For those not familiar with the musician Adrian Weiss, let it be know that this Düsseldorf-based 1976 born German guitarist started out his career with Prog Rock/ metal act Thought Sphere, having picked up his instrument for the first time at the age of 15.
Raum Kingdom are a young act from Ireland. Recently the band (vocalist Dave Lee, bassist Ronan Connor, guitar player Andrew Colohan, and drummer Mark Gilchrist) entered the Dead Dog Studio to record this first album, which clocks nearly half an hour. This self-titled EP was mixed and mastered by Jonny Kerr, known from the Pantera-tribute act TamporA, or Sludge / Crust / Grind band Fuckhammer, amongst others.
Blackwitch Pudding are a trio of wizards (Space Wizard, Lizard Wizard and Wizard Wizard), formed about six hundred years ago, out of some witch’s womb. They were trained in the Dark Arts of Doom and Witchery, searching for cosmic nothingness, creating heavy riffs and even heavier smoke. That’s my impression of this combo’s existence, inspired by the smoky biography I received.
The Aachen, Germany-based band Ius Talionis is very young, but they immediately impress the Dark Underworld with their demo Eleutheromania. The quartet (guitar player Viator Noctis, bass player Nár, vocalist Koshmar and drummer Ryu) started playing together under this moniker as from October 2013, but it sounds as if they used to perform as a team for quite some time, for this demonstrational recording sounds extremely adult and cohesive.
Craang are a Greek trio (guitarist / vocalist Manos, bass player Mike and drummer Nick) that release their debut themselves on CD. In early 2015 the material will be printed on vinyl too via the German label Pink Tank, which this band recently signed to. The result is a four-tracker, which has a total running time of more than forty minutes. Indeed, To The Estimated Size Of The Universe consists of very lengthy songs that last in between eight and fifteen minutes.
Skrømt are a pretty young band (formed in 2011), originally acting as a trio, and now being a quartet. In the beginning Skrømt were meant to be a hobby-project to the members’ other bands (like Lotus, Slug Syndicate or Fatal Frequency). Very recently they recorded their first album, which was originally meant to be a demonstrational recording.
Melmak was formed in 2010 by the Etxebarria brothers, the band is a duo which combines the darkness of the doom metal, so both brothers could put their favorite genres in it. And with this combination, the guys try to make a statement with the madness of the hardcore to explain the situation of the human being and what are the possible solutions not to extinguish as we know it...Cool concept, lovely try, nice effort…..but it doesn’t work with the doom metal influences. Don’t get me wrong, it has a nice underground vibe…but that’s where it ends.
Arising Fear was founded back in 2008 in Bavaria, by Alex Rauh (vocals/guitar), Kevin Pöllmann (guitar/vocals), Tobi Möhring (drums) and Tom Franz (bass). They wanted to make music with catchy hooks, complex song structures and hard head banger riffs.
Okay, so let's put it straight-forward from the get-go, that this is nót about the '90s Canadian Hard Rock/ Glam Metal/ Heavy Metal act which left us two rather different albums (1992's eponymous album and 1995's Inwire, both released through major label BMG's subsidiary Ariola) before disbanding in 1996 (they actually reformed in 2007, and even recorded one gig which is planned for release on DVD in the future, but then their guitarist Dee Cernile died of lung cancer in 2012).
This Toronto based Canadian Metallic Hardcore act was founded in 2011 by singer Michael Kopko, guitarists Dave Caporale and Danny Panzini, bassist Jules Parris, and a drummer whose name I was unable to retrieve.
