Ba'al

We bottled it on the 2022 AOTY post in the end (just too much good stuff to rank), but we’re back with our first monthly playlist of 2023, with some tracks we’ve been listening to in the playlist below, and some words on our picks.

Chris – Guitar

The Ocean – Preboreal

My favourite band of all time are back with new music and this beefy cut off their upcoming release Holocene. I apologise in advance for how fucking insufferable I am going to be when it comes out later this year.

Boucle Infinie – Monument

Synthwave/vaporwave/whatever you want to call it hits a sweet spot for me – blissful digital vibes and nostalgia for my youth spent playing Megadrive games. Boucle Infinie’s previous release was an absolute gem and the new album from last year is more of the same great shit.

Ahab – A Coral Tomb

Joining the chorus of everybody talking about this band – I’d never heard of them before they dropped this album in the first week of 2023 and it’s very good indeed. Big, atmospheric, oceanic doom is right in my wheelhouse and this track is a perfect example of it.

Sonja – When The Candle Burns Low…

Continuing January’s trend of catching up on new albums that I missed last year with Sonja – this is an excellent album opener, heavy rock/classic metal with a claustrophobic and crowded production that sounds tonally unique and makes it stand out. Good riffs, too!

Foo Fighters – I Am A River

Look, I know that Foo Fighters are the epitome of “dad rock”, but I genuinely loved the Sonic Highways TV series they did a few years back (music history/documentary with them recording in iconic studios across the US is absolutely my thing) and the album that came out of it is the best thing they’ve done in years. This song is a highlight, with added string sections that give it more bombast and atmosphere than you might expect.

Joe – Vocals

…And Oceans – Wine Into Water

A solid blackened death metal band who have really solidified their sound with this earworm of a track. An essential listen for fans of Fleshgod Apocalypse and the badly missed Anorexia Nervosa.

Saor – Origins

The title track from the new Saor album has one of the most uplifting and gorgeous closing sections I’ve heard in a long time. I’ve always struggled to get into this band, but this track hooked me instantly.

Winterfylleth – The Ruin

An older track from Manchester best known atmospheric black metallers. I would love to hear them play this track live, the ambient mid section is hauntingly beautiful.

Aara – Sonne der Nacht

Debemur Morti really does release some spectacular black metal. Excellent atmosphere, harmonic underlying clean vocals and some of the most caustic harsh vocals ever recorded.

Këkht Aräkh – Thorns

All the trve and kvlt black metal weeaboos went into collective frost bitten orgasm over Pale Swordsman. It is great though. Lo-fi but oozing wonderful song writing.

Richard – Bass

Sons of a Wanted Man – Kenoma

It may essentially just be Deafheaven-worshipping, riff-heavy post-black metal, but this track is honestly one of the best examples of that genre I’ve come across. Not only that, but SOAWM’s vocalist reminds me a hell of a lot of our own vocalist Joe, which is unnerving (in a good way) – and he agrees.

Periphery – Wildfire

I don’t know if I’ve ever put such a recently released single off an unreleased album on the playlist, as I’m not usually one for getting invested in advance singles, but I just can’t get this one out of my head. The song is packed with crushing grooves, but that chorus is really something else; it’s so off-kilter rhythmically, with weird chord progressions too, but it still manages to have an absolutely enormous hook. Obviously your enjoyment of this (like all Periphery songs) will hinge on if you enjoy Spencer Sotelo’s vocals, which many don’t, but I am a huge fan so this is a win for me.

Rival Consoles – Afterglow

I can’t believe I only recently discovered Rival Consoles, because this is well up my street. If, like me, you love the atmospheric grooves of the likes of Jon Hopkins, Kiasmos or latter-day Vessels, you’ll find a lot to love in the microhouse vibes of Rival Consoles and I heartily recommend Howl.

VRTRA – My Bones Hold a Stillness

Sludgy, horrible black metal with some giant, lumbering doom riffs thrown in, a big sound, and an overall atmosphere of caustic evil? Count me in.

Almyrkvi – Fading Hearts of Umbral Nebulas

I think it’s actually impossible to form a bad black metal band if you’re from Iceland – maybe even to make bad music at all? Almyrkvi do the combo of black metal and spacey ambient with much more actual weight and presence than many, and it’s a stirring, powerful sound.

Nick – Guitar

Au-Dessus – Epiphany

Something bleak to soundtrack a bleak few weeks. Fell down a little rabbit hole after listening to a lot of bands like Regarde Les Hommes Tomber, Ultha and Schammasch, and this band are more than a match for the aforementioned filth. Winter isn’t over til it’s over.

Glass Ocean – Beyond Us

I’ve been getting much of my prog-metal fix from Sydney’s Glass Ocean recently after a sudden rediscovery. I’d been a listener of theirs many years ago after they emerged as a side-project of Northlane’s Nic Pettersen (whose first two albums are in my own personal pantheon of adored records), but I lost track of them over the years until hearing this sublime album from 2020.

KEN Mode – The Irate Jumbuck

Still waiting hear the band’s long awaiting sister project, DEIRDRE Mode lololololol. Sorry, it’s a great track.

Kvelertak – Tordenbrak

I think Meir may actually be my favourite Kvelertak album. It’s not got quite the same abrasive energy as their debut but the songwriting is every bit as strong and it’s got some of the best hooks the band has ever written, of which there are a great many. All killer, no filler.

Sonny Rollins – On Green Dolphin Street

Picked up On Impulse! on vinyl after my partner asked me to play some records that are less aurally oppressive (that’s a diplomatic translation). So I opted for something that’s challenging in a different way, this time in the form of an absolute don of improvisational Jazz saxophone.