When DemiAura keyboard player Jonathan Gabriel Jr. mailed us if we could review the first album by his new band, he mentioned that there was a possibility that vocals were added to the final mix. We replied that he really had to be sure it was done, before the recordings and he replied that the instrumental version would be the final one. Now, after releasing their debut album ‘DemiAura’, I’m curious if that was the right decision.
This is a band that confused me, to say the least. Led by ex-OTEP guitarist Scotty CH, the American band The Secret VI has released some new music last summer. Five years after their last effort, a period in which the band almost disappeared from the scene, they came back with the EP ‘Mixed Episode’. An effort that that gave me some mixed feelings, that’s for sure.
Folk and Pagan bands that really make an effort out of their music, taking things seriously, without changing into a beer drinking gimmick. That’s something I can really enjoy. There are too much of those semi-serious bands that don’t seem to care and just fool around a bit. Something which is completely different with the Swedish Vikings of Månegarm. With fire and steel they are here to conquer your speakers with their new, self-titled album: ‘Månegarm’.
Quite recently we reviewed the new Melted Space album, which was a grotesque record with no less than seventeen guest musicians and vocalists. It didn’t make that much of a devastating impression, but the music was amazing. And now there’s Phantasma, the product of the soul of only three people. Backed up by an entire 100 page novel by Delain vocalist Charlotte Wessels, here’s ‘The Deviant Hearts’, and it’s a rollercoaster of emotions.
Energy, power, passion and love for music. That’s what this Dutch band is all about. Straight out of Amsterdam, the rockers of the new Orange Outlaw are here to conquer the world with an old school mix of powerful hard rock meets heavy metal. Three years after the band got together their debut album is finally here. I’m not sure you can find a “real” ‘Desert Wolf’ in Amsterdam, but the album gives you almost more than you can handle!
The Belgian metal scene is blooming like never before. I honestly don’t know why, but all of a sudden the Belgians decided to go and make some amazing heavy metal music. Following the releases of Temptations For The Weak and Guilty As Charged, who both partook in the Red Bull Bedroom Jam, is the independent release of Ython’s debut album ‘Titanomachy’. Let’s see if these Belgians have the potential to become titans.
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There’s something going on that I cannot wrap my head around. No, it’s not the bizarre name of this band, how strange Mammoth Storm may sound. But it has to do with the fact that I just, barely a week ago, reviewed the new album by Draconian. A doom album with a great amount of good tracks. And now I find the name of Draconian bass player Daniel Arvidsson on the Mammoth Storm line-up as well. The reason you play in two bands is clear to me, but releasing two albums at the same time? Why? And how good is this debut album called ‘Fornjot’?
Following the latest example of the American super group, Metal Alliance, is Melted Space. With no less than seventeen different musicians and vocalists their new album is a complete symphonic metal opera, assembled by the French mastermind Pierre La Pape. Together with some of the crème the la crème of the metal world and the entire Prague Philharmonic orchestra, La Pape has manage to create something pretty unique with ‘The Great Lie’.
