The first new music from the Boston punks Already Dead in almost a year, the band’s 2025 EP ‘I Think It’s Time To Leave…’ is in danger of being over as soon as it’s begun. Packing five high octane numbers into a little over ten minutes, the release barely gives the listener time to catch their breath, let alone provide an ideal opportunity to take stock of what they’re hearing. In terms of blending the classic Ramonescore sound with some old school, sometimes very British sounding punky thrills, the material really hits the mark, though, regardless of the release’s obvious brevity.
Category Archives: Album & EP Reviews
Watch: Oreyeon relive ‘Echoes Of Old Nightmares’ in new video
On their 2019 LP, Oreyeon delivered a set of songs driven by absolutely crushing riffs. Blending the stoner/fuzz of classic Kyuss into a doomier musical landscape, the record’s best songs were unrelentingly heavy, and yet a world of vocal filters and other tricks sometimes gave their sound a deep psych edge which kept things interesting. Over the next few years, Oreyeon would become an important fixture within the Italian doom and sludge scenes. By the time they recorded ‘Equations For The Useless’ in 2022, a much bigger recording budget gave them a slightly clearer sound, but without making their material especially more accessible. If anything, it cemented the band’s reputation as one of Europe’s finest underground metal bands.
HOUSE OF HOSTS – Reckoning EP
At the end of 2023, House of Hosts’ debut single ‘Oblivion’ introduced a band who clearly knew their way around a riff. Right from the off, it showcased a band who could potentially crush their audience with relative ease. A few of the vocals were perhaps a little too gruff to fit with the alternative metal backdrop, but it presented something with a great potential. Over the course of a couple more singles, the rough edges had been ironed out a little, but by often sharing a cleaner vocal over a heavy sound, this Welsh band marked themselves out as a rising talent and an act that might build a committed following rather quickly.
PARIS MUSIC CORP. – Wetlands / Dark Laguna
In 2022, electronic musician John Andrew Paris – aka Paris Music Corp. – released his self-titled album. Marking a return to recording after a five year hiatus, the fourteen track record was pleasingly varied, taking in beat-heavy, almost danceable works (‘Whiteout’) to artier sounding tracks adorned with great bass sounds (the Mick Karn influenced ‘Light Speed’ and the vaguely shoegaze like ‘Witch Harvest’), to pure ambient fare (‘New Blue Norther’, ‘The Original Orb’). It may have drawn from a lot of different sources, but it was to the musician’s credit that it never lacked direction. By then presenting his audience with a twelve minute epic in 2023 (the soundtrack for ‘Spectral Wind’), it was clear that Paris had so many more ideas up his sleeve and so much more to give.
VARIOUS ARTISTS – It’s A Wicked Cool Christmas!
Love it or hate it, Christmas music is big business – especially in the US, where it seems that almost every great artist has recorded something festive for posterity. Apparently, if you’re a country artist, recording a Christmas album is the law. The amount of time and money invested in festive tunes is huge, and that becomes rather bewildering when you consider that the music basically has a shelf life of four or five weeks a year.