1. Noothgrush/Coffins - Split(Southern Lord)
Noothgrush triumphantly puts out their first recording in 14 years while Coffins deliver the goods as always, this just may be the best combo of bands to be pressed to a split since ever. Although it arrived late in the year, it immediately rose to the highlight of anything new I have listened to this year. While the entire album is immaculate to my senses, the standout track would have to be Thoth from the Noothgrush side and The Wretched Path from the Coffins side. This album was accompanied by blasting volumes and a fast drive with the lady to solidify it as one of the best albums I have ever experienced for the first time.
Available as 12" or Digital Download:
http://noothgrushcoffinssl.bandcamp.com/
2. Windhand - Soma(Relapse)
As a long-time Black Sabbath worshipper, this album; let alone Windhand in general, is a gift from the beyond. Cottrell's vocals are among a select few that come anything close to sounding as good for this style as Ozzy did, it also has a tinge of Layne Staley at times which works to great effect. This album is very easy to get lost in, especially considering the 30 minute epic Boleskine which is perfectly structured for such purposes. The tonality and riffs take me to a land where I am travelling with a caravan of Hash Priests riding Wooly Mammoth's through hyperborean tundras on an endless nomadic errand of misery.
Available as 2xLP, CD and Digital Download:
http://www.relapse.com/windhand
http://windhandva.bandcamp.com/
3. Kongh - Sole Creation(Agonia)
In my eyes, Sweden's Kongh can do no wrong, this years release proves my theory strong. Much more clean vocals utilized in this release than on those past, always apt usage and still a healthy presence of grated vocals, no over the top ego stroking here just whatever fits the experience of the part at hand. This album makes Kongh sound like Gojira's evil cousin. If I were introducing someone new to heavier music, I would probably show them a song like The Portals as it starts off with some accessible cleans and smoothly transitions into some sickening sounding screams, has catchy chorus part and explodes into some bitchin' solos just before bringing you in for a landing.
Digital Download and links to order Vinyl and CD:
http://agoniarecords.bandcamp.com/album/sole-creation
4. Blaak Heat Shujaa - The Edge of an Era(Tee Pee)
A friend(and possible future reviewer for The Doom Review) threw Blaak Heat Shujaa on a few hours after a group of us had shaken hands with good ol Psil O'Cybe and damn was I glad to learn of this uniquely diverse band. Little more than a month or so later they put this release out to my delight and played a last minute show only an hour and a half away that much to my dismay I just could not get wind in the sails to attend. Everything about this album sounds incredible, while exploring many different dynamics and timbres there is always a core sound that ties everything together. There is honestly not one album or band I can really compare this band or album to, they are their own brand of psyched out fuzz rock especially with the unique vocal tones. This is a band for (non-elitist)fans of anything, one of my go to albums for rehab after overdosing on volume.
Stream and buy CD or LP:
http://blaakheatshujaa.bandcamp.com/album/the-edge-of-an-era
http://teepee.hasawebstore.com/theedgeofanera-lp-blaakheatshujaa/product/INS117937
5. Kayo Dot - Hubardo(Self-Released)
This well established band managed to release not only what is the best tonality they have achieved to date, also their longest and most diverse. Try and think of the most obscure extreme music sub-genre you can and Kayo Dot portrays some facet of it within this album in a manner that not only shows you how much further it can be taken, but also reveals the creative stifling that occurs when one commits themselves to one singular sound. This album has the potential to make any musician ask themselves "what the fuck am I even doing?".
Stream and Buy 3xLP:
http://kayodot.bandcamp.com/album/hubardo
6. Kylesa - Ultraviolet(Season of Mist)
While I have enjoyed every other Kylesa release, this one immediately stood out to me for being the most experimental by far. So many great guitar and bass tones all over this thing and the range of voices utilized serve their riffs so well it should be illegal. Unspoken and We're Taking This have been stuck in my head for the better part of the year.
Stream, Digital Download, CD and Vinyl:
http://seasonofmistcatalogue.bandcamp.com/album/ultraviolet
http://e-shop.season-of-mist.com/en/bands/kylesa/3616
7. Before the Eyewall - S/T(Self-Released)
Between the memories I was left with from the live performance and the experiences this album implanted into my subconscious, Columbus Ohio's Before The Eyewall are an unstoppable force of atmospheric doom. Leaving the vocal canvas empty was a very wise decision for this album as it allows the progressive path of the songs to really take root and imply the emotion through the tonality and structure of the notes. For my feature review on this album click here.
Stream and Buy:
http://beforetheeyewall.bandcamp.com/
8. Author & Punisher - Women & Children(Seventh Rule)
Stream and buy CD or LP:
http://releases.seventhrule.com/album/women-children
9. The Body - Master, We Perish(At A Loss)
Not surprising that one of the heaviest bands I have ever witnessed live released yet another two of the heaviest things I have ever heard. This album just sounds filthy, and while The Body gifted us 2 releases this year, the main reason I chose this over Christs Redeemers is the arc of the song The Blessed Lay Down and Writhe in Agony, the moment where the cocking shotgun sample was followed by one of the most crushing chords ever struck was one of the most magic moments in my listening this year.
Buy:
http://www.bluecollardistro.com/bcd/product_info.php?products_id=8080
10. Grayceon - Pearl and the End of Days(The Flenser)
Grayceon always has my attention, All We Destroy was on my list for 2011 and here they are yet again in 2013 with another superbly written and engineered album. With this album they have taken their signature progressive sound defined by electric cello usage and finger picked distorted guitars just a little bit further beyond the standard they had set with All We Destroy. This album also contains my favorite lyrical part of this year: "Play your song and play it loudly for all the world to hear, longhairs united what's left to fear? So synchronize, harmonize, find some peace in our demise as the rock rolls closer lets turn up louder". Enough said.
Stream and Buy:
http://grayceon.bandcamp.com/album/pearl-and-the-end-of-days
http://www.grayceon.com/
11. Uncle Acid & The Deadbeats - Mind Control(Metal Blade)
Despite the fact that Uncle Acid is a time machine straight back to the saturated tube fuzz of the 70s, instead of using their powers of time travel to try and sound like musicians of times past they use it to command their own. Every song on this album has the potential to embed itself in your mind forever after just one listen, coincidence that the album is titled Mind Control? Or Deadbeat Acid Wizardry...
Stream and Buy:
http://www.metalblade.com/uncleacid/
12. Corrections House - Last City Zero(Neurot)
Some of my own as well as many others favorite musicians got together and released a conceptual collective project that is too badass on every level. One part performance art, one part industrial post-punk, one part propaganda...by these elements combined Corrections House are one of the most intriguing bands to surface in 2013.
Stream and Buy:
http://www.neurotrecordings.com/artists/correctionshouse/correctionshouse.php
13. Lumbar - The First and Last Days of Unwelcome(Southern Lord)
A conceptual album based on the sole instrumentalists experience of life in the wake of a diagnosis for Multiple Sclerosis...would you expect anything less than crushing weight from an album on those terms? Lumbar's riffs and vocals portray a kind of pain you don't normally encounter in sludge like this, instead of trying to convince you of a non-existent pain, you can hear the disease in these recordings crawling through the speakers and invading your mind. With Yob's . Mike Scheidt manning vocals and the Legendary Tad Doyle engineering, this mighty collaboration of minds has become one of the most emotional releases I have ever experienced right up there with Green Carnation's Light of Day, Day of Darkness.
Stream and Buy:
http://lumbarsl.bandcamp.com/album/the-first-and-last-days-of-unwelcome
14. SubRosa - More Constant than the Gods(Profound Lore)
If Sleep was the heavier 90s version of Black Sabbath, SubRosa is the heavier millenial version of Jethro Tull. Coupling doom and folk with the inclusion of violins as a staple this entire album weaves in and out of itself like an immaculately coreographed masquerade. The distorted tones are absolutely unreal, very huge fuzz with enough headroom to breathe. Other instruments to be found include Harpsichord, Flute and piano. This is the kind of album I would listen to if I needed to pick myself up out of a depressed hole. Fuck whoever stole their shit two days before they played my city, beyond the shittiness of their loss that was one performance I was really looking forward to this year.
Stream and Buy:
http://subrosausa.bandcamp.com/album/more-constant-than-the-gods
http://www.profoundlorerecords.com/products-page/plr-items/subrosa-more-constant-than-the-gods/
15. Russian Circles - Memorial(Sargent House)
The virtuosos have done it yet again with their heaviest leaning album to date. With every album, Russian Circles makes strides in the possibilities of what can be done within music as a whole, with Memorial they have done the same yet again while also taking strides in what they themselves are capable of accomplishing via Russian Circles.
Stream and Buy:
http://russiancircles.bandcamp.com/album/memorial
Great, great, GREAT list. \m/
ReplyDeleteReally excellent and inspiring!
ReplyDelete