05) Morta Skuld, Creation Undone (Peaceville Records)
If you love Morta Skuld and you want more (like me), well here it is, album number seven from this brutal death metal crew. Intense, mutilating, old school buzz-sawing guitars amid incoming barbaric drums. Blast beats intertwined with gloomy segments, Morta Skuld are adept at merging old-school brutality with the intensity level of modern times. They are technical but they also understand groove. This is a characteristic that an outfit needs to survive among the oceans of brutal death bands wandering around the plains. The accomplished musicianship on display is apparent as they steamroll through this album without concession. Brutal death, from beginning to end. For Morta Skuld, that is the order of the day. They are experts at morbid, aggressive delivery – but you already knew that. Forego the headphones, turn this one up loud and stomp around the house.
Key Tracks: “Into Temptation”/“Soul Piercing Sorrow”/“Perfect Prey”
04) Darkthrone, It Beckons Us All (Peaceville Records)
Over the years you never knew what you were going to get from this outfit, as they explored their way from Trve Kvlt Death, to punkish elements and later on melding doom and black as only they can. A lot of us have stayed on throughout the decades, enjoying the different trips. This new exercise from Fenriz and Nocturno Culto is quite supremely done. The black riffs, dry, heavy, and wide-open invite you in to stay over and over. The production feels dated which for me is spot on. Echoes here and there of Celtic Frost. The gloom and eerie exist in spades as you would expect from a group that handles merging these elements so well. It sounds vintage yet current. I dig it so much, and you will too.
Key Tracks: “The Heavy Hand”/“Black Dawn Affiliation”
03) Oranssi Pazuzu, Muuntautuja(Nuclear Blast)
An obscured, beclouded introspective delightful delve. Sonically abstract and astonishing, if at times more electronic and a bit less disturbing than their previous opus, Mestarin kynsi. This crazy talented, twisted bunch have done it again. They conjure inner stirrings while allowing you to float in their realm, spurts of fearful enchantments are rammed into by shrillness, wrapped in a vast sonic zero-gravity universe of incoming and outgoing tidal waves. Slightly more industrial leanings here however beautifully written and composed, every sonic form has its own disquieting meaning. No space on any track is wasted. Another headphone recommended thriller.
Key Tracks: “Bioalkemisti”/“Valotus”
02) Blood Incantation, Absolute Elsewhere (Century Media)
This album has people who were laughing at their logo a year ago (remember the tree branch memes? Or the stretched leather? Or your friends laughing at you because they can’t read the logo?) suddenly kissing Blood Incantation’s collective asses. As a result, you will now have friends who previously wore Budgie shirts sporting Blood Incantation wear. Nothing wrong with that. Well done Blood Incantation, you have brought Death Metal some of the respect it rightly deserves. It turns out that elements of psych/prog have always been dropped into the death metal cauldron, especially with this outfit and they are innately great at it, intelligently weaving a perfect mix of the genres with the correct sensibility, timing, and arrangement. This album is an aural sensory overload of the delicious kind, and if you’ve never heard them, it’s the kind your ears have always wanted, but just didn’t know it. Twist one up and put your headphones on. Guaranteed to slake your prog-metal thirst.
Key Tracks: “The Stargate [Tablet I]”/“The Message [Tablet III]”
