Album Reviews

Impressive Symphonic Metal debut. Hailing from Hungary, Sorronia have been quietly honing and evolving their sound and style since their formation in late 2011. Now that everything is in place the band have released their debut offering ‘Words Of Silence’. Falling neatly into the Symphonic Metal bracket, Sorronia have come …

Over the past half a decade, Los Angeles’ Warbringer have produced three of the best new age thrash albums of recent years – a triptych of work which has taken its inspiration from the sound of genre pioneers such as Exodus, Exciter and Testament and brought it up to date …

David Reece really shouldn’t need any introduction, but for those of you who haven’t heard that name before, he is one very talented singer. He has sang with Accept on their 80’s album, “Eat the Heat” and then with Bangalore Choir featuring on their album “On Target”. You can also …

American Fangs from Houston, Texas released their UK début EP Pomona on the 15 October 2013 on In De Goot Recordings. The best track on this five track EP has to be the opener and title track Pomona. Although when I say début, it’s their début release in the UK …

2013’s Volition is layered, melodic, and jam-packed with more riffs, ideas, and flourish then most bands will produce within five albums. Protest The Hero, another glorious Canadian import, released this exhaustive, 11-tune behemoth, sure to please fans of modern, technically-oriented metal. For rock and jazz, there’s fusion: an eclectic genre …

Following the release of the Murder by Pride album in 2009, the pioneers of Christian Metal, Stryper, have been teasing their soldiers about releasing an album packed full of original material.  A cover album (The Covering) and an album featuring old songs re-recorded (Second Coming) filled the 5 year gap; …

Almost a quarter of a century after their formation, stoner rock legends Monster Magnet show no sign of letting up. They’ve been releasing a new studio album every three years consistently since 1995 and Last Patrol, their ninth effort which was released on Tuesday, continues the trend. And whilst four …

'Stranger Than Love', is a true power rock ballad of epic proportions. Big sounds! big riff's! big beats! big hair? (optional) these days.

Hailing from my native Belfast, Nomadic Rituals play sludgy doom so dark and dense it sounds like it has been buried deep in a peat bog a hundred or so miles south of the city and then dragged, slowly and inexorably, to the surface by a team of unsuspecting musical …

A band who first came together when the two guitarists – Jansen Press and Vincent Martinez – jammed at a music industry event back in 2009, Carousel Vertigo will be well-known to the Status Quo fans among our readers, as they were the support band of choice on the latter’s …

Lancashire based five piece Massive Wagons recently recorded their second album at Axis Studios. After their début album Fire It Up here comes Fight the System to be released worldwide on 14th July 2014. Might as well start with the title track, Fight The System. Those who already have Fire …

Berkshire five piece Primitai have been honing their particular brand of 80s-inspired traditional heavy metal riffery for a little over a decade years now, and this, their third album, is further consolidation of their position of the best young bands purveying this particular style of metal-foolery. While their 2007 debut …

What a great name and instantly summons up images of filth, depravity and altogether general unpleasantness. Hailing from Seattle this band have the corpse paint the classic 3 piece line-up, studs, spikes and a general air of not caring what you do or think. From the opening bars of ”Swarming …

In June, Europe headlined the Sweden Rock festival with a performance celebrating 30 years of rock music.  That performance was recorded and filmed and is now being released on CD, DVD and Blu-Ray. The track listing is impressive – they played 28 songs that span the entire length of their …

Sawthis, from Italy, presents us with 2013’s Youniverse. The album sounds like modern extreme metal, which touches on industrial, thrash, and progressive elements. Lyrics are screamed in a hatecore style, so the ‘Cookie Monster’ factor is absent. More refreshment is provided in that the drums sound like drums – like …

Tides From Nebula, from Poland, have composed 50-plus minutes of instrumental music “without vocals” for us to enjoy. Eternal Movement‘s songs, mostly in the five-minute length range, tend to vacillate between channeling the high impact of rock with relaxed, mellow ambiance. Unlike instrumental guitar music which emphasizes solo bursts, this …

In the beginning there was Jefferson Airplane and they were a great band.  After Jefferson Airplane split up several former members created a new group – Jefferson Starship.  They in due course changed their name to Starship, under which name they had massive hit singles with “We built this city” …

The Burning Crows released their debut EP “Never had it so good” last year which went down well with fans and critics – Planetmosh reviewer Mark Ashby gave it a 9/10.  Now, after a Pledgemusic campaign to raise the funds, the band are back with their debut album – Behind …

Platinum Brunette are a parody band from Sydney, Australia.  Fronted by Demonica Lewinsky, all three members wear drag, so you have a Nurse, a nun and a schoolgirl.  The band formed in 2003, releasing their debut single, BMW, in 2007.  This was followed in 2009 by their debut eponymous album …

Los Bastardos Finlandeses come from Finland (as you probably guessed from the name).  Without that Finland reference then with the Spanish name, the names of their previous releases (My name is El Muerte; Return of El Diablo; El Grande’s saloon & Saved by rock’n’roll) and the names of the band …