vimur

Best of 2022: Josh’s List

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Best of 2022

I had this enormous amount of words set to open this thing but opted for… not that. We’ve all lived through another year so there’s no need to reiterate. Instead, I’ll say that 2022 was great for me. It’ll be one of those years I’ll look back on as one that changed things for the better and I’ll have extremely fond memories of it for reasons I can’t mention here. But, I’ll also look back on it as a tremendous year for metal. And it doesn’t matter what strain you dig as pretty much all of it had a banner year. I know it seems like we’re a broken record saying that every year, but 2022 was damn strong. If you don’t feel the same, please rewind and revisit and get back to me. Otherwise, welcome to all the things that made a huge difference for me throughout the year and what was my 2022 soundtrack, what made the biggest impact…whatever, you get the idea. This list of 18…, wait…you ask “why 18?” Well, branding of course. We’re Nine Circles so you’ll get my top 9 and my 9 honorable mentions… and a few special mentions. 9C, as it was. So, let’s do it…

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Album Review: Vimur — “Transcendental Violence”

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Vimur - Transcendental Violence

Occasionally bands conjure up the perfect album art for their work, with help from solid artists of course, and an enormous lion breathing hellfire onto the earth is not only fitting for Vimur’s third full length Transcendental Violence, but also a visual representation for where we are as a society and what’s most likely to be the outcome of our stupidity. Vimur fights on the same fields of battle that some of the best second wave black metal bands did yet their spin, their feel, their power, and their conviction is second to none. They say the third time’s the charm but in this case, the third time’s the icing on the cake as Vimur has shorn up the small cracks of efforts past and are quite literally bullet, and fire, proof.

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Initial Descent: March 27 – April 2, 2022

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Vimur
Vimur

A renewed sense of panic and crushing weight settles in…ah, it’s Monday again. But, fear not, the memes will come hot and fresh, the sun will come out this week, AND we’ve got a full clip of new metal that consists of more treats than tricks this week starting off with Atlanta’s black metal practitioners Vimur returning with their third offering and this one blisters their previous material, Meshuggah roar back to life after a six year slumber and whether you call them tech or djent, they still got it in spades, traditional heavy metal gets a swift kick in the ass from both Satan and Wolf, and, as always, a full list of other stuff to explore. Just FYI: as much as we try to feature as many releases as possible, we miss them occasionally so if we’ve missed any here, or in the future, feel free to drop them in the comments so everyone can benefit. And, if your (metal of some sort) band wants to be featured here, click on our about page to find our email and send us one. We’d love to hear from you…probably.  

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Embracing the Descent: February 24 – March 2, 2019

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Welcome to a fresh new thing called Embracing the Descent where we will briefly discuss somewhere between one and a handful of the current week’s new releases. Every now and then we might look back a week but for the most part we’ll try and keep it current and somewhat regular. That’s the plan anyway. Now, there will be bias because let’s face it: listening to 40-60 albums each week ain’t happening so we’ll be highlighting a select few that stood out for whatever reason. Almost like a grab bag of sorts. We don’t know how we’ll land on the albums we highlight, how many albums we will highlight, or who will be highlighting them… But we figure everyone likes a good mystery. So without further ado, let’s jump into a few from this week and don’t forget to check out the full listing from Monday’s Initial Descent. Continue reading →

Initial Descent: September 11 – 17, 2016

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High Spirits
High Spirits
Welcome to another Initial Descent and yet another stacked batch of releases. Hopefully you spent yesterday getting a head start because there’s enough on tap here to keep most anyone busy. We all could use some happiness so do yourself, and those around you, a favor and check out High Spirit‘s latest full length Motivator. On the opposite spectrum, if you just recovered from Subrosa’s latest dive into Light Falls from Wrekmeister Harmonies and keep that heavy yet somber feeling alive. Blister your eardrums with Cara Neir and Wildspeaker‘s latest Split on Broken Limbs Recordings, who actually have several out this week that warrant your time. Sumerlands debut Sumerlands deeply satisfies the traditional heavy metal craving and Mare Cognitum returns with their hypnotizing take on atmospheric black metal with Luminiferous Aether. All that and much more so click that “continue reading” link. Continue reading →