Video: "The Betrayer" by Rapheumets Well

Right now, a lot of the national attention is focused on North Carolina because of Hurricane Florence. We've all got the good vibes headed out to the middle portion of the East Coast.

But right now, let's check out a band from North Carolina, Rapheumets Well. They have a compilation album coming out late next month. They've culled some tracks from their first three records.

Interested? Well, wait, there's MORE. They're a Sci-Fi Symphonic Death Metal Band. Do you know how many words that genre name is? I'm not, because I'm not sure how to count Sci-Fi...or should we just type out Science Fiction?

In the mean time, you can preorder on BANDCAMP.

LP Review: "Mother Gray" by Eshtadur

Mother Gray

The thing that makes metal one of the greatest genres in the world is that it has the ability to anger the bourgeousie while simultaneously rivaling the musical ability of a symphony.

It could be said that metal has always been the music of the proletariat and that's part of why it angers the uppers so much, but that's always been the place of art in our world.

In the years since the debuts of Black Sabbath, Iron Maiden, Metallica, and many others, the complexity and melody has often times been left out of metal records.

Certainly there is a time and a place for extreme metal bordering on noise. There's a great many records that fit that precise description in my vinyl library, but the heavy metal arms race can get tiresome.

It's always interesting to hear extreme metal bands add something to the mix rather than the four standard ingredients.

"Dark Pantheons" by Agiel

From the angriest City east of Buffalo, but still west of New York City, and not really all that close to Toronto, or Syracuse: ROCHESTER comes Agiel. (I have spent a couple fun, but non-consecutive days in Rochester.)

They are a band that have outgrown their roots as a brutal death metal/grindcore band and have become a symphonic death metal band. Their first album, Dark Pantheons Will Reign Again, was released in 2002 and the world is still waiting for a proper follow up.

For this EP release, the band has chosen a new direction for their music and have revisited the material from their debut LP. They have selected five tracks to re-record for their new sound. They are still aggressive, angry, and over the top, but now they also include some violins and other stringed instrumetns.