CD

The first part of a trilogy by legendary Californian act Von. Fifty-five minutes of icy, painful, misanthropic and desolate Aural Darkness.

Toxic Holocaust mutated into existence in 1999, when Joel Grind merged his love for classic punk and metal into his ideal band. Like his influences - Bathory, Venom, English Dogs, Possessed, Broken Bones – TH featured blazing riffs, gravel-throated vocals, and a deadly fixation on the evil in man and a post-apocalyptic world. Grind wrapped all of these elements up with a DIY attitude and begin writing and recording material almost instantly.

Although Comedown Machine is already the 5^th full-length album by this relatively successful New York City based quintet, I have to admit that it's the first time I consciously heard the band's music. The experience, I daresay was a slight disappointment at first, the music not being quite what I had expected.

Terror, hailing from Los Angeles and Richmond, has been around for ten years now and can easily be considered as the hardest working band around: five studio albums, side projects such as Down To Nothing and Donnybrook and countless tours around the world later, they're ready to unleash a new masterpiece.
After the release of the excellent record Keepers Of The Faith, expectations were high.

Taylor’s Universe blend elements of prog with RIO, fusion and jazz giving the listener something to think about. The album is very challenging, but never gets too loud or busy to lose the audience. Although probably categorized somewhere in the fusion camp, Taylor’s Universe have a very fresh feel to it and never gets too difficult for my liking.  The result is a very listenable, free jam-oriented album with plenty of chilled-out instrumentals and infectious hooks.

In a very short time (foundation was in January of 2010) after coming out of the rehearsal room, this Limburg (Belgian province in the Dutch part of the country) based instrumental band made an impression at a couple of band competitions [won 2011's Maanrockrally and Theater Aan Zee (the latter got the band 7500 euros of production budget), and were finalists at that same year's Limbomania]. Not that surprising really, considering we're dealing with a septet which includes no less than 5 guitarists!

Spiritual Beggars have been around for a long time. Their first self titled album was released away back in ‘94 and since then the band has strived to make melodious and challenging hard rock music always looking to be that bit different. This is fully fledged retro rock. There are edgy, driving guitar riffs, layered keyboard fills and swirls, big melodic choruses, a firing vocal performance, classy production.

Not to be confused with bands by the same name [most notably the Thrash/ Death Metal act from Miami, Florida, there's also band with the name from Holland playing Doom/ Death Metal), the US (Alternative Rock act from Arkansas) and no less than three from the UK (one from Huddersfield playing just “Metal”, another from Bradford playing Epic Doom Metal, and the last one from Milton Keynes, playing a hybrid of Folk, Prog and Rock)] this Post-Hardcore quintet (consisting of lead singer Maarten Vanarwegen, guitarists Erwin Wehenkel and Glenn Catteeuw

Based in Lismore, Co. Waterford, South Ireland, Melodic Metal act Sirocco was formed in early 2003 as an instrumental quartet, of which today only rhythm guitarist Jim Tobin remains.

Sirenia are back with a brand new gothic metal album, which goes by the name of Perils Of The Deep Blue. It's almost impossible to compare Sirenia to any other band in the world of female fronted metal. They've had a handful of singers throughout the past twelve years of their existence, but finally they seem to have found the true pearl in the metal ocean.