Rebel Extravaganza

Heavy Metal And Other Occasional Musics And Cultures

lord randall

Album Reviews

Album Review: Omnium Gatherum – May The Bridges We Burn Light The Way

Finland’s OMNIUM GATHERUM has never had it easy. Formed in 1996, during the time when the Gothenburg-born style of melodic death was really starting to stretch its legs and take confident steps original/current guitarist, Markus Vanhala, and co. were and have been fighting an uphill battle for recognition since the demo days. Sometimes great, sometimes good, but always deserving of a listen, the band enters the fray again in 2025 – just shy of the band’s 30th anniversary – with May The Bridges We Burn Light The Way. If you’re looking for the difference between “Intro” and “Instrumental” look no […]

Album Reviews

Album Review: Architectural Genocide – Malignant Cognition

When you’ve got a sophomore album nearly six years in the making, and it’s shorter than Reign In Blood, one of two things has happened; either you’ve decided to shit something out super-quick just to keep the band name out there, or you’ve (hopefully) spent that time honing these songs to the point that they’re less “songs” than blades and boulders, both concertina wire-sharp and heavy as granite. Creepy-crawly “intro-not intro” ‘Precursor To Bloodshed’ sets the mood for Malignant Cognition, ARCHITECTURAL GENOCIDE ready to rumble like a bulldozer in the graveyard that is ‘Coercion Into Carnality’. Immensely guttural vocal spews […]

Album Reviews

Album Review: Morbikon – Lost Within The Astral Crypts

Composed of members of bands as often intolerable as MUNICIPAL WASTE and UADA, yet also as underappreciated as GOATGOR and as forward-thinking as …AND OCEANS, MORBIKON either has a lot going for it or is an accident waiting to happen on its second, Lost Within The Astral Crypts. While 2022’s Ov Mournful Twilight was solid “enough” patch of sonic real estate , ’25 finds the lineup shifting, Dave “I’ve been in every band under the sun” Witte relinquishing his drum throne to Pierce Williams of the aforementioned UADA, Toby Swope being replaced by GOATGOR’s Blake Hibberd, lineup scattered hither and […]

Album Reviews

Album Review: Pupil Slicer – Fleshwork

Cards on the table, I’m a complete dunderhead when it comes to mathematics. A rube. Anything over short division, and I am not only not to be trusted, but avoided like the plague. Hence, I despise “mathcore”, “math rock”, and the majority of jazz, simply because it’s too wonky and up its own arse to be bothered with. Grab your slide rules, kids, it’s time to rock the fuck out to some 29/16 time signatures! I’m looking at you, THE MARS VOLTA. And don’t even get me started on MESHUGGAH post-None. I hadn’t torn an album a new rectum in […]

Album Reviews

Album Review: Agnostic Front – Echoes In Eternity

AGNOSTIC FRONT’s pedigree is impeccable, and its history and importance in heavy music in general, much less hardcore, cannot be overstated. Yep, as a matter of fact, if you’re of a certain age and haven’t heard the band, you’re probably lost on the internet, which is the way most people stumble across this site anyhow. Regardless, if – even nearly a half-century of the New Yorkers kicking global ass from basement shows to arenas later – you’re still not familiar, welcome to Echoes In Eternity, the band’s thirteenth studio record. No useless intro to wade through, as ‘Way Of War’ […]

Album Reviews

Album Review: Gorleben – Menetekel

Though in existence for a decade and a half as of this writing, the first we heard from Dresden’s GORLEBEN was the 2021 EP containing ‘Sleepless’ and ‘Contaminated’, both songs well over the ten-minute mark, declaring the band as one comfortable with letting things play out naturally. Game Over followed, further sonic explorations ensued, and the sound seemed not so much “solidified” as “in flux”, but with a general idea of where the quintet wanted to go in mind. The keys of 85KR begin the ‘Countdown’, almost TANGERINE DREAM in their nearly hypnotic pulse, joined soon after by the syrupy […]

Short Sharp Shocks

Auditory Anguish – AFA [EP]

The title track is a perfect intro to AFA, bargain basement Roots-era SEPULTURA aping as it is, while ‘Chained In A Hole’ is rife with jumpdafucup bro-core, the likes of what you’d hear from the band that goes on first at a HATEBREED show, and you just know there are five bands left before you get to be bored by Jasta and his boyos. ‘Clementine’ is Mate. Feed. Kill. Repeat. dreck with some silly-ass backmasking at the end, and ‘Tierra Santa’ is – I cannot believe I’m about to say this – even worse because it tries and fails so […]

Album Reviews

Album Review: Sacred Leather – Keep The Fire Burning

‘Resurrection’ flows naturally into ‘Spitfire At Night’, which is rife with dual leads, snapmare rhythms, and the Turbin / early Belladonna delivery of vocalist Dee Wrathchild. Come to think, at the start this one shares a bit too much shade with ‘Deathrider’ for comfort; however, to the quintet’s credit, by the end we’re being fricasseed in the fiery blaze of SACRED LEATHER’s second go-round, and it’s getting hot in here. ‘Phantom Highway (Hell Is Comin’ Down)’ is divebomb after divebomb, dual lead after dual lead, and done well, Messrs. Owens & St. Michaels flying o’er the nightside streaker freeway, swooping […]

Album Reviews

Album Review: Binah – Ónkos

BINAH’s never been one to shy away from lengthy explorations within its limited number of releases, – half of the actual songs found on 2012’s Hallucinating In Resurrecture debut passing the 7-minute mark – but when the band waited seven years after Phobiate to return with Ónkos, I knew we had something potentially intriguing on our hands. Composed of two pieces, each extending past 20 minutes, it’s obvious the band wants us to immerse ourselves in this experience, and thus, headphones ‘round my earholes, I began to ascend ‘Mount Morphine’. With two synth players in the ranks, and over a […]

Album Reviews

Album Review: Denial Of Life – Witness The Power [EP]

Look at the cover of DENIAL OF LIFE’s Witness The Power EP and can someone please tell me why basically a mash-up of two of the most recognizable album covers of one of the most recognizable bands in the history of metal seemed like a great idea? And thus, armed (or footed) with monkey boots and a length of chain, did I step boldly forward to wage unholy war against such flagrant abuse of…wait, I never really even liked SLAYER that much anyway, and – aside from the album after Those Two, for all I know or care, they more […]

Older Posts