Location: Halen, Belgium
Subgenre: crust / grind

Hello, again. My fine readers, we are cruising towards the year-end list-making apocalypse. This is precisely when I freak out that I still need to cover all my favorites in the column before they’re swept away by 2023. So, uh, check out Wrack’s Repulsive Gravity. And Soulmass’s Eidolon. And yes, any of the six Homeskin albums, although, given Garry Brents’s recording pace, I imagine we’ll get another bite of that apple soon.

However, out of all the records I waited too long to cover that meet my smaller-band coverage mandate, Days Of Desolation’s Circles is at the top of the list. Let me get straight to the point, then: If you liked the crustily grinding Eastwood record from last year but wanted more of everything, stop reading, click the Bandcamp link, and buy Circles. You won’t be disappointed.

Days Of Desolation’s MO is simple: take neo-crust and infuse blasts. “We started out as a three-piece somewhere back in 2007,” Jasper Swerts said to I(a)mmolotov in 2014. “We were (and still are) heavily influenced by bands like Cop on Fire, Ekkaia, Ictus, End of All, Ambulance, … and wanted to try something like it, but with more blast beats.” In an interview with Good Guys Go Grind, Owen Swerts talked about the critical next step for the Belgian trio: “…over time, we embraced the blast beat fully, which I think is a good evolution.” Yeah, concur. Note to self: Maybe it’s time to read the blurbs over blast beats.

Anyway, Circles is an *ahem* blast. But, to be clear, it’s primarily powered by riffs. Guitarists Jasper (the equally rad Monnier, Arrogänt, China Syndrome, art as Infested Art, including the Circles album cover, one of my favorites for this year) and Bart Jansen (Vuur, Arrogänt, Nervous Mothers) shovel a ton of riffs into the song steam engine. No surprise, then, that these crusty compositions race by with supercharged propulsion. The 76-second title track alternates between sharp Swedish grind and tumbling neo-crust so quickly that everything blurs together. When you dig into the song, dissecting every second, you realize just how stuffed it is with material, how each riff could riff alone. But, the frenetic pace is far more powerful and sets the band up well when it wants to make a point.

Because of Days Of Desolation’s affinity for fleetness, it hits hard when it takes a second to stretch out. “Bone Unto Brine” is your first riff rest stop, when the trio takes a few ticks to chew on a deliriously catchy Nasum-y lead. The twin-epics outro of “Neuron Nebula” and “Hypersleep,” with both songs exceeding four minutes, is even better, grinding towards satisfying crescendos. In these slower moments, drummer/vocalist Owen (Frequency Eater, Sons Of A Wanted Man) really shines, showing off his versatility. Some blasters can’t play slow, but Owen can construct a great groove, building a pocket for the leads. I don’t know how he sings over some of the patterns, but hey, like Days Of Desolation, he’s on top of his game. And, yeah, Circles should’ve made a list months ago. At least it’s here now. [From Circles, out now via Halenoise Records / Loner Cult Records / Romantic Songs Records / Up The Punx.] –Ian Chainey

Location: Austin, Texas
Subgenre: blackgaze

I’m not sure how to quantify whether a band is “big” on Bandcamp – the proprietary algorithm is unbelievably opaque, to the extent that sometimes I question whether there even is an algorithm – but I can confidently say that I follow the blackgaze scene pretty closely, and I can tell you that certain bands surface with a good deal more visibility than others.

And the new three-band, six-song Funeral Flowers features three of the most prominent bands in that scene: Breaths, Daygraves, and Wounds Of Recollection. I’m reluctant to call the thing a split, because it doesn’t quite feel like one. It’s too cohesive, too good, even. This is an album. In the bands’ own words:

“‘Funeral Flowers’ is a collaborative project between Breaths, Daygraves, and Wounds Of Recollection. Over the last few months, we’ve been expanding new sonic elements and expanding our approach to songwriting and this 45-minute split is the result.”

Mmm. Yep. So anyway, I’m pretty familiar with all three of those bands – I’ve written before about Wounds Of Recollection in this very space – and I went into this thinking, “maybe one of these songs will be good enough to cover in Black Market.” Frustratingly, however, no. No, all six of these fucking songs should be covered here. All three of these bands have elevated their respective sounds to entirely new and frankly jaw-dropping levels. I’m blown away by all of them. I’m not joking when I tell you this: As I write these words, I’m still not sure which song I’m going to actually write about. Will it be Breaths’ “An Artist’s Rendering Pt 2”? It has to be. Good fucking lord, what a monument. What a statement! What a sound! What else could it be? Unless…will it be Wounds Of Recollection’s “Heirloom Pt 2”? Well, obviously it will be that one. Gimme a break. Obviously. I mean, just listen to that song! Guys, you know me. You know that is literally my song. I clearly have no other choice here. Unless…

Brief digression. I remember writing about this in my review of Deafheaven’s Infinite Granite – an album I love – and thinking this all throughout my writing process, thinking, Deafheaven are doing something radical here, because they are the one – them and Sadness and Alcest and maybe Rolo Tomassi, if you consider Rolo to be blackgaze, but really, honestly, especially Deafheaven – and everyone is watching them, and therefore they have to do something radical, because anything less would leave them in the past, a legacy act, while all these other guys are over here making actual art. Sure, they could do “The Pecan Tree Pt. 2” and everyone would love it. But Nature Morte already did that. And it’s so fucking awesome. But it’s been done.

I realize that all of this – this blackgaze stuff – it must seem so small and inconsequential from the outside. I get that. But on the inside, up close, it is a wild, thrilling, ever-intensifying gauntlet, with a continually growing number of serious independent artists changing up the parameters and raising the stakes, challenging one another to do something better, something new. Deafheaven heard that call, so they switched to cleans and took a more streamlined and more disciplined approach to writing and worked with M83’s producer, and, well…that became a new challenge for everybody else.

I think we’re seeing now how the landscape is evolving from there, and how much further it can go. And Funeral Flowers is an absolutely essential document of this moment. It is a gift. You can hear a whole entire future in this. You can hear everything happening now. This is 45 minutes of music without one bad note, without one inauthentic voice, without almost anything whatsoever that I’ve heard before. I wish I was featuring all six of these songs right now, but I had to pick one, so I picked this one: “Native Tongue,” the first of two songs here by the one-man Austin, Texas outfit called Daygraves. Both of the Daygraves songs on Funeral Flowers are unbelievable. Again, they all are! I honestly just listen to this whole record straight through on repeat! For weeks now! I could have picked any one of these songs. But I picked this one…and I have no idea what to say about it.

Obviously it’s incredible. The moody, gothy synths, the tubular bells or whatever that is, the plaintive, lonely clean vocals, the uncomfortably sad and affecting lyrics, the ominous beats, the quick flip from quiet to loud, and then when he fires up the jets on those harshes, it’s like…BOOM. Lights out. It’s heroin, man. It hits my ears and my legs go out from under me. It physically feels so good to listen to, and I actually, legitimately fucking hate how short it is. I want this song to go on forever. I want this song to be played at my funeral. Only I’m not ready to go just yet. I need to listen again; I need to hear more, more, more. [From Funeral Flowers, out now via the bands.] –Michael Nelson

Location: Montreal, Québec, Canada
Subgenre: heavy metal

Metalian’s logline is Canadian Judas Priest. The Montréal heavy metal quartet doesn’t shy away from it. It’s in the PR copy. It comes up in interviews. “I guess to me, Priest are the best of the genre,” singer and guitarist Ian Wilson said to Metal Temple, “especially [the] Sin after Sin and Sad Wings of Destiny albums. Halford’s vocals are unrivaled, Tipton’s bluesy solos and Downing’s more extreme solos create some kind of musical perfection. There are other good [NWOBHM] bands, but Priest really grabbed me.” And thus, it will not surprise you that if Judas Priest grabs you, Metalian’s fourth full-length, Beyond the Wall, will grab you, too.

However, what’s lost when explaining Metalian by way of comparison is how joyful the quartet sounds when it makes heavy metal. Wilson and Simon Costa lock into an ecstatic twin-guitar attack. Bassist Andres Arango and drummer Tony Cantara are a formidable battery powering working class rhythms that undeniably swing. Sure, Priest is where Metalian typically ends up, but only because Metalian wants to make awesome music and Priest is awesome.

That said, there’s one other big thing that animates Metalian. “I’ll smoke a joint and riff on something that sounds good and turn it into a song,” Wilson admitted to Robex Lundgren. This potent songwriting process was later confirmed in an album breakdown with Decibel. Regarding Beyond the Wall highlight “Cold Thunder,” the band said, “Cold Thunder is a variety of Sativa that grows well (and big!) in cold climates like in Canada! The song was completely written by Ian, in one take, after lighting one up, haha!” Good song, by the way, showing off the band’s ability at nailing red-eyed, revved-up motorcycle anthems.

Anyway, I bring up Metalian’s pursuit of awesome music and awesome highs to prepare you for “Dark City,” a very not-Metalian song that closes this otherwise very Metalian album. It’s…’70s punk? Some perfect cocktail of weed and the need to riff good is responsible for style swerve, and thank Halford for that. If Iron Maiden toured with The Wipers and both bands decided to bash out the credits music for a coming-of-age summer camp movie, that could get you close. Hold on. That description needs more joy. I’m going to do better: It rules! It’s like some lost Canadian metallic punk classic that would dominate a Smash the State compilation. While Metalian’s brand of trad is my kind of heavy metal, I would love to hear more of this ancient punk/metal hybrid.

So, yes, to get the full Metalian experience, I suggest you first listen to the garage-metal epic “March to the Death” and then the smoking-valves fretboard workout “Fire On The Road.” You know, check those Priest boxes. But please make your way to “Dark City,” a catchy slice of rockin’ punk destined to become a mixtape staple. [From Beyond the Wall, out now via Temple of Mystery Records.] –Ian Chainey

Location: Dallas, Texas
Subgenre: doom / sludge

Blightcaster announced its arrival in 2016 with a Facebook picture: two crossed drumsticks framed by a guitar and saxophone. You could’ve just shown me this, and I would’ve been hooked. Six years later, we finally get to hear the goods. The Dallas doom trio calls Of Blood-Cursed Night “funeral fusion,” a mix of immense doom/sludge a la Corrupted’s Paso Inferior with intense sax wails. The goods are good.

It has been a saxy year in metal. Antigama, Ashenspire, KEN mode, Sigh etc. That Of Blood-Cursed Night lands a few months after Effluence’s Sarmat and the same week as Oxbow and Peter Brötzmann’s An Eternal Reminder of Not Today / Live at Moers feels right. Of course, saxes have always played a role in extreme music and been a fascinating drone texture since Urban Sax, if not eons before. I mean, whatever, this isn’t a history lesson; I’m only saying that I’ve been digging the number of bands lately that are waging sonic war with woodwinds. But I guess what I’m really saying is that it’s a good time for funeral fusion, too, a style that sounds like how Matt Browning‘s characteristically rad album artwork looks: a soulectomy performed by sludge and sax. And if you’re hooked by that thought, let me tell you, the 23-minute “She-Wolves” is a great time.

Turner (guitars) and Roe (drums) bash out droneful doom, ensuring the stretched-out riffs hit at the most satisfying moments. (All three members are in bands that have appeared in this column, but I will respect the pseudonymous mononyms.) As I’ve written before, doom and sludge live and die by the rhythm section, and Blightcaster has a killer one. Roe works in a ton of tricky rhythms and flourishes between the strums, giving this dirge a buoyancy that carries a listener along. Heck, there’s a spasm of fills on “Hexed By Plague Angels,” Of Blood​-​Cursed Night’s closer, that has made me say “holy shit” out loud every time I’ve heard it.

But be sure to save some holy-shits for Webber’s saxing. My notes say, “what if Alan Dubin was transformed into a saxophone that tumbled back in time and landed in the hands of Rahsaan Roland Kirk?” I don’t think my over-caffeinated crack at explaining my admiration is that overwrought. OK, it totally is, but just listen to Webber’s horn scream. The effects — echoes, delays, and more — make Webber sound otherwordly, shooting Blightcaster into the stars. You don’t need vocals when you have something that evocative. When “She-Wolves” fades into ambient, the tiny tootles, string noises, and drum pitters might as well be a pod of distressed space whales trying to find their way home.

Blightcaster is not for everyone. But if you like your doom agonizing, your sludge ugly, and your fusion loud, Of Blood-Cursed Night delivers on the promise of its baby pictures. I’m hooked. [From Of Blood​-​Cursed Night, out now via the band.] –Ian Chainey

Location: Sweden
Subgenre: heavy metal

The resplendent trad riff attack that opens and carries throughout “Hidden Enthronement” would be enough to keep you hooked, but Sordid Blade conjures such a rich and unusual tapestry full of off-kilter melodies and stylistic twists that it becomes engrossing. Take frontman Niklas Holm’s unique vocal delivery, which arrives shrouded from another age, an understated, somewhat haunted, and slightly nasally bard’s song where consonants are rolled at random for esoteric flourish. It’s sneakily magnetic at first, and over time becomes an obsession as he alternates with belted-out cries, singing of kings and deeds dreadful and heroic. Holm handles everything save the drums (Micael Zetterberg), and his sense for melody, which effortlessly evokes faded glory and grandeur, reveals one looking at well-trodden territory from a fresh vantage. “Hidden Enthronement,” and the rest of Every Battle Has Its Glory is an infectious journey to an imagined past that you won’t easily leave. [From Every Battle Has Its Glory, out now via Cruz Del Sur.] –Wyatt Marshall

Location: Copenhagen, Denmark
Subgenre: black metal

If your artistic fate is to make 20-minute black metal songs, you could do worse than choosing the stages of life as your theme. That’s the journey Danish trio ORM has undertaken on Intet • Altet, its third LP. Four songs, 92 minutes, an entire lifespan from birth to death.

Existential topics are nothing new for ORM. Ir, its 2019 full-length, explored bereavement. “To put it into as few words as possible, Ir is about a personal loss, the suicide of a dear family member, and all the emotions and questions that follows in the wake of something as monumental as that,” the band’s previous bassist Troels Cort Nielsen said to Captured Howls. That the band navigates these wakes sensitively and gracefully proves that black metal can be more than edgelord recitations of the evil that men do.

“Personally, I think that the genre is in a liberation process in many ways,” Nielsen said in that same interview. “Black metal is no longer just black metal, perhaps it never was, but I feel that the genre-specific constraints are being torn down and bands are trying harder and harder to take what they like and make it their own.”

The origins of ORM’s own take on black metal might be found in the members’ prior outfit, By the Patient. That band bolted the lead-heavy sound of Scandinavian melodeath onto other genres, giving those styles a crisp epicness. On Intet • Altet, the high-energy guitars remain, giving the rushing-river build-ups of the Cascadian bands, or their older Germanic equivalents, a concentrated melodicism. No matter where you are in these behemoth compositions, the guitars have a lead that invites you in while Adam Schønemann’s powerful drumming pushes you forward. It’s why Intet • Altet rarely feels overstuffed despite its runtime.

As a card-carrying member of the “you need a damn good reason to go longer than Reign in Blood” club, I think the hooks give ORM a damn good reason. But, really, Intet • Altet is successful because it’s dynamic. When ORM goes heavy, it’s heavy. The layered vocals from Simon Sonne Andersen and Theis Wilmer Poulsen, also ORM’s guitarists, have a corrosive bite to them, a textured approach that reminds me of Today is the Day and must’ve taken a long-ass time to record. The quieter sections, such as the stretches on “Floden, som kan skabe,” have a subdued poise. They also have a pulse. Like the passage of time, Intet • Altet is never inert.

That said, I think the key to Intet • Altet is that it’s uncluttered. ORM doesn’t overlayer. Most of these sections are long but restrained, allowing the vocals, guitars, and drums to shine. Additional sounds creep in to add needed weight — synthetic washes, brass, strings — but Sonne Andersen’s production provides enough space for everything to coexist. I think there’s a tendency to equate “epicness” with indulgence, slathering on ear candy in the hopes of overstimulating a listener. ORM sounds pretty confident that its music is compelling and doesn’t need more, which is a weird thing to write about an album that’s as long as a movie. But, hey, length is definitely a constraint to tear down. And when you reach the end of closer “Mod døden,” when ORM rages against the dying of the light and then ascends, I definitely feel like I’ve lived through something. [From Intet • Altet, out now via Indisciplinarian.] –Ian Chainey

Location: Indonesia
Subgenre: blackgaze

Practically speaking, when one of those splits is released (and there are many already, with more on the way), this is how it typically plays out: Sadness’ obsessively intense little army of worshippers sees there’s a new song on a new split; they (we) rush to Bandcamp to listen to the new Sadness song(s); and then, we check out the other band(s).

This process produces a whole lot of mixed bags, as you might imagine, but occasionally, you find some actual diamonds. The most notable example of this, I would say, was the massive May 2020 four-band, 12-song Hiraeth split, on which was featured an Indonesian act called Soulless, whose two inclusions on the split felt like both revelations and highlights. Soulless themselves felt like a huge discovery.

“We Will Prevail” is Soulless’ first release since a January 2021 EP, their second since Hiraeth, and is supposed to be the lead single off an as-yet-untitled (and presumably as-yet-unfinished) LP. It’s also, rather firmly, one of the very best songs I’ve heard in 2022.

The debts owed to Sadness here are pretty obvious – this is swoony, gazy, dizzying, melodic atmospheric black metal with lots of blurred edges and “holy fucking shit” moments – but it’s not even close to the same sound. Soulless are more muscular, less…elusive and weird, if you will, with cleaner lines and a more direct approach. The song is, dramatically, a pure ascension. From the opening wisps of sound, it deftly and only crescendos for nearly nine and a half minutes. It starts on a cloud, and from there, takes you to Mars, where there is a war going on. The prevalent tones and textures of the opening bars eventually, incrementally, give way to an epic Valhallan attack that Quorthon himself would be proud to have written. (The title here should be something of a giveaway in that regard.) The last four minutes here comprise a long stretch of objectively exciting and magnificently vivid music that exponentially intensifies until it suddenly vanishes.

I’m not sure if or when Soulless will deliver the remainder of the album on which “We Will Prevail” is ostensibly to be included, but I’ll be impatiently waiting for the thing just the same. I’ve said before that I don’t think Sadness is so much a band anymore as it is a genre, and if you see it through that lense, then Soulless are rock-solid evidence of how big that genre could be – and more importantly, how big it already is, right now. [From We will prevail, out now via the band.] –Michael Nelson

Location: Connecticut
Subgenre: brutal death metal

Usually, the challenge I face is making you care about brutal death metal. Anal Stabwound adds another wrinkle by being named Anal Stabwound. I wouldn’t worry about it, though. Reality Drips into the Mouth of Indifference, the second full-length by the Connecticut solo project helmed by 17-year-old Nikhil Talwalkar, has catapulted Anal Stabwound to the top tier of active BDMers. To borrow a measurement from baseball scouts, it’s a five-tool album, combining technical ability, viciousness, creativity, weirdness, and memorability. Once you’re out the other side of the gargantuan slam ending “The Violent Gust of Generation,” the band name stops looking outrageous. Instead, it becomes a marker of quality.

Talwalkar has been on my radar since releasing The Visceral Sovereign in January 2021 on Inherited Suffering Records, the label operated by Alexander Kubiashvili of Abominable Putridity and Deracinated. Pretty good co-sign. And it’s a pretty good record, already displaying an advanced BDM fluency. Despite being young, Talwalkar put in the reps. According to an interview with Obscuro.eu, he started playing drums at 3, picked up the guitar at 11, and discovered death metal soon after. His first cover, Visceral Disgorge’s “Necrocoprohagia,” is still up on YouTube. He’s 13 in that one. He bodies it. By that point, Anal Stabwound was already in the works.

Like many BDMers, the internet has provided Talwalkar not just a platform but a way to connect with peers and collaborate. Besides Anal Stabwound, Talwalkar played drums on four other 2021 releases, all of them standouts: Bludgeoned’s Summary Execution, Engulfed In Repugnance’s Consummation Of Chthonic Remnants, Hate Inclination’s self-titled EP, and Undeciphered’s Beneath The Gentle Smile. (He has since joined the international collectives Infibulated and Theurgy.) But, even in that run for the ages, Abstraction Bathes In Sunlight, Anal Stabwound’s quick follow-up EP released last year on New Standard Elite, one of the top labels in BDM, stuck out. Where Visceral Sovereign slams around with well-executed but expected death metal structures, Abstraction Bathes In Sunlight has a peculiarity that aligns it more with Defeated Sanity and Iniquitous Deeds, bands that have a hookiness derived from their uncompromising uniqueness. It was a giant step forward.

Reality Drips Into The Mouth Of Indifference shows that Talwalkar hasn’t stopped stepping, delivering on the promise of Abstraction Bathes In Sunlight by pushing everything further. “Fracture Into Infinite Geneses” features Talwalkar’s growing skills as a vocalist, nailing Paulo Henri Paguntalan’s Predator noise. “A Twitching In The Clouds” unites the speedy riffs of Oscar Ortega with Lille Gruber’s off-kilter rhythms. There are red-lined Polwach Beokhaimook blasts all over the album. That these musicians are part of Talwalkar’s network probably isn’t a surprise. But Reality Drips Into The Mouth Of Indifference works because Talwalkar puts his own spin on these influences. For instance, the title track, my favorite song so far, is just Anal Stabwound to me. It’s a ridiculous five-minute stretch of dexterous grooves, Cannibal Corpse-quality catchiness, and gloriously shreddy moments that render me only able to say “whoa.” Nevertheless, it’s not a collection of parts but a whole-ass song. It makes any preconceptions I might have about Talwalkar’s age and the band name he’s chosen melt away. None of that stuff matters when you can write and perform a song like that. [From Reality Drips Into The Mouth Of Indifference, out now via New Standard Elite.] –Ian Chainey

Location: Nijmegen, Netherlands
Subgenre: doom folk

Last we heard from Iskandr, the dream team of O. of Turia (et al.) and Mink Koops of Fluisteraars (et al.), they were battering us with the melodic and swaggering black metal they have crafted together over the years. For the frequent collaborators O and Koops, Iskandr has been something of a leaner and meaner operation when compared to their other projects, where they tend to go further afield into hypnotic, atmospheric riffage. Now, with “Knagend Zout,” the tides appear to have shifted and Iskandr is evolving, shedding its skin as a black metal act and emerging as a new beast atop currents of dark and brooding folk. An unexpected change but a remarkable one, and O’s penchant for crafting alluring yet troubled melodies is in full force on “Knagend Zout” — he’s the chief songwriter in Iskarndr and performs all instruments except the drums, which is Koops’ territory. “Knagend Zout” translates to “Gnawing Salt,” and it’s an incredible song, full of doomed beauty and forlorn longing that reaches inward to pull on indescribable desires. O showcases a booming baritone we haven’t seen before, at least in this light, and it calls from another plane, singing of tectonic shifts and the inevitability of primeval forces at play. Needless to say, the forthcoming album is highly anticipated. [From Knagend Zout, out now via the band.] –Wyatt Marshall

Location: parts unknown
Subgenre: black metal

A surprise drop today (Halloween), Bad Manor’s debut, The Haunting, is a candelabra-lit spook show. The album, which comes with a digital booklet laying out its lore, tells the story of a haunted Victorian hotel set high atop a hill and the various hauntings of its guests. Creeptastic organs and warbly theremin-esque melodic leads will have you searching for secret passageways and seeing ghosts around every corner, but the camp factor is dragged toward the realm of real horror and away from Scooby Doo by ferocious musicianship. A pummeling riff assault, artillery barrages of rapid-fire drums and a deranged and disturbed wild-eyed vocalist sharpen a sinister edge that cuts through the prevailing fright fest atmosphere. This fully-formed horror story comes from the twisted occult-obsessed minds of the Ordo Vampyr Orientis, an anonymous creep crew behind the bands Bat Magic and Bestial Majesty that Ian interviewed back in April to get a better feel for their blackened panache and mastery of heavy metal mythmaking. With Bad Manor, they’ve struck again, showing a little leg and, no doubt, cackling ghoulishly as they take us on a wild full-moon ride. [From The Haunting, out now via Labyrinth Tower / Avantgarde Music / Ordo Vampyr Orientis.] –Wyatt Marshall