Album review
The Enduring Spirit
Tomb Mold
The Enduring Spirit gives Tomb Mold more room for clean guitars and melodic detours. The death metal remains heavy, but the band let their songs breathe for longer. The result…
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Reviews
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Album review
Ashes of the Wake
Lamb of God
A Lamb of God riff rarely travels in a straight line on Ashes of the Wake. The guitars turn sharply around the beat, then lock into a groove that makes those complicated movem…
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Album review
Arcadia
Smash Into Pieces
Arcadia is built around a voice and a beat more often than a guitar riff. Smash Into Pieces make electronic textures carry much of the record's weight, then place Chris Adam's…
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Album review
Dissonance Theory
Coroner
A thirty-two-year gap between studio albums gives people plenty of time to decide what a band should sound like. Coroner don't seem especially concerned with meeting every ver…
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Album review
Attention Attention
Shinedown
DEVIL gives Attention Attention a sharp opening after its brief introduction. The riff has a restless bounce, the vocal sounds tightly wound and the production keeps the rhyth…
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Album review
Soma
Windhand
Soma finds its character in the contrast between heavy guitars and Dorthia Cottrell's singing. Windhand create a dense, distorted sound, but the voice gives the long songs a m…
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Album review
Impulse Voices
Plini
The harp solo in The Glass Bead Game captures the open character of Impulse Voices. Plini allows an unexpected instrument to become part of the arrangement's emotional movemen…
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Album review
Left Hand Path
Entombed
The guitar sound on Left Hand Path makes an immediate impression: low, rough and thick enough for the riffs to seem almost piled on top of one another. That tone is only part …
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A Brief Inquiry into Online Relationships
The 1975
A Brief Inquiry into Online Relationships is most interesting when its musical warmth complicates what the words are saying. The 1975 make addiction sound bright, public panic…
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Album review
Phobia
Breaking Benjamin
The drums make a strong first impression on Phobia. Once the short introduction gives way to The Diary of Jane, Breaking Benjamin's familiar dark rock sound has a sharp, physi…
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Album review
Hand. Cannot. Erase.
Steven Wilson
Routine is the moment when the distance in Hand. Cannot. Erase. becomes painfully human. Steven Wilson and Ninet Tayeb move through a song that gradually opens from restraint …
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Album review
Hill Country Love
Cedric Burnside
Cedric Burnside sounds relaxed and assured on Hill Country Love. His blues keeps enough roughness to make an immediate impression, with plenty of warmth as well. The guitar do…
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Album review
Chaos A.D.
Sepultura
Igor Cavalera's drums give Chaos A.D. an identity before the guitars have fully entered. Sepultura build the record around rhythm, leaving more room inside the riffs and using…
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Album review
Good Dog, Happy Man
Bill Frisell
Good Dog, Happy Man finds adventure in small changes. Bill Frisell brings country, blues and jazz together without making a show of their differences. A simple melody can rema…
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Album review
Hellmode
Jeff Rosenstock
Hellmode is a good place to hear how much Jeff Rosenstock can say by changing the space around his voice. The frantic songs remain frantic, but quieter passages have a clear p…
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Album review
Dead Anthems
The Rumjacks
The Rumjacks make it fairly easy to join in. Dead Anthems has the big choruses, lively folk instruments and rough-edged singing you would expect from a Celtic-punk album, but …
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Album review
A Dying Machine
Tremonti
A Dying Machine gives Tremonti's heavy rock a wider range of moods. The fast guitar attack remains important, but the record also makes room for more restrained singing, acous…
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Album review
Finding Beauty in Negative Spaces
Seether
Fake It has an unpleasant little swagger that works in its favour. The guitar hook is sharp, the rhythm is springy and Shaun Morgan gives the chorus enough bite to keep its ca…
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Album review
Holy Diver
Dio
Ronnie James Dio sings as though every phrase needs to reach the back of a very large room. On Holy Diver, that confidence is supported by songs with clear melodies, strong ri…
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Album review
Lovers
Nels Cline
Lovers reveals a quieter side of Nels Cline while keeping enough strangeness in place. His guitar sits within a chamber orchestra arranged by Michael Leonhart. Strings, reeds,…
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Album review
Nothing But Thieves
Nothing But Thieves
Conor Mason's voice is the obvious attraction on Nothing But Thieves' debut, but the songs are strong enough to keep that voice from becoming the whole show. The band gives hi…
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Album review
Tunnel Blanket
This Will Destroy You
Tunnel Blanket takes This Will Destroy You towards a darker, less clearly defined sound. Guitar lines do not always remain easy to pick out. Noise, sustained tones and distort…
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Album review
Para Bellum
Testament
Para Bellum opens with a reminder that Testament can still make a fairly unpleasant noise when they want to. For the Love of Pain pushes towards death metal, with Chuck Billy …
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Album review
Rare Field Ceiling
Yellow Eyes
Rare Field Ceiling makes its impression as a whole before giving up its smaller details. Yellow Eyes' guitars move around each other, the drums fill the space and the vocals s…
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