THE TOP 10 ALBUMS OF THE MONTH should be self-explanatory, an ordered ranking of ten 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 any outside factors including perceived “relevance”. 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.

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I. This month on MystificationZine.com is only just halfway finished as I’d only allowed a short number of reviews for a naturally slow month for quality releases. Otherwise the development of numerous end of the year lists is upon me, about half of which are fully written and ready to edit and produce. This year there will be six “albums you missed” lists which are sub-genre specific (death, black, heavy, doom, noise rock, psych/stoner) and if you’re wondering where the thrash list is… the quality isn’t there this year, same for sludge/post-metal. There will be four other lists included beyond those including the Top 50 of 2025 which is mostly decided upon. You can expect everything to hit before December 26th or nearby and from that point I’ll publish an editorial and begin covering 2026 releases.

II. The portal has closed on 2025 releases in terms of timely coverage. The only albums I regret not being able to cover in longform review are December releases which I’ve included in this list otherwise. Please do not spam me for coverage of 2025 releases in the year 2026, the page must turn alongside the wheel.

III. Consider following on YouTube. The channel will pick back up next week as I catch up on the Albums of the Month I’ve missed first, will edit and finish some unpublished reviews, and then I will cover some of the End of the Year stuff, culminating in a multi part Top 50 of 2025 feature.

IV. As always I’d like to express my gratitude for the bands, labels and PR firms who choose to work with me. Thank you.

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Nothing balances the blood’s treacherous humours better than heavy rock ’til heavy metal done right and in the case of Boston, Massachusetts-based troupe BYGONE the trade between various eras of heavy music proposed within their self-titled debut LP was righteous from the first hit. Their work reflects a time when the soil on the boots of 70’s progressive rock and heavy psych gave grit to the working class aspirations of the early days NWOBHM scene via groups like Quartz. The hum of this record is built upon a lot of great (analog?) synth/keyboard work, catchier but aspirant songs, the type of tonal reach which should appeal to folks who can hang with Magic Circle, Thin Lizzy, late 80’s Tank and UFO just as easily. A great hang every time I picked it up.

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Pagan/epic black metal troupe MORTE FRANCE comes from founder Kval who’d aimed for ‘Hesperia‘ to resonate with European heritage and history speaking to both Pagan and Christian symbolism and heroism alike as the band’s range broadens beyond their debut LP. Parts of this album hit like an old Hate Forest or Belenos record alongside their own ‘epic’ focus where various vocal styles and lead guitar melodies create peaking moments. You can feel the inspiration for this album when sitting with it despite its uneven pace and broad themes, something a bit less introverted than one’d expect from this arena of European black metal.

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GREVE turn deeper toward guitar driven feature on this latest album as complex and even opposing guitar tracts generate dissociative yet dark forest-bound atmosphere delivered with sublime tact. Void of anything remotely “symphonic” beyond a few floor toms struck ‘Bleknat bortom evig tid‘ is a particularly sharp showcase of their own compositional intensity within a six or even eight minute song. The carve of these songs and their guitar work might be my focus but we don’t always get a full fledged “song” from in in any tuneful sense but more a vexing set of movements into the unknown. Most of these songs blend together into one extended thread which provides exquisitely unsettling immersion.

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Olde Outlier probably aren’t the sort of band one could coherently describe in one succinct sentence, their work is by design some manner of blackened death metal yet it conjures an extreme form of heavy metal at a mid-pace, a sort of ‘epic’ or at least dramatic hand applied. It wasn’t that I’d found myself describing a different band within each longer-form piece applied during review but rather than ‘From Shallow Lives to Shallow Graves‘ twists upon itself, bends its extreme metal timbre into both tripped-out rants and soldiering tanklike movements often in unpredictive conclusion. All of this comes without rapt urgency and instead unfurls into engrossing result. It won’t be the one to truly brutalize the ear with any sort of catchy worm nor any sort of hammer but should catch the ear of patient, thoughtful skulls who still have a psychic connection to heavy metal’s traditions.

“Enriched by telepathic discourse with those doomed and beached by the delirium of the Ancient Ones’ resonance New South Wales, Australia-based quartet OLDE OUTLIER venture through ancient blackened death and arcane heavy metal stride in realizing this idiosyncratic debut full-length album. Mutated by the desert winds of the Far Realm and loosed into dust-born singularity ‘From Shallow Lives to Shallow Graves‘ offers a strong alternative to the usual mashing of ‘old school’ extreme metal traits into heavy metal formae in pairing nigh psychedelic worming movements with adventurous blackened death metal jog. Steadily morphing rhythmic presence and an at times free-handed stroke applied finds their songwriting crafted on its own terms in wizened simplicity where they’ve traded away brutality for a more deliberately stated experience beset by a broad allowance of tone and temperament to their work.“

>> FULL REVIEW <<

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Santiago, Chile-based quintet NECKBREAKER represent true underground thrash brilliantly in the sense that their sound isn’t overbaked, their theme reflect a world gone mad from an internalized perspective and their blueprints are heavily inspired by the original Bay Area impact given to the best of the European’s aggressive response soon after. Around since 2011 despite having to hit the resent button at least once on their gig these folks seem to understand the core purity of the thrash metal experience without making a slog of it, keeping it all about the riff while still having something profound to say. With song titles like “Crush Zionism” there is obviously no shying away from current world events here but they’re speaking to more than just politics over the course of this solid forty minute thrash record. If this album had hit me one week earlier it’d have gotten a full review but I’m no less stoked on it. Check this out if you enjoy Trastorned, Inculter‘s latest, and the first Critical Defiance album.

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After seven full-length albums and countless other releases since forming in the mid-90’s this Italian doom metal fixture haven’t faltered from their cause and their own personality, a possessed priest sort of character given to cathedralesque keyboards/synth, slow strummed riffs and sermon-like delivery. ‘Taetra Philosophia‘ both compliments their inspired 2021 release and calls back to the core of Abysmal Grief as a dark outlier and an engrossing experience in general. They’re not the weirdest or wildest prospect within Italian doom metal’s storied history but that doesn’t stop their work from ringing with its own distinct resonance, this being one of their finest releases to date.

“With the choir’s red-eyed blur asway on the right and the organist aflame on the left the unnamed figure dead centre the pulpit completes their unholy trinity with his guttural vibrato, an ominous sermon dedicated to hair-raising seventh revision of the vile tome’s curse as Genoa, Italy-based doom metal trio ABYSMAL GRIEF preach the hungered call of the soil below. On the very cusp of completing their third decade of alignment these fellowes reinforce an enduring campaign of dark-black doomed delirium with a seventh full-length album no less devout in its disgust. The horror of an ancient tradition returned ‘Taetra Philosophia‘ serves to demystify all offensive prophecies fed to ailing minds via their necrotized eldritch oratorial take on Italian doom esoterica.“

>> FULL REVIEW <<

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For lack of a more appropriate term I’d consider Darvaza‘s work rooted in ‘old school’ black metal but not dominated by it in the sense that the devout tend to too literally borrow in their perception of the artform’s modus rather than purpose. Without abstracting the core form and furor of the sub-genre they’ve created a personalized sense of movement and expressivity which provides an ancient and demented call to the learned. Beyond this point their themes appear to speak to sovereignty granted by spirituality, however serious this is it is delivered with conviction above and beyond ensuring that every time I’d delve into their work it’d inspired.

“Attaining knowledge of the forbidden arts beyond their spectacular shedding of the corporeal’d already lent Italian/Norwegian black metal band DARVAZA their own enlightened bale, or, access to the finality of total spiritual ruin unto infamy yet here on their sophomore full-length album the duo gaze beyond ego-death, aiming to soak deeper within the resonance of the adversary. ‘We Are Him‘ is the embodiment suggested, a deepest yet stare into the liberation of the mirror-void propelled by their amplification of classicist nauseation. The veering finesse of their dagger-hand finds itself sawing through moderne austere black metal dramatism more often here, speaking less to chaotic singularity and more to despotic actualization as their songcraft serves first to rally and then ride into conquer.“

>> FULL REVIEW <<

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If we’re just reading the writing on the wall Unfyros‘ second LP speaks to transcendental actualization, a sojourn from the temple toward the ichor of the cosmos, and this sets the tone well enough yet these folks aren’t exclusively face value in terms of presentation and overall thematic depth. ‘Star Blood‘ is an album worth delving into completely via its lyrics, imagery and of course the enigmatic mid-paced black metal within. This time around things are a bit less ritualistic in composition but no less of a hex upon the ear. They’ve traded the pyre warmed meditations of the first record for chilling star-lit atmosphere and it is a more than worthy shard to explore, stepping away from repetition and leaning into meandering and ominous motion. Easily one of the best, most repeatable black metal albums of 2025 for my own taste.

“Possessed by a voice spoken through the fire-borne flickering of the quintessence and set upon the deathly cold of the nightside Oulu, Finland-based black metal trio UNFYROS open a second channel above and beyond within the course of this inspired sophomore full-length album. Awash in purposed exploration of the unseen and wrapped within the process of transcendence from the corporeal ‘Star Blood‘ offers its own ozone-hewn brilliancy, a unique act of ancient-handed spiritual gloom via mid-paced atmospheric black metal. A feat of unreal doomed resonance beyond their already brilliant earlier work this album explores their knack for the wandering riff in cyclic reprise, an impressive weave developed within droning ritual-bound focus and presented via arcane yet crystalline sound.“

>> FULL REVIEW <<

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Though there is something ungainly, strangely institutionally academic about calling for truly challenging music before adding the caveat that it must be coherent, repeatable and such I do think that a band like Lychgate present their work on the edge of perception and recall on ‘Precipice‘, a wildly skilled feat which is demanding as it is intoxicating. It is bizarre that their nightmarish realm never insists as a tax upon the time spent within despite world class performance, needle-fine arrange, and a whole crew of minds ensuring its surreal narrative is nuanced to the nth degree. I don’t know that they’ve created a comfortable seat for the mind here but rather an agitation which thus far yields enriching froth on my part. There are few black metal adjacent records released this year (perhaps Qrixkuor) which offer an adventure on this scale or with this level of skill applied to every last detail.

“The hive mind’s insatiable tunneling toward efficiencies cannot possibly outpace the rot produced by the greater machine, no matter how ouroboric the form taken by civilization becomes an entity of uniform obedience will always suffocate beneath the outcome. Given a view from the deeply bent spine of surreal envision London, England-based avant-garde black/progressive metal quintet LYCHGATE arrive beyond the crest of many years with a vision of tormented liberation on this accomplished fourth full-length album. Despite its time emboldened density of razor-precision’d statement ‘Precipice‘ speaks clearly, deliberately through its arc as a ~48 minute ordeal marked by Eldritch tension and beauteous grey-glowing contemplation. Though you’ll no doubt immediately recognize their work by its ‘ready well established traits the long wait between releases appears to have granted this record a thrillingly repeatable density, a compelling realm of its own to explore beyond past accomplishments.“

>> FULL REVIEW <<

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Extreme metal was generally created for the sake of taking a knife to the audience, pushing the envelope on violence and performance while sorting out the extreme fringes of the cause with various shades of cold grey reality and high fantasy escapism. These long-standing death metal minds haven’t just picked up the knife for the sake of nostalgia or some manner of physical exercise upon the weakening hordes abundant but for the sake of keeping the edge of death metal sharp with outrageous acts. Their actual mission statement is their own, of course, but from my perspective Omegavortex are presented as a psychic and physical threat to the listener, disdain conjured through brain-damaging athletic accost. Even if I’d probably reach for their first album’s riffs more often ‘Diabolic Messiah of the New World Order‘ proves that these folks had room to move, habits to destroy and rebuild, some extra button to push and speed to ramp within their craft to generate something even more destructive. Brilliant stuff from one of the best doing it today.

“All prophesies point to a future defined by a less humane existence void of moral justice or historicity as subsequent generations calloused by unceasing warfare and indoctrinated by corporatist technology are rendered remorseless, corrupt and culture-void. In their infinite wisdom Germany-based black/death metal band OMEGAVORTEX express as the sawblade across borders, the revelator of the nightmare to come, as they tip the scales toward scenes of doom and downfall on this potent sophomore full-length album. Frenzied to the point of kinetic chaos yet controlled in its directive ‘Diabolic Messiah of the New World Order‘ seeks to burn away the delusions of those held captive by gods and government before grinding against their wounds. Though it is an experience of mayhemic blackened death veering into war-torn terror these folks’ve not left behind their ancient death-thrashing spiritus so much as accelerated it into horrified greyscale firestorm.“

>> FULL REVIEW <<

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