terraasymmetry Features

The Top 20 Albums of September | 2023

THE TOP 20 ALBUMS OF THE MONTH should be self-explanatory, an ordered ranking of twenty albums that’d resonated most throughout this month. If you’re new to the site, the tendency is heavy and/or surreal music. Choices are selected based on temporal immersion, personal connection, impressive style, point of view, aesthetics and with consideration for the lasting value of each selection. All choices are ultimately personal and come without consideration for populism, nepotism, cronyism or perceived “relevance”. Any records left off this list will still be considered for end of the year lists. I am just one man, writing about music is a passion I afford as much time as is manageable and I am grateful to have so much to choose from. Thank you.

I. The wetness of the Pacific Northwest returns on cue after a year (plus) without a good piss-down. We got a new sliding door, watched the second season of Foundation (twice), and I’m almost done beating Lies of P. Behind on my goals for the year but enjoying the green and the grey-ness of the present. Excellent month, a much needed downpour of interest and meaning for a dry year in heavy music. There were a solid ~25 records I wanted to include here but you get the best gear I could muster. Apologies if I missed a few noise rock/other releases, been saving those for a list series later on down the road.

II. October is stacking up, more than expected with about ~30 longform reviews planned alongside a couple of premieres I’m stoked for. Expect (at least) 3-4 album of the year contenders on the docket. Interviews are way behind, list features are way behind, yet I am doubly inspired by the music I’ll be covering next month.

III. In 2023 most written reviews will now also have an additional video component. Both edited and off-the-cuff videos will now be embedded or posted to the site regularly (weekly). If you enjoy these please consider following on YouTube. We’ve just passed 550 subscribers, thank you for your support! I’d lean into the video skills more but I want to establish basal consistency as we reach past the first year of ‘content’.

IV. Each day I meditate with all-consuming gratitude aimed toward the bands, labels and PR firms who choose to work with me — Not to mention the kind few readers who donate to the site intermittently. The goals and ethos of Grizzly Butts have not changed in 2023 but I will be looking for ways to more efficiently cover more music worth talking about on a regular basis. Thank you.

#1Album of the Month
ARTIST:TOMB MOLD
TITLE:The Enduring Spirit
RECORD LABEL(S):20 Buck Spin

The fourth album from this Toronto, Ontario-based trio appeared out of seeming nowhere as a confidently alien stretch into the classic progressive death metal realm. These influences, which’d always been discussed and somewhat apparent, now bloom in the abundance of this record as a still aggressive attack with much sharper, sometimes airbrushed illustrative touch. Naturally there is a leap here compared to the year-over-year progression we’d found in their past work, the cold Eldritch graveyard murk and the vacuum of cosmic horror vibes aren’t deleted outright but this record concerns itself with asking questions on the nature of existence, purpose, and generally what I’d consider questioning the cycle of creation and destruction one might find in all mysticism. The signature of the band is here and it is not buried or mutilated, this is where it potentially develops into something liquid (possible to carry into a variety of vessels). This is their most considered and intentional work to date and a universally recommendable death metal album.

>> FULL REVIEW <<

#2
ARTIST:FABRICANT
TITLE:Drudge to the Thicket
RECORD LABEL(S):Profound Lore Records

It is hard to imagine what a relief it must’ve been to finally release the part of this Berkeley, California-based technical death metal band’s brains that must’ve been itching to realize ‘Drudge to the Thicket‘ for about a decade. You know some of these folks from Mefitis and yes, up front this album is that level of great as the technical and compositional skills of these folks is world class and this album is through and through a finest example of the ‘challenge to reward’ ratio being prime. I’ve not seen nearly enough hype for this album so if you are a fan of later Anata, Exlimitr, Crimson Massacre hit play on this one right away.

>> FULL REVIEW <<

#3
ARTIST:DEMONIAC
TITLE:Nube Negra
RECORD LABEL(S):Edged Circle Productions

The cutting-deep thought patterns of Limache, Chile-based blackened prog-thrash metal band Demoniac are weaponized against the populace for this third and most accomplished full-length album. ‘Nube Negra‘ may very well read as elegant in its shredding indulgences and standout use of non-traditional instrumentation as they craft this truly memorable, blackened and big-brained thrash record but they’ve thankfully not given up on the riff and the rapid dissolution available to feral speed metallic extremes. Arrogance, destructive attitudes and righteous superiority course through the disdain-pumping veins of this work, a bleak-minded and intoxicating record with a feral spirit.

>> FULL STREAM <<

#4
ARTIST:BLOOD OATH
TITLE:Lost In an Eternal Silence
RECORD LABEL(S):Caligari Records,
Raise the Dead

Romancing the dark unknown one brutal act at a time Concepción, Chile-based ‘old school’ progressive death/thrash metal quartet Blood Oath arrive tested and self-sustained on this impressive debut full-length. Those with a pre-existing thirst for the authentic, rugged underground sound of cruelest and earliest prog/tech-death metal sophistication will find a golden-mined set of raw material on ‘Lost in an Eternal Silence‘ to appreciate. Their work smacks of bestial intelligence (think early Sadism + early Sadus) enough that it becomes an addictive and energizing substance in its own right spin after spin.

>> FULL REVIEW <<

#5
ARTIST:WELLS VALLEY
TITLE:Achamoth
RECORD LABEL(S):Lavadome Productions

Another great big surprise at the end of the month this third full-length from Lisbon, Portugal-based avant-garde/post-black metal trio Wells Valley offers a tragedian, brilliantly dark motion upon doomed atmosphere and nigh noise rocking clangor into their unique touch of dissonance as this very focused and intense record demanded my attention through every listen. Not only is the render of the album a beautiful, horrifying thing to witness but the music itself achieves a unique black/doomed effect by unusual means. I will have much more to say in the full review once it is finished.

>> FULL REVIEW <<

#6
ARTIST:HEXVESSEL
TITLE:Polar Veil
RECORD LABEL(S):Svart Records

Finnish black metallic forest folk rock act Hexvessel recollects past-and-present compounds into personal alchemy on this brilliant sixth full-length album. Haunting in its presentation of one diorama after another ‘Polar Veil‘ puts to use decades of insight, a career-spanning call upon strengths as a sort of walk through the milling mind pondering both place and spiritual significance. The result is surreal in its atmospheric lustre as points of dramatic black metal and ritualistic folken ebb lend a dreamlike, doomed sort of magic to the endless stroll through the moonlit woods they’ve summoned within these eight images.

>> FULL STREAM <<

#7
ARTIST:TERMINALIST
TITLE:The Crisis as Condition
RECORD LABEL(S):Indisciplinarian

Positing the normalization of a fundamentally failing system of survival as the only practical future reality worth considering, the fantastical sci-fi optimism of Danish-American thrash metal quartet Terminalist fades into scenes of terrifying cataclysm, brutal inequality and extinction on this harder and faster-thrashing second full-length album. ‘The Crisis As Condition‘ may very well shake an imposing fist at a world embroiled in its own self-defeating nature as a point of it’s purpose yet the listening experience it offers showcases a band deepest-yet in the wiles of their craft as they reach closer to the halls of mastery, beginning to take hold of their most tuneful strengths while remaining a dire force in the unforgiving realm of thrash metal.

>> FULL REVIEW <<

#8
ARTIST:TIDELESS
TITLE:Eye of Water
RECORD LABEL(S):Chaos Records

Both sentiment and savage emotional rupture create unsettling radiance as San Diego, California-based shoegaze/death-doom metal quintet Tideless arrive with this second pass at their ambitious concoction of forms. Applying the hum-drum drift of maudlin rock guitar textures and groaning-loose movements to ultra-specific taste in extreme metal may not be brand-new in modus yet this sophomore full-length album growls and shimmers in creating its persona-yet-exaggerative brand of alien reverb as the longform stretches of ‘Eye of Water‘ move independently, grotesquely sweetened by transcendental muse and existential lurch alike. The excitement to be found here is in the testing of boundaries, the taxation upon either side of two extremes as they merge in seeming earnest taste for both realms. 

>> FULL STREAM <<

#9
ARTIST:TAAKE
TITLE:Et Hav Av Avstand
RECORD LABEL(S):Dark Essence Records

Yet another very important band in getting me deeper into black metal back in the mid-2000’s Taake essentially stretch their wings here into bigger but not uncharacteristic pieces. // ‘Et Hav Av Avstand‘ may very well propose a different scope and increasingly atmospheric station in presentation of its knowing gaze but this doesn’t put a dent in the accessible, approachable lure yet reviled spiritus of the artist. The four contiguous epics herein put to great use the signature rock-fingered, trill-and-hammered riffcraft of this notable auteur to the point that easing away from the six minute heavy rock shaped song toward progressive rock-sized chunks of muse feels entirely natural on this self-liberated, unhindered full listen.

>> FULL REVIEW <<

#10
ARTIST:UADA
TITLE:Crepuscule Natura
RECORD LABEL(S):Eisenwald

Reconnected teeth-to-tail in ouroboric rebirth the strident haunt we capture Portland, Oregon-based black metal quartet Uada within here appears resolute, determined to reclaim and redefine the identity forged thus far. Indirectly acknowledging the cyclic nature of existential awareness available to a lifelong pursuit of introspection the artist emphasizes both depressive ardor and the rabid yet sophisticate language of melodic black metal as a primed form of heavy metal’s emotional connectivity. ‘Crepuscule Natura‘ expectedly matches the blazing wit of high sentience with artfully melodic glean, knowing themselves (chaff and else) better within each dimensional rift conjured, this being a cumulative thought at the behest of tried resolve.

>> FULL REVIEW <<

#11
ARTIST:EXCARNATED ENTITY
TITLE:Mass Grave Horizon
RECORD LABEL(S):Nuclear Winter Records

In an exceptional month for death/doom metal this record stood out most for its substantive work. // Envisioning mass death Portland, Oregon-based death/doom metal quartet Excarnated Entity come armed with a new logo and new life breathed into their war-ravaged realm of malevolent yet surreal post-apocalyptic muse on this debut full-length album. ‘Mass Grave Horizon‘ offers suffering and death in cyclic whorls, a path which stabs and fumes back upon the wheel but ultimately succumbs to subterranean rebirth and an eternal return to war. Girded by viscerally achieved dread and vivified guitar interest this first cycle feels sets into motion a damningly repeatable curse enacted within each listen as greater doom indents the mind in vengeful passage ’til eroded, cratered beyond recognition.

>> FULL REVIEW <<

#12
ARTIST:DESECRESY
TITLE:Deserted Realms
RECORD LABEL(S):Xtreem Music

In a starkly cacophonic octagonal configuration set to maximal refraction Helsinki, Finland-based death metal project Desecresy present another exemplar rationing of cult and cryptic atmospheric death from their depths, an unreal and otherworldly realm so deeply imagined at this point that it begins to carry with it the weight of serialized, unbreakable hallucination. Album number eight on a sojourn I’ve followed from the start, ‘Deserted Realms‘ offers another hundred turns of every dial in order to further stylize the render on this vexing, morbid and mind-flaying eminence, a resonance that could only come from such intently focused specialization.

>> FULL REVIEW <<

#13
ARTIST:KEN MODE
TITLE:Void
RECORD LABEL(S):Artoffact Records

The second half of the ‘Null’/’Void’ diptych from Vancouver, Canada-based sludged-at avant-noise rock quartet Ken Mode makes its first half feel like a primer, an intro to the frustrated skronking depths of ‘Void‘. Whereas ‘Null’ had a few excitable singles this record is a pain machine of a different order and a great redeemer since I never quite connected with the fuming but distantly exaggerative side of the band as they toyed with industrial/noise in their own way on a few pieces. This record has some surprising post-hardcore turns to it as they crank out mathy, sludged garage burners one after another. I suppose I regret not reviewing it during the week of release because this is kinda ruthless in terms of defeated and screamed-out noise rock adjacent records.

>> FULL STREAM <<

#14
ARTIST:SLOMATICS
TITLE:Strontium Fields
RECORD LABEL(S):Black Bow Records

Achieving their finest font of accessible excess Belfast, Northern Ireland-based doom/sludge metal trio Slomatics continue to break new ground beyond amplifier worship here on their seventh full-length album. They’ve chosen to deal in sharpened songcraft in the process of re-charting their greater map in notable transformation from droning, sludge aggro past unto a more emotional and evocative work; Showcasing heightened brainwaves within steady meditation, ‘Strontium Fields‘, reads as gloomed-over and sombre as it paints a more peaceful drift which remains outright heavy, a balance which intends to serve the song in every case.

>> FULL STREAM <<

#15
ARTIST:MELAN SELAS
TITLE:Zephyrean Hymns
RECORD LABEL(S):The Circle Music

In ongoing search of new meaning by ancestral call and desirous ascension Trikala, Greece-based black metal duo Melan Selas walk armed with patient reveal of winged spiritus, readied to prove unyielding readiness as their second full-length album looms. Narrating their ethos in pursuit of the wisdom of ages in thrashing verse these hymns are unleashed most often as lofty epics, the artists own vision of Hellenic black metal which is oft traditional in spirit but deeply marked by a distinct personal touch; There should be some obvious appeal here for fans of Greek black metal up front but ‘Zephyrean Hymns‘ comes with enough variety introduced per enough thrashing/epic heavy pockets of greatness which should call for a broader ear. A worthy voice for the cult and a great direction overall as Melan Selas lean towards their heavy metal driven strengths rather than press on too quickly into abstract forms.

>> FULL REVIEW <<

#16
ARTIST:PRIMORDIAL
TITLE:How it Ends
RECORD LABEL(S):Metal Blade Records

In the past the folks behind Irish pagan metal band Primordial had been squarely on the same page despite splitting the songcraft in diagonal sections but this isn’t entirely the case for album number ten, an ambitious record with a couple different modes in mind. ‘How it Ends‘ doesn’t seem to have reached consensus as to whether they’re leaning into revolutionary rock kicks or following up with a shade darker-than ‘Exile Amongst the Ruins‘ and in truth they’ve certainly done both, see-sawing in such a way that the full listen is uneven but no less of an ‘epic’ than one’d expect. It’d taken a while to warm to, and there are a couple of songs that still do nothing for the tone of the record, but there is come coexistence among these armies as I’d ultimately found myself keen to the unexpected and newly arisen traits that’d found their way into this landmark tenth record.

>> FULL REVIEW <<

#17
ARTIST:BAXAXAXA
TITLE:De Vermis Mysteriis
RECORD LABEL(S):The Sinister Flame

There is good reason to fear that which rises from its grave twice though we cannot be sure the shambler(s) from the star-lined tomb of Niederwerrn, Germany-based black metal quartet Baxaxaxa‘d ever slept in the last two years, they may just as well have remained roving in the shadows all this time. Today they intend to breach distant shores, raise their ranking numbers and carry this newly skin-bound tome representing the followers of an ancient curse; ‘De Vermis Mysteriis‘ isn’t quite as memorable as ‘Catacomb Cult‘ had been for me a couple of years ago but it is far more accomplished in its atmospheric definition, eerie in it’s uniquely doomed early 90’s black metallic voice which is unmistakably Baxaxaxa‘s own retching, doomed form of possession. This time around things took a bit longer to click into place but ultimately delivered upon the promise of the mid-to-slow paced doomed yet dramatically stated pieces which’d been their strength from the get-go.

>> FULL REVIEW <<

#18
ARTIST:SUFFER YOURSELF
TITLE:Axis of Torture
RECORD LABEL(S):Aesthetic Death

On the spectrum of angst, dread and nihil Stockholm, Sweden-based funeral death/doom metal quartet Suffer Yourself weigh heavy with the nausea of classic forms on their fourth full-length album as they tread from torture to torture. Long and arduous, minimal in accoutrement yet expansive in its render ‘Axis of Tortures‘ is not a beautiful act but rather an elaborate and I suppose necessarily confrontational act which does well to thoroughly explore its proposed four degrees of dread. That said of course this may not be easy to prescribe as daily listening in terms of mood generation and despite the riffcraft having generally exceeded past work from the band. No doubt these songs will read heavier, more actively focused on the riff and in turn even more appropriate in a live setting and this shift towards aggression should effectively hold the attention of folks who’ve the necessary depressive mode and taste for death/doom.

>> FULL REVIEW <<

#19
ARTIST:REBAELLIUN
TITLE:Under the Sign of Rebellion
RECORD LABEL(S):Agonia Records

The fiery direct-to-skull beating of this fourth full-length album from Porto Alegre, Brazil-based death metal trio Rebaelliun unleashes has been incensed by the corruption and insane rule of the new pandemic world ‘Under the Sign of Rebellion‘ confronts and shouts down. The revived soul of their early millennium-honed brutal yet technical punish finds its furor again in trying times, armed with their signature machine-gunned sound and plenty enough to say this band might appear ‘of a certain era’ in terms of style but they’ve proven that doesn’t mean they’ve any intention of lazing about and making easy work of it, the result is a ripping death metal record which should ping the nostalgia of some and help to re-educate many others of the many, many shades of brutality which run deeper than stupid fucking gimmickry.

>> FULL REVIEW <<

#20
ARTIST:WEALD AND WOE
TITLE:For the Good of the Realm
RECORD LABEL(S):Fiadh Productions

Though there were a ton of records I could have considered for the final slot here Weald and Woe‘s sound is yet even more refined and compelling on this second full-length record. Consider this a folken, epic black metal release with muscle memory pertaining to both traditional heavy metal and with a taste for Obsequiae‘s obvious similar impetus. Though their sound is familiar, a bit rawed-out in a satisfying way, and such I’d found myself drawn to this record for its sense of spectacle and obvious memorable qualities. I guess they’ve put out a By Fire and Sword record this month too but I rarely get promo stuff from No Remorse and haven’t checked it out yet.

>> FULL STREAM <<

HONORABLE MENTIONS

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