Sixteen years into their career, Curse The Son have unleashed a devastating work in ‘Delirium’. By taking many cues from classic stoner and doom bands and then adding their own brand of extra sludge, this fifth album from the New Haven heavyweights certainly doesn’t sell itself short in terms of riffs. The record’s general heaviness will be enough to win over a huge section of the metal community, but some already intense workouts take on new levels of darkness when the arrangements are peppered with some very bleak lyrical concerns.
Author Archives: Real Gone
Listen: Canyons And Locusts unleash ‘Anna Save A Life’
Noise rock duo Canyons And Locusts hit several peoples’ musical radar back at the beginning of 2024 when they assaulted unsuspecting ears with the pleasingly noisy ‘Love Goes Down The Drain’, a trashy yet smart anti-valentine.
UNEARTH – Bask In The Blood Of Our Demons EP
Unearth’s eighth release ‘The Wretched; The Ruinous’ presented fans with an uncompromising thirty six minutes worth of pure metal. The US metalcore band pulled out all the stops to deliver a truly heavy set which pulled together the strongest elements of their crossover sound. The album’s highlights really showed how broadly the band could apply their heaviness for mixed results: ‘Eradicator’ drew from the groove metal of Pantera’s ‘Far Beyond Driven’; the brilliant ‘Broken Arrow’ slowed down just enough to show off more of a timeless hardcore approach; ‘Dawn of The Militant’ applied angular rhythms against a slow and sludgy groove before dropping into some superb thrash passages, effectively showing off the full range of the band’s talents, and ‘Mother Betrayal’ even found time to drop melodic arpeggios and goth influenced vocal passages into something derived from classic Lamb of God. ‘TW;TR’ was one of 2023’s strongest metal discs – one of those records that offered fans of extreme sounds something great, no matter where they chose to drop in.
THE WOOD – Days
Liverpudlian band The Wood are an interesting prospect. Their music, on the surface, is sophisticated pop-rock, but dig a little deeper, and their debut album ‘Days’ will serve up other interesting styles, all pulled together to create an enthralling listen.
Watch: The Rattlebacks return with new video ‘Waste’
Those who’ve been keeping a close eye on Brighton’s The Rattlebacks throughout 2024 will have witnessed a band seemingly going from strength to strength. Each of the singles released from their forthcoming album has found the band sounding much more confident than before. Blending elements of melodic hard rock and a pinch of grunginess, the band’s best songs have conveyed a broad sound, and with ‘Dementia Lounge’ especially, The Rattlebacks’ ability to combine absolutely killer late 80s/early 90s riffs with a vocal that celebrates a classic rock approach reached its peak.