the constant pounding of heavy metal in my ears. Here are some of the albums that are making me happy right now.
The Physicists – Observation
This unusual Finnish outfit combine death metal, lyrics about mad scientists and mathematics gone awry, and electronic bleeps and bloops to create a crazy sound described only as “Mathdeathboogie”. Observation is catchy as hell and one of the most original metal albums released this year.
The Universe Divide – Dust Settles on the Odontophobes
Instrumental albums are always a bitch to pull off – they either end up drawn-out and boring, or overblown exercises in guitar virtuosity. Dust Settles on the Odontophobes is neither – it’s a piece of poetic, progressive mastery that draws you in right from the first note.
Oak Pantheon – The Void (EP)
A killer debut EP from one of the most sophisticated melodic black metal bands I’ve heard in a long time. Oak Pantheon use keyboard and acoustic guitar sections to create a masterpiece of atmospheric BM. Fans of Agalloch will dig this album.
Opeth – Heritage
If you fell in love with Opeth’s beautiful, haunting progressive death metal and lead singer Mikael Akerfeldt’s mix of clean vocals and growls, Heritage may come as a bit of a surprise. On this album Opeth have done away with the harsh vocals and much of the death metal and created a purely progressive rock odyssey. Fans of porcupine tree and Jethro Tull will find much to enjoy here.
Pain – You Only Live Twice
Germany’s answer to nu-metal bands like Disturbed, this project of Hypocricy’s Peter Tägtgren kicks out another album of punchy riffs and hard rock groove mixed with 80s electronica and techno.
Van Canto – Break the Silence
Van Canto started off as a metal covers band with a difference – they sing acapella (unaccompanied by instruments). That means every riff, every solo, every bass line is done for the five vocalists. What started off as a bit of a joke has now turned into four studio albums and headlining shows across Europe. Van Canto’s forth album, Break the Silence, is a great mix of covers (Sabaton, Manowar, Running Wild) and originals from the fun German band.
What are you listening to right now?
Who am I? I’m Steff. Born in New Zealand, raised on a steady diet of metal and out-of-print archaeology books, I’m now a freelance writer, accessible formats producer, and full-time iron maiden.
You can keep up to date with all the metal madness at my Steff Metal blog. I update 4 times a week with reviews, articles, advice and silliness about living the metal lifestyle. And, for alternative biz owners, I run a creative business community for the dark side at Grymm & Epic.
Keep it brutal \m/
Steff
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