VARIOUS ARTISTS – Kitchener-Waterloo Metal Cover Collection

Featuring six bands and a selection of retro metal covers, this compilation is an interesting prospect. None of the featured acts will mean very much to most people living outside Canada – or even anyone living too far outside of Ontario – but in a couple of instances, the bands’ choice of material involves songs that will have spent decades gracing millions of stereos since the 1980s. By choosing a couple of very familiar 80s classics, Invicta and Cathartic Demise both stand a fair chance of picking up a new fan or two via this release – and at the end of the day, that’s what every hard working band wants…and needs. By recycling early nineties death metal, both Aepoch and Raider can seem more marginal, but their featured performances capture some more than reasonable extreme metal chops.

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Watch the new video from Talk Show Host

When billing as power pop punk, the new single from Toronto’s Talk Show Host might seem like an oxymoron, but in many ways, it’s a fairly accurate description.  ‘Crisis Actors’ features the kind of buoyant vocals – and vocal filtering – you’ve come to expect from so much twenty first century pop punk, but musically, the track comes with much bigger boots.

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ZERO FIRE – The Attic Sessions EP

Canadian metal band Zero Fire’s second EP ‘Second Sun’ was packed with great riffs. By creating a brand of melodic metalcore that also included nods to groove metal and contrasted its heaviness with use of clean vocals, it managed to be very broad in appeal. A year on, ‘The Attic Sessions’ offers fans and newcomers a couple of live recordings that demonstrate both extremes of the band’s sound. While a new studio recording would have been preferable – and a full length album better still – this EP has the benefit of giving a premier to a pair of previously unrecorded tracks.

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GATEKEEPER – Grey Maiden EP

Metal has gone through various different fashions over the decades. No longer just typified by the big vocals and studs ‘n’ leather of the New Wave of British Heavy Metal, it has taken in different influences and spawned several subgenres, with each giving a very different listening experience. Very little of this seems to have been noticed by Canada’s Gatekeeper, whose debut album ‘East of Sun’ relied heavily on some very 80s riffs and the lyrical themes of an old Helloween LP.

Offering a couple of new recordings alongside an acoustic re-working of an old favourite and an obscure cover tune, their 2019 EP ‘Grey Maiden’ is similarly rooted within the 80s and although incredibly old fashioned in style, this four tracker is actually great at what it does. For those whom enjoyed the previous LP, it’ll be a more than welcome stop-gap.

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PINK COCOON – Alienation

For the purposes of this studio recording, Montreal’s Pink Cocoon isn’t a band, but the work of multi-instrumentalist Zolla Marc. He’s a man who cites a fairly diverse selection of rock and blues acts among his influences, ranging from the predictable Black Sabbath and Electric Wizard, to the more unexpected – quite often, metal based performers won’t take time out to praise Robin Trower, especially when praise for Hendrix seems likely to get more attention. He also name-checks The Distillers and The Pretty Reckless among bands who’ve helped shape his playing and sound. For most stoner practitioners, the musical sphere starts with the first four Sabbath albums, moves into Hawkwind and then goes back to Sabbath’s ‘Never Say Die’…y’know, for variety, so while you’d be hard pushed to hear the influence from Brodie Dall or Taylor Momsen on this debut release, it’s still thrilling to know Zolla isn’t stuck in a musical rut.

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