Metal Riot

After nearly 5 long years, Philadelphia-based progressive thrashers Vektor are back with their third studio album entitled, Terminal Redux. Both embracing and expanding upon the intricate layers of the preceding albums, Black Future and Outer Isolation, the band deliver the album that we all knew they were capable of.

 Never one to take a metal-by-numbers approach to song-writing, Vektor have embraced some unusual audio elements, including the vocal assistance of a group of Philadelphia soul singers, adding further texture to the sound without compromising on the riff-heavy fury. Recorded in part at the band’s home studio, along with Panther Pro-Audio in Philadelphia, Terminal Redux is a fine demonstration of technical precision, a 73+ minute masterclass in complexity, and affirmation that there is still plenty of innovation and intelligence in modern day metal.

EXCLUSIVE TO THE EARACHE WEBSTORE, we have limited edition colour vinyl, with 400 ‘Pterotoptic’ Purple vinyl coming with an exclusive woven patch, and a further 100 including a hand-signed photocard! For those who prefer CDs, you have not been ignored, as we also have 500 CDs with an alternative woven patch and hand-signed photocard. Pre-orders start at 1pm EST, and when you throw in 4 brand new T-shirts and 2 awesome hoodies, and this is one deal you simply don’t want to miss out on!

Here’re the first 5 minutes of Banger‘s documentary on ‘Slaughter of the Soul’.

Full episode out Dec. 25, pre-order now:
http://bit.ly/BuyMEA-SOTS

Electronic metallers THE BROWNING have announced a US tour supporting North Carolina rockers ALESANA. The tour kicks off in Winston-Salem, North Carolina on April 3rd, with the final show taking place on May 3rd in Dallas, Texas.  Also joining ALESANA and THE BROWNING are CAPTURE THE CROWN, CONQUER DIVIDE and THE FUNERAL PORTRAIT.

I for one think The Browning take risks and have fun energy, so I root for them and similar spirits Exotype to really evolve with time like Linkin Park did but retain their heavy elements. I think it could be a really good thing. Enter Shikari or 36 Crazyfists  are already there, just bands in their own ballpark.

Don’t miss THE BROWNING on tour with ALESANA at the following shows BELOW.

Adam Warren and the boys in much appreciated Midwest death core band Oceano are returning with their first new album from 2013 with new record Ascendants. Re-touching on the origin of the ideas in Contagion, the record is not a linear storyline from that record but “we did follow a general cohesive theme,” says Warren. Pre-Order this bad boy HERE.

Tracked by producer Nick Nativo (MONSTERS), the record deals with Adam’s ideas on many topics such as humans coming from more than what society and religion tells us. The general theme seems to be that we are the Children of Gods and have higher essence in our DNA but have forgotten. It’s pretty cool. I for one am stoked for this. Hear Adam talk about it  in depth BELOW!

More shows announced by the  Evile camp.It is great to see the band get back on their feet yet again. One of the most consistently killer thrash bands in the world!

“Evile are coming back next year, we’ve been hard at work over the past few months with Piers, our new guitarist, to get up to speed with putting a great set together for our first show back at one of our favourite venues (so much of a favourite I named a song after it!), the Underworld in London, on March 28, 2015.

We’ve still got a lot of work to do in the coming months to make sure we can be better than we’ve ever been but we’re treating this as a new start, I always hoped (idealistically) that Evile could be a band that kept the same members for as long as we lasted but obviously there are some things you just can’t fight or plan for and life just isn’t that straight forward.

We want to make sure we put the time in to be stronger than ever but we can only all manage to be available at the same time for one or two rehearsals per week which is why we haven’t rushed straight back out there. We need to put the effort in to be as good a live band as we want to be, that’s what we’re aiming for starting next year. This time we are going the DIY route, we have no label or manager. Just ourselves and whatever stage people will let us play on.

We finally get the chance to tour in support of our last album Skull which we released through Earache in May 2013, sadly we never got a chance to promote it properly so it seemed to fly under the radar for a lot of people so we plan on playing that album in full at shows next year as we’re really proud of what we put together on that one and think it deserves it’s time in the spotlight.Check out the rest of the dates we have booked in for next year and we will see the London faithful at the Underworld on March 28 for the resurrection of Evile.”

Click HERE for dates and “Skull”, thrashers!

Savage Messiah‘s The Fateful Dark just may restore your faith in metal (if it was waning for some inexplicable reason). The all killer new album from the London based act is a maze of melodic metal vocals reminiscent of metal’s yesteryear married to the modern aggressive riffing we’ve come to savor in 2014. Metal Riot got an inside look at the album from vocalist/guitarist Dave Silver as well as talked about their new video “Hellblazer” with contortionist Pixie Le Knot (Game of Thrones season 3).

Click HERE to read more.

The current Annihilator team led by Jeff Waters (of course) and Dave Padden continue to kill, beating Cannibal Corpse to the punch with a new album called Feast. Seriously, say the word “feaaasssst” in a George Fisher growl and you have to wonder how Cannibal didn’t nab that title to go along with recent gems Torture and Kill. It’s just as well, cuz Feast is the best Annihilator disc in awhile. “One Falls, Two Rise” has some very cool alt-rock parts, but it still explodes into full tilt metal as the song progresses.

Annihilator are Canada’s legendary true guitar heroism-centric thrash academy, teaching metal heads for 14 albums now how to get whiplash. Jeff Waters is one of the flashiest shredders around but also knows how to be tasteful, and he proves it on Feast again and again with songwriting as important as ample chops. The 3D deluxe edition comes with a killer re-cut classics disc (featuring songs like “Never, Neverland” and “Fun Palace”) Re-Kill for new fans. Similar to Stryper’s recent Second Coming it is the rare kind of re-recording LP that actually has merit) but the real reason to grab this is the new material and the gory as hell, photorealistic Gyula Havancsak zombie artwork, who has done work for Jungle Rot, Opera Diabolicus, Hour Of Penance and Tyr’s recent killer Valkyrja (www.hjules.com).

Feast delivers on opener “Deadlock”, a thrash song that really charges and even surpasses most Slayer of late. It’s a high bar to set from the start and is frankly the best song, but the rest of the album is good. Jeff is a shredder who can also play with feel, like the spectacular Marty Friedman who I really love. “Wrapped” is straight up rock n’ roll infused metal with lyrics and guest vocals from one of my favorites, Danko Jones. “No Surrender” shows range with weird funk rock that sounds fairly dated but gains ground when it gets heavier. “Demon Code” is a real ride and Waters and co. shine as expected. Highly recommended. Nice mellow day listening to stuff like The Dodos and Russian Circles with Chelsea Wolfe, then picked this up and felt metal course through my fingertips as I stared at the bloody cover. Dropped right into zombie, shred hell!