Well, about time some would say! With some luck the top 10 and runners up, might be posted before the playlist of January!
TERRORIZER– Before The Downfall (Complete demos, live and unreleased tracks1987/1989)
Well, it’s soon Christmas and we’re all grinding. Last month we nailed that “World Downfall” is the best Death/Grind album around – and is there a better way to follow that album up, than with some healthy hours of listening to TERRORIZER’s demos and unreleased tracks, and a few live goodies? The good old material from before the band, more or less disbanded, before they went to Morrrissound to record their legendary debut album!
MALAKHIM – Theion
I have for a good while stated that all good Metal music had been made and released, and no new bands would arrive and make an impact. Though I was wrong! The last 4-5 years has given us a good deal of new strong bands and releases. One of these new bands is Swedish MALAKHIM, consisting of two veterans and three cohorts, that we really aren’t sure about who are.
The band has released a demo, an EP and a live album, just like in the good old days. And now their smashing debut full length “Theion”. Dark and slightly chaotic Black Metal with healthy guitar melodies, midpaced heavy madness, evil vocals and an eerie ambience. A sure contender for the 2021 top ten list, though I got to it, too late.
OFERMOD – Mysterium Iniquitatis
A new album from OFERMOD is always exciting. You never really know what to get, besides atmospheric and worked through Black Metal. Belfagor knows how to craft a song and make it powerful! Here Belfagor is joined by Devo on bass, Calle Larsson on drums and Nebiros handles the vocals. Atmospheric and pummeling are the two puns here – a strong offering from the band, that forces you into the vortex of mysticism and chaos.
MALIGN – Divine Facing / Fireborn
The harbinger of Orthodox Black Metal, this band is often hailed for. Raw and relentless music, and the rumours say the same about their behaviour within the Stockholm Black Metal scene back in the days. Nevertheless, the music has always been slaying and captivating for me- and this compilation of their “Divine Facing” and “Fireborn” Eps on Norma Evangelium Diaboli is a hardhitter of ranks. So atmospheric and drawing, upsetting and bestial!
FUNERAL MIST – Deiform
This is a highly anticipated album, I can’t remember when I last have seen so much hype around a Black Metal release from a band, that still is underground. Though Aricoch and Lars B. deliver. This is dark and evil, as music from this bunch should be. Drawing one into the universe of FUNERAL MIST, a bleak brutal and pummeling world that leaves no one behind.
TYRANNIC – Mortuus Decadence
What is TYRANNIC, besides an Australian duo with an awesome logo? It is pure energy… Intense Heavy Metal laden Doomy Black Metal, heavy yet bleak, melodic yet grim, so old school it reeks of moldy graveyard coil and killer vocals!
CLANDESTINE BLAZE – Secrets Of Laceration
The newest offering from Mikko Aspa is yet a nail in the coffin of whatever you find nice and pleasurable. This is the essence of contemporary Black Metal encoffined in second wave of Black Metal sound and aesthetics! This band just becomes darker, more evil and bestial as time passes on!
CLANDESTINE BLAZE – Fist Of The Northern Destroyer
I was caught by the first scream of the title track! This is the band’s third album, and the first from Mikko Aspa I laid ears upon and I haven’t looked back since. There’s been eight full length albums since, and I haven’t been disapointed yet. Classic second wave Black Metal, freezingly cold and evil, dark and hateful with a bleak bleak atmsosphere. And the raw raw quite thin production on this release is ace!
BAPTISM – Beherial Midnight
December is for Finnish Black Metal. I purchased this CD together with CLANDESTINE BLAZE “Fist OF The Northern Destroyer” back when they were released and they arrived late December, so it has been a tradition to blast this evil in December. Raw, intense old school Black Metal with vocals from a world beyond this, where our mortal coil roam.
BLAZE BAYLEY– War Within Me
First he rocked the world with WOLFSBANE, then he got hired to fill in for Bruce Dickenson in IRON MAIDEN, where he delivered vocals for the two quite good albums “The X Factor” and “Virtual XI”. Two albums that never have received the praise that they deserve in my opinion. After IRON MAIDEN he created his solo band did some albums, revived WOLFSBANE for a single album and then continued solo – and we have now reached his seventh solo album – which kicks us hard with genuine energetic Heavy Metal and Blaze’s kick ass vocals!
And if you didn’t get enough of the soundbits, check out the Spotify playlist, with the albums available on there, here:
https://open.spotify.com/playlist/1UPTgJQ8p3igyez5NJKXci?si=75b4bb23f61c4ca4