Inter Nihilum et Inanitatem [Weekly Mixtape 228]

Nothingness | Death Obvious
Thætas | Godless | Lago
Muerto | Mourir | Disorientation
MetaladiaN | Squelching | Emptiness

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Here At The End of All Things [Weekly Mixtape 180]

Beheaded | Phorboda | Clairvoyance
Kratornas | Trypanon | Derhead
Abhorrent Expanse | Dephosphorus
Defacement | Witherer | Anthrodynia

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375: Imperial Triumphant

Dreams of Consciousness Podcast Episode 375 features an interview with Steve Blanco of Imperial Triumphant.

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Bandcamp Friday Picks [Oct 2022]

October 7th is Bandcamp Friday, that blessed day in which the streaming company waives their cut of all purchases made through their platform. If you're interested in showing some support for the underground, here are some recent and upcoming releases that are currently testing the robustness of my new computer speakers.

Lovecraft Lager[Weekly Mixtape: 2•04•2022]

KOSMOKRATOR • Swampbeast • Voidceremony • Colin Stetson • Excarnated Entity • Burial [ITA] • Devoid Of Thought • Gridfailure • Gorguts • Occulsed • Fossilization • Fabio Frizzi / Andrew Leman

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207: Teeth

Dreams of Consciousness Podcast Episode 207 features an interview with Erol Ulug of Teeth.

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203: Sunless

Dreams of Consciousness Podcast Episode 203 features an interview with Sunless.

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202: Mors Verum

Dreams of Consciousness Podcast Episode 202 features an interview with Mrudul Kamble of Mors Verum.

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Episode 164: Suffering Hour

Here is Dreams of Consciousness Podcast Episode 164, featuring an interview with YhA of Suffering Hour.

[cover photo by Alvino Salcedo]

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an interview with Bedsore

Referring to their music as "kaleidoscopic metal of death", Rome's Bedsore take a progressive approach to creating extremely dark and heavy music. With their debut album Hypnagogic Hallucinations set to be released this week through 20 Buck Spin, I reached out to the band to find out about what led to their psychedelic and hallucinatory style. Guitarist/vocalist Jacopo Gianmaria Pepe was kind enough to answer my questions.

Bandcamp Picks: Vader, Ulcerate, Azath, Venomous Skeleton

Emerging from death metal's primordial era and never stopping since, Vader have been more consistent and prolific than any of their peers. Not quite a return to the sonic overload of the Litany period, their 12th album Solitude In Madness is nonetheless a brisk slice of thrashy death metal, allowing the band to graft some catchy Bay Area hooks and mid-paced Priest-styled bangers unto their blast-heavy style. The empire chugs along.  [$11]

Listen to my interview with Vader here.




Since they pioneered dissonant death metal with their third album (and inspired a legion of imitators in the process), it's easy to understand why Ulcerate would want to mine their own territory before going in search of new ones. With its pandemic-appropriate title, Stare Into Death And Be Still fleshes out the band's distinctive style a panoply of dischordant riffs, atmospheric interludes, and Jamie Saint Merat's disorienting, amorphous drumming technique. An album of the year contender, for sure.  [€7.77]

Read my interview with Ulcerate here.

Like Vader, newcomers Azath plant themselves in the fertile delta where death and thrash metal meet. Committed to the joys of pure speed, Through a Warren of Shadow recalls the frantic thrashing of Merciless and Grotesque, with a garage-worthy production to maintain that old school fidelity. Quibbles about the recording budget aside, this is one of the more enjoyable debuts I've heard in the last few years. [$7]



If a new Ulcerate album isn't enough to fill your atmospheric death metal needs, Tel Aviv's Venomous Skeleton should scratch that itch with their first full-length. Drowning in Circles lets tremolo guitars slither over mid-paced beats and through heavy reverb, resulting in an intensely claustrophobic, near-psychedelic album. Bad vibes from across the dead sea. [€7]

Bandcamp Picks - Convulsing, Imperial Triumphant, Mutilation Rites, Churchburn

Australian solo act Convulsing is one of the most interesting acts in death metal right now. Atonal, atmospheric, and dynamic, sophomore album Grievous never gets stuck in one style or one tempo, taking the listener on a claustrophobic voyage through everything the genre was and could be. Ending the album with a moody re-imagining of Porcupine Tree's "The Sleep of No Dreaming" is perhaps the most indicative window to the man behind the project. This is a death metal meisterwork that deserves to be counted among the best of the year - and since it's available as a "name your price" download, there's no reason not to get it right now.


New York's Imperial Triumphant have been chipping away at the boundaries of death metal from day one, but their latest album takes their ambition to a whole new level. Vile Luxury combines the dissonant, skronking style of past releases and expands it to include a horn section and choir, combining death metal and hard bop in a way that recalls both John Coltrane and Immolation. An Ascension of death metal. [$9.99]


Fellow New Yorkers Mutilation Rites keep their death metal relatively straight-forward and brutal. But Chasm has just enough progressive and and punk rock digressions to its blasting fervor that these six songs never get tedious. And the production (recorded, among other places, at Brooklyn's infamous Saint Vitus Bar) brings the most out of the band's onslaught. Death done right. [$6]

Revolving around Vital Remains co-founder Dave Suzuki of and one-time Grief sticksman Ray McCaffrey, Churchburn sounds pretty much like what you'd expect. On their debut full-length None Shall Live... The Hymns of Misery, the quasi-black metal riffs of early VR are dragged to the depths and slowed to a crawl, resulting in one of the most evil death doom albums of recent years. As grim as a New England Winter. [$8]

Mixtape 50 - Setentia

Here is the 50th installment of the Dreams of Consciousness podcast, featuring an interview with Maxwell Gravelle of Setentia.

An Interview with Sunless

When they released their first demo last year, Minneapolis-based Sunless impressed a lot of people - not least of which was this blog. Wasting no time, they put out their full-length debut Urraca a few months back, solidifying them as a band for fans of progressive and mathy death metal to remember. I reached out to find out more, and bassist Mitch Schooler was kind enough to educate me on the band's history and the scene they came from.

Bandcamp Picks: Ulcerate, Polyptych, Barghest/Teeth, Our Place of Worship is Silence

Few bands have been as successful in reshaping a genre in their own image as New Zealand's Ulcerate. Shrines of Paralysis both encompasses and transcends death, black and doom metal, and is exhausting in its commitment to the kiwi band's unique vision of metal. The last two Ulcerate albums were a window into death metal's future as newer bands tripped over themselves in their rush to emulate; no doubt this new release will inspire a whole new wave of imitators. [$9.99]

The problem with making death metal with a progressive mindset is that straying too far in one direction means losing sight of the other. Not so with Chicago's Polyptych, whose third album Defying the Metastasis strikes a balance between twisted riffs, jagged Voivod-esque rhythms and pure aggression. A band whose talent and originality should earmark them for the discerning death metal fan. [$7.99]



Barely 6 months after their 7" with Fister, DoC friends Teeth return with a new split cassette courtesy of Cvlt Nation. On the 20 minute track "The Hell That Whispers In My Bones", they push their slow dissonant style as far as they've ever taken it, netting them their strongest material to date. Louisiana's Barghest hold up their end by taking the express train from "black" to "metal", only making stops at "kvlt", "trve", and "grim". [$6]



If 20 minutes of sanity eroding death sludge isn't enough for you, Our Place of Worship Is Silence share not only members with Teeth but their atonal approach as well. Their aptly titled debut The Embodiment of Hate is dark and unrelenting, a maelstrom of churning riffs and pounding drums. More straightforward than their other band but a fitting companion nonetheless. [$7]

An Interview with DreamLongDead

As someone weirdly obsessed with the idea of R'lyehan death metal, Athens' DreamLongDead were quite a find. As evidenced by their last album AriseHowlingDarkness: Of Cyclopean Masonry & Non-Euclidean Geometry, the band has both a unique vision and some top notch songwriting; a study in creepy atmospherics as curated by HP Lovecraft and Autopsy. Vocalist/guitarist Tassos was kind enough to answer my questions and indulge my increasing Lovecraft fixation. Cthulhu Ftagn!

Mixtape 32 - Mitochondrion

Here is the 32nd installment of the Dreams of Consciousness podcast, featuring an interview with Shawn Haché of Mitochondrion.

An Interview with Creeping

Creeping may be new to many (outside their New Zealand home, at least) but the band has been in existence for over a decade, playing an unsettling style of slow atmospheric metal that forces death, black and doom to co-exist in a way I can only describe as "R'leyehan." Their most recent album Revenant, recorded by Jamie St Merat of Ulcerate, was one of my Bandcamp Picks a few months back and a damn fine listen to boot. Needing to know more, I reached out to the band for an interview, and bassist/vocalist Marko Pavlovic cut right to the chase with his answers.

Bandcamp Picks - Deformatory, Deviant Process, Desolator [Swe], Altarage

DoC friends Deformatory kicked off 2016 with a brand new album. [It would have been nice to get a head's up, but you know, whatever...] Malediction is death metal in the most Canadian of ways: technical with lots of melody and no shortage of blast beats. Like bacon dripped in maple syrup, it's a combination that just works. [$8 CAD]


In nearby Quebec, Deviant Process have a similar approach to technical death metal. Remarkable for its focus and maturity, their first full-length Paroxysm recalls their countrymen Quo Vadis and Neuraxis in its combination of melody, brutality, and fretboard wizardry. A reminder, if one is needed, that Canada is home to both Rush and Cryptopsy. [$7]


If, like me, you love Swedish death metal but the endless procession of soulless Grave knock-offs is HM-2 much for you, Stockholm's Desolator will come as a welcome relief. The four song EP Spawn of Misanthropy combines elements of thrash and death metal in an attempt to carve out its own niche, not unlike similar scene outliers Hypocrisy and The Crown. A mix of old, new, borrowed, and true. [56 SEK]


Spaniards Altarage probably don't care much about impressing anyone with their musical abilities - they're much too focused on obliterating everything in their path. The unrelenting barrage of Nihil sounds like Hate Eternal employing the eerie (one might even say R'leyahan) atmospherics of Portal, Ulcerate et al. Simultaneously spacey and claustrophobic. [€7]

Keep'n it R'lyeh

Within the heaviest of heavy metals, there’s a sound that's becoming increasingly prominent; that favours odd time signatures, discordance, and slow lurching riffs as much as blastbeats; and throughout it all, sustains a dark and oppressive atmosphere. It crosses the boundaries of death, black, doom, and sludge, heedless of categorization (and the nerds who need it). Death metal OGs Immolation and Gorguts epitomize this sound, as do rising stars Ulcerate and Mitochondrion. The last few years has seen an explosion of new bands like Creeping, Teeth and Abyssal who started on a similar path and crafted their own take. I'm even inclined to shoehorn bands like Blaze of Perdition and Deathspell Omega, who share similar tendencies...but I already did a lot of convoluted pontificating about "avant noir", so maybe I'll leave that alone for now.