Newly signed to Relapse Records, Vacuous are demonstrating that they're more than just another "Incantationcore" band with their second album. In His Blood builds off of the cavernous death metal of previous releases to include post-punk and melodic flourishes, added dimensions to the gloom and dank.
DoC faves Cartilage are back with a new EP of schlock and horror. With four new songs and a Troma-worthy intro, Tales From The Entrails: A Necrology builds on the tradition of thrashy Bay Area gore-grind as pioneered by the band's friends and mentors, Exhumed.
Corpus Offal emerged from the ashes of Seattle's Cerebral Rot and Demoncy. Now based in Austin, the band keeps it dismal and dank on their self-titled debut, with the lurching, squealing, filth of Immolation and Incantation being notable influences.
Necrambulant are about slamming brutality and little else. The Phoenix band's second full length Upheaval of Malignant Necrambulance is midpaced, guttural, filled with squealing pinch harmonics and a pinging snare sound in case anyone doubted their commitment to the style.
Celestial Scourge have found a middle path for brutal death - not shamelessly derivative of classic bands, but also not needlessly trying to improve on something that was perfected 30 years ago. The Norwegian band's debut album Observers of The Inevitable treats tech death and slam the way Reese's pieces did chocolate and peanut butter - two great tastes that taste great together.
Arizona-based multi-instrumentalist Cameron Boesch is the man behind the long-running project Light Dweller. On The project's fifth album, The Subjugate, avant meets tech meets discordance and atmosphere in a way that would make Luc Lemay proud.
Philly's Concrete Caveman keep it brutally simple and direct. Their latest EP War Behind Glass is a noisy mix of death, grind, and hardcore, with the occassional bird sounds (recording in studio) left on the recording for ambience. Their label Strange Mono is donating proceeds from the release to Doctors Without Borders.
Kosuke Hashida is the Tokyo-based guitarist of death metal acts like The Cauterized and World End Man. Outrage is the second album released under his own name, and it adds some cribbed Slayer riffs to Terrorizer-style deathgrind for an especially thrashy, relentless grindcore album.
Drugs of Faith is the long-running band of Enemy Soil/Agoraphobic Nosebleed guitarist Richard Johnson (affectionately known as "The Grindfather" due to his decades spent in the scene). On their latest album Asymmetrical, Johnson's lyrics about our bleak present and bleaker future are given a backdrop of grind n' roll, noise rock, and chaotic hardcore.
London's Final Dose aren't the first band to notice the overlap between black metal and crusty hardcore - but maybe being from the country that created both genres gives them a deeper insight to their similarities. The project's second full-length Under the Eternal Shadow is even more direct and no-frills than the second wave "Norsecore" bands that preceded them.
The Pennsylvania-based solo project Muskeg Charnel has delivered the fourth part of an intended seven album cycle based around the concept of decomposition. Despite the gore/death-facing album title and some Morrisound-friendly sections, Decomposition Part 4: Livor Mortis is squarely in the USBM style of melody, shrieking vocals, and shoegazing riffs.
Saor's Andy Marshall describes his music "Caledonian black metal", separating his project from other pagan, folk, and black metal bands by drawing from the history and traditional music of his native Scotland. Whistles, string arrangements, and pipes make the project's fifth full-length album, Amidst the Ruins, sound especially grandiose and cinematic.
Ainsoph is a product from the overlooked Dutch black metal scene, which is increasingly becoming known for its tendency towards experimentation. Affection & Vengeance is agnostic about genre classification, mixing post-punk, post-rock, and blackgaze in a way that will appeal to everyone but kvlt pvrists.
Guiltless is the new band formed by Josh Graham (known for A Storm of Light and Made Out of Babies, as well as for the visuals/projections he created for Neurosis and Soundgarden). Teeth To Sky is the band's full-length debut, and it strips away most of the atmospheric and melodic elements from ASOL, focusing on oppressive chord progressions and restrained tempos.
Aussie trio REEKMIND Mired in the Reek of Grief is a trudging death-doom album that
Karla Kvlt was formed from the ashes of pioneering German noise rock band Eisenvater. The trio's debut Thunderhunter juxtaposes Teresa Matilda Curtens' ethereal vocals with some trudging Melvins-worship, making for a compelling blend of sludge, drone, and shoegaze.
Chilean trio Ocultum have been making a name for themselves in stoner/doom circles, earning praise from the likes of Conan (the band, not the barbarian or talk show host). Expect swaying riffs and meandering song structures from their third album Buena Muerte, with some feral snarls and punky chord progressions that edge the band from Sabbath worship into sludge territory.
Noisepicker debuted with an EP called doom/punk/blues - a title that doubles as an apt description of the band's sound. The British duo's sophomore album The Earth Will Swallow The Sun continues along those lines, combining doom metal and noise rock, with some Tom Waits-style grit courtesy of Harry Armstrong's gravelly vocals.
Seattle's Dark Meditation wed goth rock and classic metal - two genres tied to the Eighties that have seen a resurgence in the last decade. The band's latest EP Where the Darkness Bleeds shows that Judas Priest and the Sisters of Mercy had plenty in common, even if their respective fanbases rarely got along.
