Reading · To The Teeth | New Heavy Music

Welcome to the To The Teeth newsletter! Your weekly AI-free update of new heavy music. You can listen to the playlist on Spotify. If you like what you read, go to Patreon (receive a patch!) or Bandcamp (buy a patch!), or consider becoming a paid subscriber. Peppers are hot 🌶️!

Pff, that was a lot of work but it was fun: the list of my favourite 100 black metal releases is out in full. The Substack algorithm didn’t hesitate to let me know that everyone and their mother are making lists on the platform, so I don’t think I’ll be adding much to it soon (can’t promise though). I’ve been listening to so much great black metal the past week, that I’ve been actively pushing into other genres to keep my palate busy. Anyway, I hope you enjoyed it too. This week, and that’s a coincidence, not a lot of new black metal. Good stoner, good death, good prog, and yes, also good - if avantgarde - black metal. It’s a great release day!

Missed it? Read part 1 (100-67), part 2 (66-35) and part 3 (34-1) and let me know what you think in the comments.

Psych/prog stoner/doom, USA (Stickman Records)

FFO: Khemmis, Baroness, Weedpercker

It took Elder one well placed EP to grab the attention back. I wasn’t really paying attention to the last two, maybe three full lengths until 'Liminality/Dream State Return’ came out last year. It did exactly what an EP does well: it showed off that they have more angles to them than they had showed before, and it got me properly hyped for this new release. I’m off, space bound.

🌶️ Funebrarum

Death, USA (Pulverised Records)

FFO: Incantation, Krypts, Cruciamentum

I’m sorry to all the other death metal bands. This is that one really fucking good death metal album this year. And of course it’s another Phil Tougas release, a name you should be familiar with right now. Is it not for Atramentum, Zeicrydeus and Chthe’ilist before, than for the excellent albums with Exxûl and Worm this year.

🌶️ Devin Townsend

Prog, Canada (InsideOut Music)

FFO: The Devin Townsend Project, The Devin Townsend Band, Strapping Young Lad

Luckily, insane prog nerd Devin Townsend didn’t go too far overboard with this one. There are just a mere - and yes I’m combining the two versions, he releases them all doesn’t he - 48 new tracks of his utter madness, featuring (mild nationalism incoming) the North Netherlands Symphony Orchestra and Anneke van Giersbergen. If you hated Devin Townsend before, this’ll be goddamn kryptonite. The Moth is Devin Townsend plus. Devin². Maximum Devin.

🌶️ Monolord

Stoner/doom, Sweden (Relapse Records)

FFO: Windhand, Yob, Conan

More really good stoner/doom, in one week? That’s rare.

🌶️ Trelldom

Avantgarde black, Norway (Prophecy Productions)

FFO: Dødheimsgard, Taake, Gaahls Wyrd

Two years ago Trelldom suddenly came back into the world after 17 years of silence, but not to revive the fire spitting black metal of before. Rather, a DHG/VBE-ish weirdo style. This second comeback album goes on from there and has just as much saxophone as it has blastbeats. And hey, copper is metal, too!

🌶️ Deafkids

Experimental electronic punk, Brazil

FFO: Petbrick, Author & Punisher, Street Sects

I first heard about these guys when they played with Petbrick at Roadburn. I was absolutely floored by seeing Igorr Cavalera destroy a kit from a meter distance, but I knew to remember those crazy Brazilians too. This is their first proper album since then, and it rocks.

There’s more: Godthrymm (epic doom, UK), Night Vigil (🌶️ ~~atmoblack/ambient~~ psych/prog seventies, Greece, I guess? Ayloss - Spectral Lore - goes into psychedelic territory on his second album under this name this year, and it’s as if Gnosis was written by Pink Floyd), Fournier (🌶️ death, New Zealand - technically a re-release from march this year, but I missed it, you might have too and it’s good), Grave Pilgrim (melodic black, USA), Auzawandils (black, USA - a new Alex Pool project), Serpent Lord (pagan black, USA), a split from Sulfuric Cautery & Tolerance (goregrind, USA & grind, Finland), Erdve (blackened hardcore, Lithuania), Dauþuz (black, Germany), The Scalar Process (prog/tech death, France), Velnezers (black, Latvia), The Fifth Alliance (sludge/post, The Netherlands), Galvanist (experimental doom/death, USA), Pharmacist (thrash/melodeath/grind, Japan) and Sarcasm (blackened death, Sweden). The rest is in the playlist!

🌶️ A Perfect Circle (alternative, USA)

🌶️ Employed To Serve (metalcore, UK)

🌶️ Fen (atmoblack/post, UK)

🌶️ The Ocean (prog/post/sludge, Germany - now with new members, including Lane Shi Otayonii)

🌶️ Havok (thrash, USA)

🌶️ Hippotraktor (prog/post, Belgium)

🌶️ Moonspell (gothic, Portugal)

Not-so-heavy album of the week: RaiNao (pop/reggaeton, Puerto Rico)

Next week: A.A. Williams, Converge and Evergrey.

What is your favourite? What did I miss? Let me know!

🌶️ To The Teeth: Elder takes off into space, and Funebrarum gives us the yearly great death metal record