Invisible Oranges

Castle Rat are messengers of a vividly realized, immersive, and theatrical realm born from doom metal and high-concept fantasy. At the center stands the band's mastermind, Riley Pinkerton, known on stage as the Rat Queen, a powerful, armored figure commanding a dark and mythical domain. What began as a spontaneous decision to costume her bandmates for a casual Halloween show has metastasized into a sprawling mythology populated by a plague doctor, a druid, and the cosmic Rat Reaperess.

Over the past few years, Devil Master, Blank Spell, and Spiter have crystallised a new wave of black metal-inspired bands in the hardcore scene. But to call them simply black metal is selling them short. While they possess that genre's banshee screeching and diminished chords, their punk-ified speed metal riffing and erratic structures reveal something foreign and gothic. Zorn show this better than any other. ... ...

Subcarpathian black metal is an understaffed subdivision of the genre. It’s currently occupied by only one band, Poland’s Kalt Vindur, whose work is entrenched in regional history. The nomenclature does not denote a more deprived artistic approach compared to other Carpathian bands but ties Kalt Vindur to their home province. They loosen those ties on their upcoming fourth album, The Void of Time, releasing in November.

Left To Die are a death metal supergroup led by extreme metal maniac Matt Harvey (of Exhumed, Gruesome, Pounder, and Cold Slither) and his frequent collaborator and drummer Gus Rios. They’re joined by two former members of Death, Terry Butler and Rick Rozz. The band plays songs from the Mantas/Death pre-Scream Bloody Gore demo era to bring songs to the masses that may never have otherwise been properly heard with a modern coat of paint.

Here are the new releases for July 12th to 18th. Releases reflect proposed North American scheduling, if available. Upcoming Metal Releases: 7/12/26 - 7/18/26 Äxe -- Autogeddon | Caligari Records | Speed Metal + Black Metal | United Kingdom (London, England) With the umlaut on the A, seemingly just for the sake of it, and band members named Professor Speed and Nihil Kaos, Äxe isn't afraid to embrace the cheese.

The roots of Truck Violence’s post-punk rage stretch thousands of kilometers from Montreal to the west, deep beneath the frozen tundra, to a small hamlet in central Canada named after the Lac la Biche that attracted fur traders and early pioneers. Vocalist Karsyn Henderson and guitarist Paul Lecours are pioneers in their own right, first meeting as middle school kids living on the periphery of a physical and emotional state that could be cold and unforgiving.

Death metal, black metal, thrash metal; ubiquitous labels that remain near and dear to our hearts, but what about devil metal? That one doesn’t get as much love or airplay as it should. NunSlaughter, devil metal’s fiercest and foremost practitioners, have just released Satanic Chaos Legions, their newest slab of good ol’ rotten punishing blasphemy.

Solace are veterans of the metal world. They first formed in 1996 from the ashes of the alt-metal band Godspeed, who made their name by being managed by Geezer Butler and were the backing band for Bruce Dickinson on a Black Sabbath tribute album. Solace’s metal credentials are undeniable, even if it was under a different name. Their output in the intervening years has been fairly sparse, with their newest, Fading Failing Ruin, being only their fifth album.

This year, the small town of Scarborough, UK was home to the 4th annual Fortress Festival, which contained a roster of excellent black metal bands from around the world. This is a report of the final day of the festival, the pre-show and Day 1 can be found here. ... ... The second day of Fortress had an even greater density of bands than the first, but armed with an understanding of the layout and secret corridors of Scarborough Spa, I charted out a battle plan.

Those who venture into the more eccentric waters of metal sometimes meet projects that defy easy labelling. This is definitely the case for Stack Overflow in Corpse Pile Interface, released on May 8th via Prophecy Productions. This gargantuan "weird fish" of a release marks the return of A Forest of Stars, who had been silent since their last presentations four years ago. Almost eight years, in fact, if one goes by the 2018 release date of Grave Mounds and Grave Mistakes, the group’s last record.