Too many albums, too few reviewers…that’s the problem with all the metal blogs, not just this one. What do you do? How do you get a sense of what’s out there if you’re only listening to a fraction of what’s getting released? How do you open yourself up to new music? I’ll tell you how: you jump into all the unpicked promos each month and devote a sentence or two giving a sense of what you gleaned from it.
That’s right: we’re back for another round of “The Month That Was…” so enough preambling…let’s dive into this edition of Nine Circles ov… and see what’s been festering in April 2024.
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I don’t know why I was so surprised to hear black metal this vicious and cold on a larger label like Metal Blade, but after the left turn they took on previous album The Harrowing of Hearts Polish outfit Blaze of Perdition have re-ignited their fury and fire on new album Upharsin. Five razor sharp tracks of uncompromising black metal that gets a big lift from a slithering bass line that find moments in the madness to shine and a shifting tempo that lets the menace creep closer. This is a very, very angry band finding its rasp again, and I’m down for it.
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Is there more I can say about Couch Slut, one of the bands that reintroduced me on a musical and personal level to the gang of misfits I call friends in the extreme metal community? You Could Do It Tonight is the band’s third full length and fourth overall release, and their mix of noise rock, avant hardcore and Tom Waits storytelling just gets better and better. There are few front people who can best the presence of Megan Osztrosits, and she’s ferocious here, recounting real world insanity on tracks like “The Donkey” and “The Weaversville Home for Boys.” But like I mentioned when I raved about “Funeral Dyke” from their Contempt album, the rest of the band have risen up to equal her fervor, and it’s a sonic pleasure to behold.
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It’s been a hot minute since we covered Dialith, the power metal band out of Connecticut. Since 2019 to be exact, and in that time the band have continued to incrementally tweak their sound in bigger and better ways. Alter is their second EP following 2021’s Atrophy, and continues the trajectory of strong vocals from Krista Sion which really strong composition and performance from leader Alasdair Wallace Mackie as well as the rest of the band. I love the bit of saxophone on “Ironbound” and the exotic opening of closing track “Shadowdancer.” Another strong release, and if all Dialith do is give us lean and excellent EPs moving forward I’ll continue to be happy.
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Expect to read or hear more about The Shape of Fluidity, the latest from Dool, because this is an early year favorite for a few of us here on staff. Trading in gothic, heavy rock with shades of psychedelia and doom, the band have crafted their best album to date, creating an album heavy with universal themes of identity and connection in an ever-fracturing world, and they do it by zeroing in on very personal, specific narratives; namely, the long road of vocalist Raven van Dorst, born intersex but assigned a female gender by doctors, to find and embrace her hermaphroditic nature. Songs like “Self Dissect,” the title track and especially “Hermagorgon” are intricately tied to her story, yet reach out to embrace those feelings of displacement so many of us struggle with…all to some seriously heavy post rock and doom that make this a winner from every perspective.
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The twitchy, glitchy grind of Full of Hell is usually not for me, but when the band injects a little more melody and coherence into their attack as they do on latest full length Coagulated Bliss, well…color me intrigued. I also love that we’re past classifying albums based on runtime: at only 25 minutes I can see folks wanting to claim this is an EP, but the cohesive nature of the songs and the fact that this thing just rips (current favorite: the thrash attack of “Transmuting Chemical Burns”) makes this a complete vision and a full album in my books. I’ve never been a fan of the bands splits, but this thing is so good I just may have to schedule a revisit of previous works.
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I don’t know that I really cared about High on Fire after Snakes for the Divine. The Kurt Ballou (a player and producer I LOVE in other things) produced-era of albums largely felt like a mash of noise with little nuance for me. I guess all I needed was the introduction of Coady Willis on drums, because Cometh the Storm is a monster of an album, with Willis injecting a MASSIVE drum sound for Matt Pike and Jeff Mantz to wrap their guitars around. Burning Ambulance wrote about this album better than I ever could, so I’ll end by agreeing that when the band lay back a little on their attack with numbers like the title track and “Sol’s Golden Curse” there might not be anyone better in the metal game.
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Has it really been eight years since Tarot released an album? I remember the hazy, organ soaked classic 70s sound of The Warrior’s Spell, and only barely recall 2016’s Reflections. Hearing the clarity and attack of the opening title track, Glimpse of the Dawn sounds like it really benefited from the time away. This is righteous retro rock that evokes bands like Uriah Heep (a band I’ve been lovingly reviewing on my site as I dig into their discography) without being overly slavish in their songs. The organ sound is terrific, the songs like “The Winding Road” and late cut stomper “The Vagabond’s Return” display a swagger and confidence, perhaps aided by the entire band contributing to the songwriting. It’s no secret I love this kind of rock, and Glimpse of the Dawn has been in steady rotation here since it’s release.
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If you’re going to put the name of my favorite kind of distortion pedal in your band name, you better be prepared to back it up. Uh, yeah…Temple of the Fuzz Witch do so in spades on their third release Apotheosis. From the gnarled bass tone the opens “A Call to Prey” to the final gallop that abruptly ends the final track “Ashes” this album is awash in high clipping and stoner doom groove. Everything is just dark and filthy and carries a current of the occult in its riffs, from the nausea-inducing verse that precedes the trad metal refrain in “Wight” to the rushing storm of noise and distortion of “Raze (Varg)”. There is nothing that escapes the fuzz witch here, not even the vocals. There is heavy, and there is heavy, and Temple of the Fuzz Witch inhabits the latter with total abandon.
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It’s no secret that we loved Gloom Ballet, the debut from death rock/goth outfit The Wraith, with both myself and Corey putting it on our end of year lists. After the tragic passing of singer Davey Bales I wasn’t sure if we’d ever get anything again from the band. Lo and behold here we are with Ghost March, featuring new singer Harley Mace doing a great job taking the band forward. This evokes Phantasmagoria-era Damned for me (a fave) and to a lesser extent Misifts, so if that’s something that excites you, prepared for some serious cool vibes. It’s taken me a while to get past the somewhat thin production (I like my death rock to have a heavy low end) but the songs like “Requiem of the Damned” and the very, very Damned inspired “Last Light” (it even calls out “Curtain Call ” in its lyrics) are right on par with everything the band did right on their debut album. This one is growing on me with every listen.
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Another month down. The surprises and discoveries continue to pile up, so let me know what we missed and what we should be on the lookout for and we’ll see you in May.
Until next month, keep it heavy…keep it safe.
— Chris
Nine Circles 