There are way too many records released every week - which one should you listen to? Why is the new Bruit the best record of the year? Which post-metal record is the dark-horse of the year? Questions that we want to answer - we review lots of records every week and you can also check out a little teaser before reading the whole thing. And if you want to, you can also browse through our archive and have a look at the amazing records you might have missed out on.
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Everybody is talking about creating immersive music. Music to get lost in. Music to forget everything around you to. The only ones who don‘t talk about it are the true masters of really coming up with music you can simply dive into. For you will be caught and held up. SUNN O))) are back with another record and there are only very few bands who can release a live album as something truly unique. Welcome to Metta Benevolence!
Continue reading >Those that treat themselves to a heavy dose of early pg.lost releases every once in a while should be excited, as Enfold is very much a record that has that same feel and can easily be added to the mix. Soars is the solo project of Kristian Karlsson, most well known for writing and producing for Cult of Luna and pg.lost. Enfold is his first solo release under the name Soars. A record that is driven by bass and low register synths, sprinkled with great melodies and that characteristic vocal sound that most people will associate with early pg.lost.
Continue reading >Transcending tragedy, Cynic bravely brings the cycle started on Focus to an unlikely and poignant end.
Continue reading >A few months ago, the author of these lines released a raving review of an album by a “band” (maybe more of a collective?) called ÂGE ⱡ TOTAL and still there is no week when I do not give that record a listen. Some time after this review there was a promo email for a record by a band called Modern Men. However, we all know what Lennon said about life and plans and so on and so here I am – struck by how stupid I have been not reviewing this record by Modern Men and featuring Stéphane Miollan quite late because it is really mesmerizing!
Continue reading >Seeking a plethora of inspiration from the grunge and metal era of the nineties, Strangers With Guns bring their own unique take on a generation that was flooded with attitude, brashness and vitality. But hey, this is Strangers With Guns we’re talking about, so not everything will be as it seems on Become A Pope. Expect the unexpected!
Continue reading >Somewhere between Plini and Porcupine Tree, noodling around with garage-goth throwback riffs and Djent rythms, A Vast Field Of Silence is sure to please the austere fret-afficionado as much as the bored Prog-head.
Continue reading >There are reviews in which it’s most important to be able to not try to outperform the band in length, in detail, in elaboration for these records bathe in the glory of the mystique – maybe not performance-wise because that can clearly be analyzed and described – but in the way they came to be. One of these – in this author’s opinion – is the latest Converge record Bloodmoon:I! So let’s have a look at this new opus magnum!
Continue reading >Monosphere’s ferocious and crushing waves of “post-metalcore” hybridised with many modern progressive techniques have made The Puppeteer one of the heaviest and most forward-thinking releases of the year. The album is a visually sublime and a sonically expansive piece of art that will quite literally blow your mind!
Continue reading >Even though this music is conceived from grief, anxiety and depression it lends an uplifting and soaring sense. This is mostly due to the glimmering tremolo guitar and melodic themes that soar in and out of the doomy sonics throughout this stunning album.
Continue reading >In a galaxy far, far away you might encounter Hemelbestormer. Only in your imagination, of course. All their releases are inspired by outer space, stars, galaxies, black holes millions of light years from our planet. Through their take on the Post-Metal sonics they yet again bring us a narrative about extra-terrestrial phenomena.
Continue reading >Have you been hit by a sonic truck today? If not, maybe you should consider giving the debut of Dying Wish a listen. With Fragments of a Bitter Memory the Oregon newcomers deliver one of the best hardcore debuts in recent history.
Continue reading >By and large, the COVID-19 pandemic forced bands to change their perspective in a wide variety of ways when it came to writing music as they could no longer meet up in person due to various restrictions and lockdowns being put into place and as a result, the creative output of many of them have had a very different vibe from their usual releases. But what if you’re in a band with only one member? Deer Park Ranger and rhubiqs are two such acts that decided to put forward a collaborative release under the fitting moniker Transatlantic Alliance, the eponymous debut album of which is, by far, greater than the sum of its parts.
Continue reading >”To be boxed in” is the idea of being incarcerated, to have no free will, not being able to follow and fulfill your own dreams and desires. Or that one is stuck inside a certain box, whether one wants to be there or no. Many Post-Metal bands are stuck inside in a genre which is wide open and hellishly close at the same time. Oakland’s Daxma have just released a record which basically is their way out of that box; even though it’s named Unmarked Boxes.
Continue reading >Aggression, Intensity and Ferocity is only a fraction of what Bailer’s latest album Disposable Youth brings to the Metalcore table. Deep, profound lyrics and a musical maturity beyond their years makes Bailer a colossus. No matter what genre of music you lean towards, Disposable Youth speaks to everyone. It will crush and batter you to a pulp, but the masochist in you will love every second of it!
Continue reading >Abrasive – that might be the best word to describe Rien Ne Suffit, the new record by Plebeian Grandstand, just like it might have been the best one to describe all their releases up to now. However, there is something about this new measure of utter madness and sheer uncontrolled life-denying anger, that is different. Might be the production which some people have called “too clean” - probably because they never understood the band anyway!
Continue reading >When one of the forerunners of new Belgian Post-Metal releases an album, then it’s something one should listen to. In the case of BARST‘s new record REAL it’s actually something one should look at and listen to. Best on a real big screen.
Continue reading >Oh, it’s that guy again! With a ginormous three discs album, a spectacular Roadburn Redux performance and an equally impressive live record the monolithic Drone Metal / Free Jazz fusion of his Neptunian Maximalism arkestra has left an unmistakable imprint on the scene of artistically charged heavy music during the last two years. In 2021 I’ve so far skipped his more blackened project Sol Kia, but his solo work Junkyard under the abbreviation CZLT was my personal review debut here on VoS. Now Belgian multi-instrumentalist Guillaume Cazalet strikes again with yet another project, which is called Zaäar and describes itself in biblical manner as “a collective born from a rib of Neptunian Maximalism”.
Continue reading >What would AC/DC sound like, if they had decided to fuse their hard Boogie with Psychedelic elements rather than Blues and Hard Rock? The answer to this never-posed-question can now be heard! No, there is not another AC/DC record, but a band that embodies the aforementioned combination: Snake Mountain Revival! The name alone is already pure magic, right?
Continue reading >Trying to stay ahead of things can be difficult in these modern times as there are countless possibilities for finding new bands and labels to follow, so zines like VoS have a certain responsibility to provide you with the best suggestions ahead of time. In some sense we failed you with this one: Knowledge Through Suffering is an awesome one-man-project from Italy with Umberto Poncina giving birth to a genre-bending example of extreme Metal for the 21st century. Concealment seems like a three-track EP but with 30 minutes of running time it is much, much more than that – lesson in how a Black Metal-schooled musician mixes Death Metal, Doom, Noise and a pinch of Avantgarde into something bigger than its single elements.
Continue reading >Simply put, Mylder’s latest EP If Not From Or To is music for the morning after, a delicate and sincere folk inspired album that rests quietly beside you and gently soothes your soul.
Continue reading >Contrition’s debut Broken Mortal Coil is the third and final chapter of our Jeff Wilson-triple bill in the last few days. And man – this special showing goes out with a BANG! It is loud, it is rowdy, it is savage and yet – it is atmospheric, it is dense and it is the best finish on could wish for this trilogy.
Continue reading >The second part of our Jeff Wilson triple-bill: His main band, Chrome Waves who released a new record a few months ago, called The Rain Will Cleanse. Interestingly, it’s less Black-Metal and more of a mixture of Post-Punk and Art-Metal. And an interesting one, too.
Continue reading >Post rock is just one of those genres. Every time you think you’ve heard it all and the well is starting to run dry, an album comes along that completely reaffirms your faith. That happened this week with the release of Ascension, the prolific debut album from Greek post rockers Ephemeral Echoes. New kids on the block they might be, but they come bearing one of the year’s standout releases.
Continue reading >Today and tomorrow you will get a triple-dose Jeff Wilson with this review and the next two. Jeff who? Well, one of North America’s most productive and well-respected musicians within the realm of dark, sinister, blackened music with a certain attitude that reaches far beyond the typical thunderstorms. His music is often highly atmospheric, very dense and with a touch of dark wave. Altars of the Moon and its one-track, 30-minute-debut is a wonderful example of that.
Continue reading >Kowloon Walled City play Folk music. Okay, not really. But that certain grit, that crispy sound of a low-tuned guitar with steel strings whose reverberations are much broader than just the riff itself – you can find that on the new record by the Oakland-based quartet. Piecework shows the band come back after a longer hiatus with as much strength as before.
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