I really wish I liked this. There's so many moments on here that are great, but it's bogged down by stupid shit. I'm not sure if clean vocals are super common in melodeath, but even if they are I just don't like the clean vocals here at all. They just sound cheesy to me. I was liking Tear Down This Holy Mountain a lot... until the (I think?) trap beats came in. The guitar solo behind it sounded good but the fucking beats sound awful. Part of that is just that I don't really like trap, but even ... read more

Some people might find sludge metal to be boring, but to me, sludge has the ability to be some of the heaviest music known to mankind. Case in point, Primitive Man. Like their name might suggest, this is pure monkey music, and I'm all here for it. The guitars are absolutely crushing, I'm not sure how they achieved such an overwhelming and noisy tone, other than using an ungodly amount of distortion and gain, but I love it. The vocals are absolutely monstrous in the literal sense that they sound ... read more

Like another user said, (on RYM) this is very reminiscent of Roads to Judah, though in my opinion, this is a little bit better. It's really just more consistent, all the tracks on here are pretty good. The production is crisp, and most of the melodic lines here are pretty great. The vocals actually have a good bit of variation which isn't entirely common for this genre, so that's appreciated. Overall, a pretty great record, Russia is apparently really good at Blackgaze.

I wouldn't go into this album expecting metalcore, cause to me it really isn't. There's a couple breakdowns but other than that this doesn't read to me as metalcore at all. I haven't really listened to this kind of music in a hot second, it just hasn't appealed to me, but I've been listening to Heroine a bunch recently so I decided to give The Dark Pool a spin. And... it's good. Jacob's vocals aren't quite as good as they are on Heroine, and I can't believe I'm saying this but I really feel ... read more

I don't listen to a ton of drone metal. I've dabbled in it, bit of Nadja, some Hell, etc. But this is on another level of suffering in the form of music. Some of the screams on here are blood curdling. I have no idea what the lyrics are but I can't imagine they're sunshine and rainbows. Recently I've found that slow tempos in metal have a lot more potential to be earth shatteringly crushing, and I think I've found the perfect example for that. For a black metal album, the bass is loud and ... read more

who the fuck is making AllMusic's reviews

Well, this is my first Brutal Death Metal album I've listened to and... yeah, it's pretty damn good. I'm considering checking out the rest of their discography but looking at one of the scores and the genre tag "deathcore" makes me nervous.

I think if DSO leaned into the dissonant part of their music more you'd get something like this, though I think this really shines on its own as being dynamic in its own right. Honestly my favorite parts are the more atmospheric black sounding parts, the end of Seeds of Death (Departure), the midway ish point at The Enemy Within, and the ending of Fruit of Life really showcase this bands chops in making both heavy and brutal music, but also dynamic music. Very good stuff.

Pyrrhon dives deeper into Avant-garde madness, taking cues from sludge, mathcore and the likes. While not as immediately crushing and impactful as What Passes for Survival, it's still pretty damn good.

Everything is on point here. The vocals are varied in both technique and style but not in a cheesy way. The riffs, mwah, chef's kiss. The drums, oh the drums. I believe they got a new drummer and whoever this guy is, he's insane, I love it. The playing is even tighter and more precise than their other albums, it feels like this band has really figured their niche out, like suddenly everything clicked and they're going all out with it. The sludgey section on the 12 minute closer absolutely beats ... read more

Pyrrhon take a more straightforward approach with their debut compared to The Mother of Virtues. I honestly think the mathcore influence is understated here, there's a lot of weird and hard to follow yet catchy sections. Though not as inventive as their later projects, this album is pretty good.

Very reminiscent of Obscura by Gorguts with it's riffs though the vocals definitely have a Hardcore tinge to them which I definitely appreciate. I haven't listened to hardly any Mathcore influenced music recently so this is kind of a breath of fresh air in the sea of Black and Death (mostly black) metal I've been consuming.

*Note* there should be a dissonant death metal genre on here, just saying

Edit: raised score from 79 --> 85. This is growing on me.

Edit 2: raised score from 85 ... read more

These tracks are both absolute beasts, clocking in at 20 minutes each. Siberian Hell Sounds' half reads mostly as atmospheric black metal with hints of sludge metal and their powerviolence sound. From the little I've heard from them, this is probably their most black metal sounding outing. The ending devolves into a barrage of noise and screams with a hard stop, which is always appreciated (if it's done well that is.) 4/5 song, pretty damn good.

Convulsing's side immediately differantiates ... read more

You see my monkey ass brain probably wouldn't have listened to this album if I had discovered it on here since the funny number bar is yellow, which means bad album. But I saw it somewhere else and number is good there so I listen, I like album.

Now this is some evil sounding shit. Good stuff.

Okay first, a couple notes. This is the first War Metal album I've listened to and this is also the only album I've listened to with any Pagan Black Metal influences. I don't tend to listen to a lot of lo-fi black metal but for whatever reason when I checked this album out, the way it sounded just intrigued me so much that I had to hear it through, and wow am I glad I did. I can definitely see the appeal in this type of production now, there's almost an otherworldliness to it, like the band is ... read more

I don't typically listen to a band's entire discography in such a short amount of time, that being around 2 days for Wake, but they've gone through such an interesting development as a band that I couldn't help but check everything out (that I could listen to on streaming). And my final conclusion is that surprisingly, I like them better when they leaned towards grindcore. Which is weird considering I've been on such a black metal kick recently but I find their grindcore albums, especially ... read more

Very reminiscent of DSO (as if that's not the most used term when reviewing technical black metal) though I think it stands out as being unique from it enough to be well worth while. Not to mention that it's just a good listen.

Oh cool I just stumbled onto a gem of an album apparently? I haven't listened to a whole lot of dissonant death but this is really really good. I'll be sure to check out more music like this thank you very much.

I honestly don't really know how to feel about this album. I might have to listen to it a couple more times but for now it's more disappointing than anything. There are good moments here but within all of its "avant-gardeness" there's not much for me to hook on to. Vile Luxury almost perfectly balanced weird and eerie atmospheres and instrumentation with so called "normal" song structures. And maybe comparing it to Vile Luxury is unfair, but even then I still expected more ... read more