Top Picks
Cavalera [Conspiracy] – Schizophrenia Re-Recorded (new old death-thrash)
The Cavaleras have been on quite the nostalgia kick of late. Having toured classic albums like Roots (1996), Beneath the Remains (1989) and Arise (1991), 2023 saw them (re-)enter the studio to give Sepultura‘s debut EP/LP combo Morbid Visions (1986) / Bestial Devastation (1985) a twenty-first-century makeover. While those re-recordings were widely well received, much of the charm of the originals was also lost in the update. Those records are largely revered (to the degree that they are) for their crude enthusiasm, if not necessarily the quality of the contents themselves.
Second Sepultura long-player, Schizophrenia (1987) is an entirely different beast. That album has always been teetering on the edge of greatness, trapped between the untempered aggression of its predecessors and the more refined (and competently performed) run of classic, genre-defining albums that followed. Whereas Morbid Visions and Bestial Devastation were defined by and remain compelling because of their rawness, Schizophrenia has always felt like another genre-classic record being somewhat stiffed and held back by the quality of its performance and production. This re-recorded version, therefore, comes across like the album having finally achieved its true form, as it was always meant to be heard.
Sure, it’s essentially the same song six or seven times over (with an extra, bonus offering this time around as well. But it’s a hell of a song! Especially when you remember that they were essentially defining this type of sound upon first outing. Listening to Schizophrenia I’m reminded from whence (serial “Arise” coverers) In Malice’s Wake got all their riffs, and there’s a surprising amount of hardcore rhythms blended in there that remind me a lot of what bands like Gatekreeper are doing these days and suggests Sepultura were maybe even more forward thinking (or Gatecreeper even more regressive) than they’re given credit for. Or they’re some seriously crafty revisionists.
Who knows if the Cavaleras intend to continue any further down this re-recording path. Landmark albums like Roots and Chaos A.D. (1993) still sound as vital today as they did upon first release, but I, for one, would love to see them re-record Arise, which—despite its genre-classic status—has always been held back by some seriously sub-par production, even if the performances are on point. They should skip Beneath the Remains though, that shit is perfect.
Construct Of Lethe – A Kindness Dealt in Venom (weird/progressive disso-death)
Keeping this brief, since I wrote way more about Schizophrenia than I was intending (and because I want to get back to playing Elden Ring), but if you want something new new that’s out today, then I think Construct of Lethe is probably the pick of the bunch. They’re a band whose sound has always evolved across each release, and A Kindness Dealt in Venom sees them wading into post-tinged disso-death territory, without foregoing any of the dark brutality or technical angularity that defined their earlier releases. From my first few listens, I think I probably prefer this to the new Ulcerate album, and I’ve also found that Constrct of Lethe records tend to reveal themselves across multiple listens, so I imagine there’s even more there to unpack with time. Either way, it leaves a hell of a first impression.
Release Roundup
Adelon – Resurgence (prog death)
Aklash – Reincarnation (folk metal, meloblack)
Alcest – Les Chants De L’Aurore (post-black, metal?)
Ancient Entities – Echoes Of Annihilation (death metal)
Anthropophagus Depravity – Demonic Paradise (brutal death metal)
Aseethe – The Cost (sludge doom)
Assimilator – Expelled into Suffering (shitty-blackened death metal)
Aussichtslos – Schicksalstotschlag (black metal)
Autumns Eyes – Grimore Of Oak & Shadow (Type O Negative in the woods)
Bangladeafy – Vulture (weird electro noise-prog)
Battlesnake – The Rise And Demise Of The Motorsteeple (campy occultish rock)
Black Veil Brides – Bleeders (gothy butt-rock/metal)
Blóð – Mara (post metal, sludge doom)
Brunsten – Ethyl (noisy post-punk/hardcore)
Brutally Deceased – Chasms (death metal)
Cainites – Revenant (death metal)
Codex Mortis – Tales of Woe (meloblackened death metal)
Coral The MerKnight – Vs. The Beasts Of Burdentown (“post-deathrock”, bog-standard prog metal)
Derelict – Versus Entropy (tech-death)
Dezperadoz – Moonshiner (heavy metal, thrash)
earthtone9 – In Resonance Nexus (nu/prog-ish alt metal)
Eden Adversary – Kingdom ov Heresy (symphonic deathcore)
Escalation – Ruins of the Falling World (death-doom)
Feed Them Death – The Malady (death/grind)
Floating Worlds – Skywatcher (synthy prog rock)
Foreign Hands – What’s Left Unsaid (metalcore, hardcore)
Forest Field – Mystery & Mayhem (prog rock)
Gasket – Babylon (blackened hardcore)
The Ghost Next Door – Classic Songs About Death and Dismemberment (prog rock)
Gorgatron – Sentience Revoked (brutal death metal)
Gravethorn – Underground Rituals Of Those Unseen (black metal)
Greenleaf – The Head & The Habit (stoner rock/metal)
Grim Colossus – Descent into Madness (doom metal)
Grimoire – Lovehunt (heavy/trad metal)
Ground2A – Communication (hardcore, metalcore)
Helveth – Descent into Chasm (black metal)
Horseburner – Voice of Storms (progressive stoner-metal, Baroness)
Hyperdontia – Harvest of Malevolence (death metal)
Iffernet – Iffernet / Dolpo (black metal)
Inherits the Void – Scars of Yesteryears (progressive meloblack/death)
Inner Shrine – Aita (symphonic doom?)
Kärv – What the Dunes Have Hidden (black metal)
King Bastard – From Whence They Came (sludge doom)
Kittie – Fire (who asked for this?)
Kraanerg – Heart of a Cherry Pit Sun (zeuhl, apparently)
Kvaen – The Formless Fires (no-longer-thrashy meloblack)
L.M.I. – Failed to Feel It (weird/progressive/blackened deathgrind)
Les Chants Du Hasard – Livre Quart (spooky classical)
Liv Moon – Circle of Life (symphonic power metal)
Lucifericon – Sabatraxis (black doom)
Malachite – Eye of the Storm (modern/instrumental melodeath)
Markkheim – Crimson Crush (industrial metal, darkwave)
Mechanyzed – Ivy King (heavy/speed metal, thrash)
The Mercury Riots – In Solstice (hard rock)
Morbid – Necrotic Fairytales (sludge death)
Mylingen – Under en svart himmel (blackened melodoom)
Nel Buio – Nel Buio (blackened death metal)
Ov Shadows – Heresiarch (black metal)
Paragnosis – Paragnosis (instrumental stoner prog)
Pissrot – Soaked In Slop (death metal)
Portrait – The Host (heavy/trad metal)
Practical Gore – Scare Squad (death metal, sludgy goregrind)
Prehistoric War Cult – Barbaric Metal (blackened death metal)
Primordial Serpent – Triumphant Son of Darkness (black metal)
Qaalm – First Light of the Last Dawn (doomy black metal)
Release The Titans – Odyssey (sludge)
Religious Observance – 7 Years of Neglect (sludge)
Remina – Erebus (post metal, goth doom)
Rendezvous Point – Dream Chaser (prog metal)
Replacire – The Center That Cannot Hold (tech/groove-death)
Rifflord – 39 Serpent Power (sudgey stoner metal)
Sarke – Endo Feight (black metal)
Seven Spires – A Fortress Called Home (symphonic power, melodeath)
Seventh Dimension – Of Hope & Ordeals (prog metal)
Shadow Witch – Eschaton (The End of All Things) (stoner metal)
Solnegre – Annihilation Of The Self (post metal)
The Story So Far – I Want To Disappear (ok pop punk)
Sumac – The Healer (posty noise-sludge)
Tether – Mirror Work (nu metal)
The Used – Medz (please stop)
Unholy Craft – Saa Morkt, Saa Mektig (shitty black metal)
Valerian Swing – Liminal (progressive post rock)
Vexing Hex – Solve Et Coagula (does not sound like its cover prog)
Void Blight – Monolith of Vortex Realms (brutal death metal)
Voraath – Vol 1: The Hymn of the Hunters (blackened death metal)
Vulgar Chaos – The Edge of Sanity (groove death)]
Wage War – Stigma (very bad not good nu/metalcore)
Wharflurch – Shittier/Slimier (shitty death metal)
Wild Spelks – A House Full Of Strangers (altish indie rock)
Windswept – Der Eine, Wahre Konig (black metal)
Wizzerd – Kronia (stoner rock)
Wounded Masquerade – Forlorn (DSBM)
Wrach – Quae Infra Volo Videre (black metal)
YR – Maanelyst (black metal)
Zealed – Divination (deathcore)