Fuoco Fatuo - Obsidian Katabasis (2021)

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Another Profound Lore release committed to the Severed Heads Open Minds altar. Obsidian Katabasis is a gargantuan 6 songs of glacially paced Funeral Doom with a Death Metal backbone and it's a monolithic traverse through densely layered soundscapes that move through mollifying guitar sections with a lot of space flowing between to forward creeping death metal sections that utilize more haste and intricacy.

A trade of heft vs ferocity. All the while it's incredibly heavy and suffocating through its build but the woven atmospheres of guitar delay, reverb, feedback and ambient noise add a great deal of breadth to the plodding nature and I'd say without this it would be all weight with no nuance. This thing rips!

Fuoco Fatuo - Obsidian Katabasis (bandcamp)

Suffering Hour - The Cyclic Reckoning (2021)

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Here we go again, Profound Lore doing what Profound Lore does better than almost any other record label out there, consistently putting out releases within the umbrella of metal that is forward-thinking, hard hitting and unequivocally true to its cause. In the case of Suffering Hour, the trio out of Forest Lake, Minnesota, are emerging into the new year with their sophomore album, The Cyclic Reckoning, and they are punching way above their weight.

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This new album is a monolithic tower of black/death metal, trading between genres with purpose and force, and the concocted energy as well as atmosphere are forces that emit an untapped barbarity through serpentining black metal chords, pummelling drums and a combined vocal output that sounds sheer… At times summoning the same ferocity as Death Fortress, which if you know me, is a volatility I appreciate in something flying under the banner of death metal. Only two songs have been released so far… but I'm sure as hell paying attention.

Suffering Hour - The Cyclic Reckoning (bandcamp)

Of Feather and Bone - Sulfuric Disintegration (2020)

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I was pretty content with how 2018's 'Bestial Hymns of Perversion' sounded and find myself dipping back into it every once in a while still, but I think 'Sulfuric Disintergration' is an even better attack on the banality of standard death metal. Meat and Potatoes with a lot of bulk but staunchly invigorating and zealous in its approach: Bestial with a nations worth of ire and grime caked throughout it with an emphasis on speed a la grind. Profound Lore doesn't often disappoint, and I hope it stays that way!

Sulfuric Disintegration (bandcamp)

Spirit Possession - Spirit Possession (2020)

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Here's another album flying under the venerable Profound Lore Records label, a well-oiled machine run by Chris Bruni who always seems to be ahead of the curve, and it's another album that will be heavily listened to by yours truly – The sound and production is exactly what I'm looking for right now, albeit I have only listened to the only two tracks released, I am staunch in knowing that this album nails down primitive sounding black metal.

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A sound that harkens back to the cold and primeval sounds of 90's black metal, with angular riffs, shrill atmosphere, ghostly production at its centre, and on the sonic periphery a torrent of influences takes shape in the form of heavy metal that borrows perfectly from early hardcore, in the same way that Razor did back in the late 80's during the festering metal scene of Toronto until they unfortunately and unceremoniously faded away into obscurity… It was a perfect. This to me is everything going right for forward thinking black metal. Imagine fusing together the best elements that make up Hellhammer, Mercyful Fate, Negative Plane, Razor, mid Darkthrone and Finland's (underrated and under appreciated) Swallowed and you will come up with a sound that is comparable to Spirit Possession's impressive, maybe immaculate, self-titled debut. What a release!

It's also worth noting that the vocalist/guitarist in Spirit Possession is the same vocalist/guitarist that makes up the band KNEEL, of which I posted about a few days ago and another release I think is basically perfect. Some accounting for taste for sure.

Spirit Possession (bandcamp)

Warp Chamber - Implements of Excruciation (2020)

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Chris Bruni of Profound Lore Records has always had his hands on the pulse of death metal, feeling for signs of life and then giving that life existence on the planes of sonic annihilation. He's had a few misses during his tenure (my opinion) but other than that, Profound Lore Records is one of the most consistent record labels out in the abyss of all things metal or tied to that which is heavy.

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Warp Chamber come out swinging on their debut full-length, a full-bodied attack of churning and cavernous death metal with a predilection for fetid guitar tones, bloated vocals and a backdrop that sounds nothing short of putrid. You get the point I'm not so subtly making, yeah? implements of Excruciation isn't reinventing the wheel or anything, but the integrity and brute force in which they will pummel you for thirty straight minutes is a thing to behold. There isn't a single second of filler floating around in these caves of churning riffs and vocal belches, it's absolutely filthy, and the way the drumming manages to bob and weave its way around with adept blasts and fills restores a fragment of my faith within 2020's ability to impress upon me. One of the better releases of the year so far, and it's not even close.

Implements of Excruciation (bandcamp)

A.M.S.G. - Anti Cosmic Tyranny (2013)

A.M.S.G. stands for "Ad Majorem Satanae Gloriam" which is Latin and means "For the Greater Glory of Satan", the only member is Angelfukk Witchhammer and he considers the music to fall under the appellation of “Holocaustik Canadian Terrorist Black Metal” and “Black Magik Terrorism”…

What the fvkk? I have my ears to the ground with anything put forth by Profound Lore Records, being a record label I trust to consistently release forward thinking metal, and A.M.S.G. are hardly an exception to this. 'Anti Cosmic Tyranny' is unique if not hard to digest, with its unabashed nature to satanism, the occult, and all that is true fucking darkness. It is to my understanding that this album was conceived when Mr. Angelfukk was serving a prison sentence for the possession and selling of guns and drugs. Black metal throughout its history was spawned from crime, so I suppose this should earn a respected head nod from within the genres puritans? Whatever, fuck all that.

I'm not even fully through this album yet as I post this, and I'm not fully certain what I've made out of it all, like I said, lots to take in and digest from this, but I can't deny the allure of the dark journey it seems to take you through… Dragging the listener into the yearning aphotic chasm of all that is unhallowed and bleak.

Anti Cosmic Tyranny
(Alternate Download Link)