Ba'al

What with all this new EP business, we’ve not done a monthly playlist yet this year. No doubt you’ve been on tenterhooks, so here we are with some tunes that some of us have been listening to and some words explaining our picks.

Nick – Guitar

Thou – I Feel Nothing When You Cry

I’ve liked Thou for a long time now but never counted them amongst my favourite bands, but Umbilical is looking like the album to change that. It’s currently my highest rated album of the year and there’s very few upcoming albums that I think will challenge that. Just absolutely fierce from start to finish.

Rivers of Nihil – Criminals

Going through a sustained period of heavy listening to Rivers of Nihil at the moment. I just think they’re pretty untouchable in the progressive death metal world, not many bands are as consistently good and that seem to get better with every release. The new tracks have given me plenty of optimism that whatever full length comes next is going to be another outstanding release.

Wrthless – 2000 Cans

Came across this track after the band posted the intro along with a sample taken from Limmy’s Show (the “give us your laptop” scene with Paul McCole’s sad monologue) and the two fit perfectly as a midwest emo track. Sadly the Limmy sample isn’t on the actual released track but it’s a fantastic little emo/pop-punk song nonetheless and it’s got me in the mood for that kinda thing now the sun is coming out.

Sunken – Ensomhed

Probably not the last band that we saw at Fortress Festival to appear on this list. You may have heard us wax lyrical about Sunken before and it was our pleasure to play alongside them a few weeks ago. Was interesting to watch them twice in succession in a small rock bar and then on the grand stage at Scarborough Spa. They were overwhelmingly good on both occasions.

Charli XCX – B2b

No, not business to business, back to back. I mentioned earlier that few albums will challenge Umbilical to be my AOTY and this is one of those. Though at the time of writing I am yet to hear it, every track I’ve heard so far has been up there with my favourite Charli tracks and it seems like the general consensus is that brat is among her best work. So to say I am ‘much excite’ to hear it is an understatement.

Richard – Bass

Triptykon – Altar of Deceit

…you’re right Nick, it’s just the beginning of the Fortress chat. The lineup for the whole festival was frankly ludicrous, and one benefit to me personally was an impetus to finally take an overdue listen to the second Triptykon album ahead of their mighty headline set – and I think it’s probably better than the first. Chonk, blast, heft, OUGH.

Falls of Rauros – Arrow & Kiln

It was a joy to behold Falls of Rauros’ first show outside of the US, and handily for me they played a set of exclusively songs from the two albums I know properly. Of those, I’ve been getting especially into Vigilance Perennial either side of Fortress and this track is a powerhouse example of their folk-driven, emotive atmospheric black metal.

Obsidian Kingdom – Endless Wall

Obsidian Kingdom were undoubtedly the biggest curveball on the Fortress lineup; though they use elements of black metal, they are mainly a prog metal band with loads of post metal, doom, gothic keyboards, clean vocals and electronica mixed in. Though they got the smallest crowd of the weekend, I loved their full album playthrough of 2012’s Mantiis, and they were thoroughly lovely when I met them to buy some merch afterwards.

Ashenspire – The Law of Asbestos

A few weeks prior to Fortress I went to see Ashenspire at Corporation in Sheffield and was once again bowled over by their fiery, cacophonous performance of anti-fash progressive black metal fury. It took me a while to get on the Hostile Architecture hype train when the album came out, but now I am fully onboard, and that show was as life affirming as a wall of torturous noise can be.

Hamferð – Ábær

Moving away from past gigs and on to future ones: these guys opening the Solstafir/Oranssi Pazuzu tour later this year has very nearly pushed me to buy a ticket even though I’ve seen both headline bands twice apiece. I have Nick to thank for alerting me to the new album by these Faroese heavyweights, and their mix of melodic doom, post metal and death metal combines into what might be my album of the year so far.

Chris – Guitar

Childish Gambino – Big Foot Little Foot

New music from Donald “Childish Gambino” Glover is always welcome, even when it’s a rework of a previous release. This song sounds like two tracks in one but you will get the chorus stuck in your head, and the black-and-white music video is as precise, striking and affecting as you’d expect.

Warrington Runcorn New Town Development Plan – A Shared Sense of Purpose

This act was one of my best finds of 2023 (the year where I tried to listen to too much new music and burned out my ability to care), so I’m digging this new album from them – more bleak, sparse electronica beats with a depressed mid-century British vibe, lovely stuff.

Agalloch – Kneel to the Cross

I get to see Agalloch at Fortress Festival I get to see Agalloch at Fortress Festival I get to see Agalloch at Fortress Festival I get to see Agalloch at Fortress Festival I get to see Agalloch at Fortress Festival!!! As you might have guessed, pretty hyped about that fact, no further comment necessary.

Graywave – Dancing in the Dust

Like a hybrid of synth/vapourwave with crunchier metal bits, but an overall chill vibe – discovered this one from a Church Road promo email and it ticks a few of my boxes pretty emphatically.

Nile – Chapter for Not Being Hung Upside Down on a Stake in the Underworld and Made To Eat Feces by the Four Apes

Please never change, Karl Sanders, you absolute Egyptology-loving, spiky guitar-wielding, brutal riff-writing madman.