FOR THE LOVE OF METAL
New York State’s Suffocation don’t waste any time on their latest release, Blood Oath. From the moment it bursts out of the starting gate, the album lumbers along with the death metal/ grindcore sound that has become a trademark of the band.
Swiss band Eluveitie have reappeared with a new offering that is being billed as “an acoustic album” that is the first of a two-part concept series. Despite the use of the term “acoustic,” Evocation 1 is far from having a minimalist folk sound.
The five piece Swedish band Hammerfall started in the late 90s as a power metal side project of members from bands such as In Flames and Dark Tranquility. No Sacrifice, No Victory is now the band’s seventh full-length studio album
Brutal, crushing, epic metal to the march of Roman legions! With their debut Romulus, Ex Deo establishes a unique middle ground between the fierce brutality of Kataklysm and the storming pagan metal of Blackguard, Moonsorrow and Tyr.
Samael’s Above is an album that comes and goes very quickly, but while it hangs around it pounds those who hear it with a relentless return to form. Said to be a “tribute” to the Swiss band’s past, this new effort leaves behind the more melodic and organized sound of their previous album, Solar Soul, in exchange for an all-out torrent of black metal/industrial metal that rarely leaves any space to catch one’s breath.
The new album from Finnish band Amorphis fits in perfectly with their recent sound and albums. In fact, Skyforger sounds like it could easily be the third entry in a trilogy that would begin with 2006’s Eclipse and continue on with 2007’s Silent Waters.
Combining folk elements with catchy song writing and haunting keyboards, underneath another brilliant vocal performance by Joutsen, Skyforger is set to be another classic in the Amorphis discography.
With the early May sun setting behind the Toronto skyline, the Sound Academy was surrounded by an air of excitement on this Monday night as concert-goers traveled en masse to see Opeth and Enslaved.