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Hah...now there's a novel thing: a band describing themselves as “Austrian Alpencore”. As to what that entails, I will tell you later...first we do the history bit, okay?

Aahhh, Hawkwind...masters of Psychedelic Space Rock! You know, it's the first time I'm being asked to review an album by this great band revolving around guitarist Dave Brock? Due to our usual Spaced-out specialist temporarily being unavailable, you see, and although it means extra work in my to-do box, I'm not exactly complaining!

Dark Forest are a UK quintet, who present us on “The awakening” a slab of traditional  heavy metal.

The people at Victory Records really have a nice taste of music, concentrating on bands which are musically special, and somewhat “out-of-the-box”. Originally concentrating on the Hardcore and Punk genres, the guys have meanwhile broadened that palate to include bands from other genres...but at all times, there's still that somewhat special side to the bands, which stems from a will to bring something slightly more progressive.

Like so many of us music lovers outside Greece, I first got acquainted with Thessaloniki based Groove/ Metalcore act Bewized through the Casket Music/ Copro Records release of their debut full-length The Scorch Of Rage, issued in late April 2011 (review posted around that date is still available in this website's “Archive” section for your factual needs), and promptly catapulted the album into my year-lists!

The new (4^th)  full length releases from Californian Deathcore band  Winds of Plague.

Wasted Bullet is a Melodic Hardcore band from the Netherlands. The band consists of: Robbert  (vocals), Joel (drums), Lesley (bass), Max (guitar) and Jasper (guitar). They form a rather young band because their websites contain little to nothing of info or band history. Now the band released an album last November, and to be honest they do an awesome job at it. Especially when you realize this is the bands first full album.

From Central Florida comes a powerhouse band in the metal world from a familiar presence. Guitarist Shane French, is prepared to unleash his new project along with guitarist / vocalist Morrie Vozdeck. The called themselves “Voz”. Joining Morrie and Shane is drummer John Teer.

Oh my, talk about milking out successful events! In late 2010, Brian Fallon (lead singer/ guitarist of The Gaslight Anthem) and his guitar tech Ian Perkins got together to write songs together for a side-project of theirs, which he announced as concentrating “...on the dark side of soul music...”. In essence, they were writing some singer-songwriter songs with somewhat darker lyrics, and the two headed to a studio to record a total of 12 original songs.

Having come across this Finnish band's name as a reference in Circle's most recent album Incarnation, I felt no reluctance whatsoever about having to review this quartet's most recent outing.