Saturday may seem like an odd day to open the flood gates on new music at our site. Page views usually drop precipitously, which I guess proves that lots of people are visiting our site at work or school rather than at home. Or maybe lots of people are just too hungover to put heavy music in their heads. Anyway, I do this as much for myself as for anyone else, so on we go….
I paired the two bands featured in Part 1 for obvious reasons, and in Part 3 I’ve collected new stuff from bands who have no trouble getting attention but I’d like to mention anyway. In this middle part I’ve picked more underground names, with a lot of variety in the sounds (though I’ve siphoned off the black metal for tomorrow’s Shades of Black post).
GODS FORSAKEN
Actually, I don’t yet have any full songs to share from this first band, only a teaser, but I have high hopes based on the people behind the project.
Gods Forsaken is a new band formed by guitarist/bassist Anders Biazzi (Just Before Dawn), vocalist Jonny Pettersson (Wombbath, Henry Kane, Ashcloud, etc.), and drummer Brynjar Helgetun (Just Before Dawn, Crypticus, Johansson & Speckman, Megascavenger, etc., etc.). There will be some guest appearances on their forthcoming album, too, including solos by Gustav Myrin (ex-Blood Mortized) and Daniel Gustavsson (Demonical, Tormention).
The debut album of Gods Forsaken is named In A Pitch Black Grave and it will be released by Soulseller Records later this year. The very cool cover art is by Patrik Tegnander at Chainsaw Design (he’s also a member of Gravebomb).
That teaser of music is below. Get stoked for some old school hellfire.
Gods Forsaken on Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/godsforsakenSWE/
KRYSTHLA
Not long ago Andy Synn reviewed the new album by the UK’s Krysthla for our site, comparing their music to a fusion of “latter-day Decapitated and late-2000s period Meshuggah“, with other influences in the mix. In his opinion, they are “definitely right on the cusp of greatness”.
Induced by his review, I’ve been listening to Peace In Our Time and really enjoying it. I’ve also enjoyed Krysthla’s new lyric video for “Make Disciples Of The Nations”, which hits as hard visually as the music does. Hope you enjoy it too.
Peace In Our Time will be released on April 7, 2017, via PHD. It’s available for pre-order from Amazon UK here.
https://www.facebook.com/krysthla/
SLOTH HERDER
Four long years ago our old friend Utmu wrote a guest post for us in which he sung the praises of a band from Maryland and Pennsylvania named Sloth Herder, struggling to define their style but settling (with tongue in cheek) on “blackened doomgrind”.
The very same Utmu encouraged me to check out a couple of songs now on Bandcamp from the Sloth Herder’s debut full-length No Pity, No Sunrise, which is their first release since the 2012 EP Abandon Pop Sensibility. Those two songs are “Doll Incapax” and “Inner Dissolution”.
There are some mighty, head-battering grooves in these songs, as well as head-whipping riff abrasion, head-swirling guitar derangement, and flesh-lacerating vocal extremity. Both tracks are technically exuberant and explosively energetic, but the second one also shows a side of the band that plummets into a black pit of oppressive desolation. I’m not sure what genre label to apply to the music either, but I sure do like it.
No Pity, No Sunrise will be released by Grimoire Records on March 24. Order via this link — and if you let the Bandcamp player below continue to run, you’ll here both songs.
https://grimoirerecords.bandcamp.com/album/no-pity-no-sunrise
Sloth Herder on Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/slothherder/
CHEVALIER
I’m afraid I don’t have a lot of useful background information about this next band. I’ve searched, but come up empty-handed. All I have is what’s available below the YouTube stream of this next song, which I discovered thanks to a link on Facebook by the excellent Malokarpatan.
The song is “Chevalier”, which is also the name of the band. The YouTube description states: “Medieval speed metal from Finland, 6-track EP A Call to Arms coming out on tape from Sarlacc Productions during the spring of 2017″.
This is an exception to our “rule” about singing, because the singing here is quite good, and the song as a whole is a fireball of epicness that’s been stuck in my head for the last 24 hours.
I’ll be watching these spaces, as you should if you dig this track:
https://sarlaccproductions.bandcamp.com
https://www.facebook.com/SarlaccProductions/
EXALTATION
To round out this collection of diverse sounds I have a single named “Blaspheme Mortality” by the band Exaltation from Auckland, New Zealand, plus a video of them performing live at the Whammy Bar in Auckland last November.
New Zealand seems to spawn top-shelf black/death bands like nowhere else. Exaltation bring churning, storming riff destruction anchored by a pulse-pounding drummer, with a wild howler behind the mic. This new single is damned ferocious and quite electrifying. The dudes can obviously bring that marauding, typhoon-strength energy in a live setting, too.
https://exaltationband.bandcamp.com/releases