Album Review: Ist Ist – The Art Of Lying

Album Review: Ist Ist – The Art Of Lying

Ist Ist’s The Art Of Lying is a clear, coherent and ordered example of consistency – the considerable class and all-round quality are established early and maintained throughout. Is that consistency sustained partly because of a sameness to the material?...
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Album Review: Various Artists – Alice Cooper, Killer – 50 Years Later

Album Review: Various Artists – Alice Cooper, Killer – 50 Years Later

There have already been a host of various-artists tribute albums (my own personal favourite is still 2014’s Ronnie James Dio: This Is Your Life. The recent The Metallica Blacklist contained some sparkling stuff but was perhaps too much of a...
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Album Review: Brion Starr – A Night To Remember

Album Review: Brion Starr – A Night To Remember

New-York based Brion Starr invites you to a nocturnal 1970s-influenced netherworld in this finely-crafted collection. The mood, the atmosphere, the production and the mix (Starr in cahoots with sonic legend Tony Visconti) are spot on – but are the songs....
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EP Review: Like Moths To Flames – Pure Like Porcelain

EP Review: Like Moths To Flames – Pure Like Porcelain

If you’re looking for a spark of inspiration, there is much to like about this latest EP from US metalcore outfit Like Moths To Flames. The opener, Ameliorate, sets the general tone of epic and tortured, facing up to diseased...
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Album Review: Bummer – Dead Horse

Album Review: Bummer – Dead Horse

When considering giving up time and/ or cash to any new album, the titles of the tracks can reach out to you and say something – such as JFK Speedwagon … I Want To Punch Bruce Springsteen In The Dick...
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EP Review: Grace Hayhurst – Existence Is Temporary

EP Review: Grace Hayhurst – Existence Is Temporary

Troubled times? Suddenly aware of your fate? Time running out? Searching for a state of grace? Prog Metal can save you. Multi-instrumentalist, multi-talented, classically-trained Grace Hayhurst has delivered a five-track instrumental EP that in its own (almost...
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Album Review: The Wandering Hearts – Self Titled

Album Review: The Wandering Hearts – Self Titled

There are many who say award-winning The Wandering Hearts are “the real thing”. But “UK Americana” by its very nature offers something of a dichotomy – there are those who prefer their Americana strictly American. If the music is roots,...
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Album Review: Mordred – The Dark Parade

Album Review: Mordred – The Dark Parade

Thrash attack with funky bass and flashes of hip hop among the shredding guitars – welcome to The Dark Parade, which sets out to grab you by the collar and throw you headlong into the mosh pit, into the mash,...
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Album Review: Rose City Band – Earth Trip

Album Review: Rose City Band – Earth Trip

Do yourself a summer treat, drop out of your anxieties and drop into an American beauty, Rose City Band’s Earth Trip. Just be warned you might not want to leave. Prolific songwriter and celebrated guitarist/vocalist Ripley Johnson (Wooden Shjips, Moon...
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Album Review: Keuning – A Mild Case Of Everything

Album Review: Keuning – A Mild Case Of Everything

What’s your favourite song by The Killers – Mr Brightside? When You Were Young? Somebody Told Me? Human? All These Things That I Have Done? Well, whatever it is, unless from the recent Imploding The Mirage, the chances are it...
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