• INDEPENDENT RELEASES • These short reviews focus exclusively on new releases from January this year, all of which were self-released by the bands themselves or on their own (small) imprints. There is no specific focus on genre for these selections, whatever is independent and worth talking about is included. // In an attempt to be more conversational these are more easygoing and casual than longform reviews, so relax and think for yourself. — If you find something you dig go tell the band on social media and support them with a purchase. If you’d like your music reviewed, read the FAQ and send promos to: grizzlybutts@hotmail.com

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CAPRAHED is a solo project from Adelaide, Australia-based musician Phil Howlett (Solemn Ceremony, ex-Lucifer’s Fall) which carries a sort of daemonic sci-fi theme centered around mind-flaying goatmen from another dimension who go to great lengths to invade the earth. “Empire” is a half hour song in four movements which details humanity’s fight back against their psychic enslavement, a work which features some of the more adventurous material from Howlett of late per interest in punk, alt-noise, progressive, and psychedelic rock. It makes for a different sort of doomed mélange of guitar ideas and tripped-out experiments which do well to narrate the story in mind, portraying uncertainty and dread to great effect. Even when split into four parts for the sake of each distinctive movement outlined the whole of “Empire” is a miserable dirge save for a number of odd detours and uncomfortable shift in mood over its course. A surreal and at times sparse experience I’d enjoyed the nausea which carries through the whole of the piece and enjoyed getting some sense of where the story goes within its duration. The digipack version of this record also includes the 2023 released self-titled EP from the band.

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BELEGHOST is a solo black metal project from Italian musician Satvrno Occvlto and comes very much in the tradition of bedroom black metal. ‘Where the Mountain Lies‘ is homebrewed raw stuff without any particularly roughshod or broken components as the artist takes some clear inspiration taken from Darkthrone and perhaps Immortal‘s earlier days for the black metal side of things, filtering in an equal amount of dark ambient pieces to round the experience closer to a half hour in length. Though the guitar work is nothing the average black metal crate-digger hasn’t heard before each of the three main songs here are effective enough in that simpler tradition and feature vocals which veer into Dagon-esque territory depending on the song. Very typical work overall but with plenty of care taken to infuse these songs with personal meaning and some reasonable polish applied.

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BLOODCRUSHER is a Medford, Oregon-based solo brutal death metal project from Dave McKey (Under the Red Tide) which focuses on bigger grooves, guest spots, and slamming moshable grinds throughout this second full-length album. ‘Voidseeker‘ would’ve normally irritated the shit outta me with its frequent guests (via four of the first five songs) but these additions help to add variety to a record which is pretty damned straightforward by default. The bulk of the experience is equally intense wherein the action is strangely atmospheric on a few pieces (“Sanguis Aeternus”) and some of the rhythms are more related to tech-death and deathgrind in some sense as the artist was clearly on a roll churning out ~2-3 minute burners and guttural slappers. While I appreciate a full ~37 minute record which showcases some solid production values (appropriate for this style at least) as well as strong use of various vocal techniques I do think that this record could’ve been cut down to size and selected for only its most choice pieces.

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MIASMA is a duo from Yogyakarta, Indonesia who’d started out as more of a dark take on stoner doom to start with their first digital single but quickly began to evolve into a more occult-themed extreme doom metal fervor with their first EP back in 2023 and then this demo from 2024. While a very small run of tapes was made available on December 25th in their country the demo is now more broadly available as of early January. The tape features two songs and yes, fans of Exhumation‘s more recent work should appreciate the organic sound and steady whip of opener “Boundless Chaos” but there is still a twisted take on doom lurking in their intent. You’ll find this shamanic pulse is alive in the opening riffs of the other half of the EP, “Everlasting Avenue” which serves as a strong compliment to the first piece via its thrashing yet obsessive rhythms and disrupted pacing. For my own taste this is one of the more compelling demos I’ve heard in a while, hugely anticipating the full-length album they’re building based on the style found on these two songs.

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From Iceburn and Blind Idiot God to Shining and more recently Agabas the lineage of heavy instrumental music inspired by jazz fusion, improvisation and acts like Mahavishnu Orchestra is not necessarily unexplored but rarely broad in its appeal. I’m not sure that Paris, France-borne quintet CKRAFT have perfected any one given ratio that’ll have the masses going mad for saxophone and synth-accordion in metal but their use of odd-timed chugs and alt-metal should appeal to fans of Meshuggah and Gojira on a basal left of chunking craft here on their second LP. ‘Uncommon Grounds‘ is moody yet playful, occasionally letting loose with a breakthrough tangent or strange interruption (see: “Uncommon Grounds”) which helps to characterize their work from the first listen. The trouble with the jazz-metal hybrid remains the same, though, as the riffs and the rhythms themselves have no specific appeal beyond some jaunty chugs making for a surreal, sometimes anxiously developed sense of scene as the greater imprint upon the ear. Closer “Nostre” is maybe the closest thing to an exception but an early 90’s thrash groove doesn’t fully seal the deal in terms of purposing that movement as more than a rhythm to riff off of in wilding tangents. Though I’d loved this as expressive muse it wasn’t gripping enough as guitar music for my own taste.

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Although Colorado/Michigan-based experimental death metal duo DISCORDANT MEDITATION have had backing for some of their releases the artists involved (including D.P. from Swelling Repulsion) have always taken a hands-on, do-it-yourself approach to most everything they do. I don’t doubt this debut full-length release would/should get picked up for broader release, just as their demo and EPs were in compilation form last year, but for now this is an independent release… and a great one. The first impression is some manner of brutal and technical death metal with some inspiration taken from Immolation and the more chaotic spectrum of progressive death today. This shouldn’t be all that shocking if you’re a fan of the bestial side of USDM but the album extends its mutant (but actually not all that weird) form of semi-dissonant, brutal and sometimes technical death into more obsessive waves as the album burns on, thankfully finishing its tormented thought in under ~35 minutes.

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