Imperial Cult - Spasm of Light (2019)

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Been listening to the new Mork album a decent amount, on top of a handful of other releases that will soon get their brief moment in the spotlight over here at SHOM soon enough, until then, satiate your need for raw and unrelenting black metal via Holland's Imperial Cult—Spasm of Light is a highlight of 2019 to be sure—Something about the current looming dread has caused me to have returned to it quite a bit as of late, and just assumed you might want to as well… and if not, that's just bent, man. One 35-minute track of downward spiralling black metal heavily entrenched in a wall of sound and atmospheric armageddon served on a brass platter next to the goats heads soup. No inner peace.

Imperial Cult - Spasm of Light (bandcamp)

Deiquisitor - Humanoid EP (2021)

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Denmark's Deiquisitor dropped a 25 minute EP on us this year and it's a steep descent into the meat grinder abyss of pummelling death metal. Focused on the chunkier side of death metal, there's always a purveying, simplistic brutality to their sound—nothing particularly cacophonous, but meaty with a lot of weight behind its hooks and any semblance of space is squeezed out with Deiquisitor's deliberate assault.

Deiquisitor - Humanoid (bandcamp)

Barbarian - Barbarian (2012)

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Here's an album I just wanted to remind everyone of! I have been heavily dipping into this gem of an EP quite a lot recently—I guess black thrash/speed is high on my radar right now and this Italian beast nailed everything on this 25-minute EP, spot on production and the best release from the band in my opinion. Dig in!

Barbarian - Barbarian (bandcamp)

Sulpur - Embracing Hatred and Beckoning Darkness (2021)

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Here's another Amor Fati Productions release that is cold as hell and well worth your attention! Embracing Hatred and Beckoning Darkness is the debut album from Sulpur, which (as of now) has no known information about the band, further bolstering its obscurity. Second wave black metal that hearkens back to the early 90's in a lot of ways but feels much less influenced by the early sounds of thrash and speed metal that the earlier progenitors latched onto—Instead Sulpur drinks from the same well as MGLA, Algor, Lluvia, and many of the Icelandic black metal bands (to name a region) wholly dedicated to this style built on a blistering tempo and a dense, frigid soundscape.

The songwriting here is essentially without any flaws—the riffs come in fast and cold as a witch tit, the drums are mixed perfectly down to the splash cymbal and even the pickup on the bell is right where it's supposed to be. The same can be said about the vocal work, which makes use of some nice versatility. No single track dips below the 7-minute mark and there isn't a single moment on this album that I could reasonably consider filler, nothing stale here, just blistering black metal that has done everything right. One of the best I've heard this year so far.

Sulpur - Embracing Hatred and Beckoning Darkness (bandcamp)

Skeleton - Ordainment of Divinity EP (2021)

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There are really only two things I am certain of in this world:
1) Nothing really matters.
2) Skeleton are keeping the underground lit.

A follow-up EP to their staunch debut LP has recently been released by Austin, Texas' Skeleton and it's a forward lunge into the sonic soundscape of the incredibly raw and already unfiltered sound of the band—which had no qualms trading proficiency for energy and cohesion for a crackling atmosphere. They doubled down on Ordainment of Divinity when it comes to the production, going even further into a blown out production, especially within the drum sound, denting the fidelity as much as possible to a point where the sound is as ghastly as it is garish.

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I think a lot of people will be disappointed with the decision to mess with the production to the extent in which they did but I think fans of the eponymous debut album will be even more slighted that most of the festering grooves on the debut have mostly been traded out for a barbaric ferocity with much more black metal than thrash/hardcore influence this time around. Me, I still like it. I think an EP is exactly the right time to start threshing around sounds and I think they really nailed a lot of it… The intro track sounds like a medieval funeral dirge and the way it bleeds into the first song is right up my alley! No apologies.


Skeleton - Ordainment of Divinity EP (bandcamp)

Spectral Wound - Frigid and Spellbound [Single] (2021)

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Spectral Wound has never really been big on my radar, but from Profound Lore's reputation and track record alone I'll listen… Also Quebecois black metal has its own staunch reputation worth paying attention to. I'm not going to make any claims off this single alone, that would be a hackneyed response… But the pre-order album on bandcamp has evidently been doing alright for itself.

Spectral Wound - A Diabolical Thirst (bandcamp)

Diocletian - Darkness Swallows All EP (2021)

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Diocletian have been pummelling peoples ears into submission for the last decade and with their newly realized 'Darkness Swallows All' EP the band is looking to turn a corner after 'Amongst The Flames of a Bvrning God'. New Zealand has proven to be a gestation ground for bestial sounding death metal with bands like Vassafor, Heresiarch, Witchrist, Vesicant and Diocletian at the helm of all the chaos. Vassafor's 'To The Death' release last year was among one of my favourites, just ugly!

But this new EP from Diocletian seems to be cut from a cloth of death metal that is at its core even more raw and even more crude than that of their opus "Gesundrian'…which a lot of the time, is a welcomed force in terms of my taste… This time, I'm not too sure. One thing is certain, It's an absolute far cry from the sheer ferocity a band like KNEEL were able to impose on their 3-song EP last year.

I'm posting this one up for the vultures to feast on, as for me, I am unsure of the direction these brutish Kiwis are taking. All is fair in love and war.

Diocletian - Darkness Swallows All (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)

Mahr - Maelstrom (2020)

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Each band out of the enigmatic and elusive Prava Kollektiv all released an album on November 18, all of which, from what I have heard thus far, have delivered a devastating sonic landscape under the umbrella of atmospheric black metal. Mahr are just one of these bands, and Maelstrom is nothing if not suffocatingly obtuse and crushing, both in the weight of its sound, spacing and tonality. Similarly not unlike Sonance, Mizmor, Leucosis and or Skáphe in its ability to convert instrumentation and the space between the instrumentation into a cohesive sound rife with ferocity and new ideas.

I can't recommend checking all of which I have mentioned above, enough. These are groups pushing through the banality of generic soundscapes with zeal and authenticity. Buy everything for a 'Name Your Price' donation. 

Mahr - Maelstrom (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)