Jaldaboath at Myspace
When I heard that Jaldaboath (real name James Fogarty) was recording a solo EP, I was anxious to hear the results. He was a founding member of one of my favorite metal bands, The Meads of Asphodel. However, when I actually got around to hearing this EP, it turned out to be a [...]

Svartsot at myspace
Folk Metal is something you either love or hate. Apart the odd artist such as Agalloch or Hammers of Misfortune it’s usually exuberant, joyous and unashamedly cheesy. It’s an easy recipe to get hideously wrong, in a widdly keyboard smorgasbord and ye olde worlde theme park style charm offensive that certain acts end [...]

Alestorm at Myspace
If you haven’t heard the term “Battle Metal”, then you haven’t had the misfortune of reading Metal Hammer UK recently. After previously covering Oasis and the The Verve in the 90’s and in recent memory given My Chemical Romance and other emo bands front covers, said magazine has now decided it is “the [...]

…All the songs on this album run along at an atmospheric and foreboding mid-pace that allows for a sense of tension that like all good catharsis is in a definition a chore, but a glorious one that you will undertake time and time again. Each song is underpinned by a powerful melody that is melancholy, wistful, melodramatic and brimming with pride all at the same time without being pompous, hackneyed or dreary…