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Advent

Naked and Cold
Solid State (2009)

Beloved was a band that I never really got into. I gave them a chance, but to me, they were just another band in the faux-hardcore/screamo scene. They were mediocre for what they were doing and living in the shadows of other bands playing similar styles of music in a much more dynamic way. They were like a less volatile … Read more

Dead City

Goddamn the 21st Century
Thrashed! (2009)

To create a preface for the reader I'm going to backtrack a bit. I grew up during an amazing time for metalcore - before Victory Records became giant media whores. So noted I have a very obvious soft spot that style of hardcore. This may be helpful information for you since Dead City compares their sound to that of Crowbar, … Read more

Bloodhorse

Horizoner
Translation Loss (2009)

This review has been a long time coming. Translation Loss Records seems to have a knack of finding the best of the recent crop of stoner or post-metal style bands and giving them a home. This band fits nicely into the first category. Made up of members of Boston area hardcore luminaries of sorts, they have been steamrolling their way … Read more

Seneca

Reflections
Lifeforce (2009)

Although they aren't breaking any new ground, especially in the already worn-down genre of metalcore, North Carolina's Seneca are talented at what they do. Though everything they've written on their sophomore album Reflections has been done before, they execute it with such precision and emotion that it gives it a new feel. This isn't to say that their songs were … Read more

Three Mile Pilot

Planets / Grey Clouds
Temporary Residence (2009)

Thank (insert the deity or spirit or devil that you pay allegiance to here)! Three Mile Pilot is finally giving listeners new music to enjoy, which after years since their last record of new material, 1998's Three Mile Pilot EP (The two-CD compilation of rarities, Songs From an Old Town we Once Knew was released the following year). Comprised of … Read more

Korova

Another Happy Customer
Victimized (2009)

Korova are a DIY hardcore band from Alabama. They wear their influences on their sleeve, with latter-day Black Flag being the predominant one throughout Another Happy Customer, though other 80s bands pop through their discordant surface. The minimal, noisy tracks separate the band from a number of their crustcore peers, but they definitely developed their songwriting from 80s thrash and … Read more

This Time Next Year

Road Maps and Heart Attacks
Equal Vision (2009)

The term "pop-punk" has been tarnished and dragged through the mud quite a bit thanks to the surge of boy bands disguising themselves as pop-punk bands: All Time Low, Forever the Sickest Kids, Mayday Parade, etc. These bands parade around giving a bad name to any band that draws any influence from the New Found Glory/Saves the Day school of … Read more

Izah

Finite Horizon / Crevice
Independent (2009)

Europe, as the old continent, contains a great deal of culture and a long history to help shape musicians and the work. Many in the United States move on obliviously with our lives while barely noticing some of the more well known bands from there. Izah is a group from the old continent that surely is under the radar of … Read more

Skeletonwitch

Breathing the Fire
Prosthetic (2009)

Skeletonwitch's name is known fairly well among the metal community. The band won a lot of new fans over with their sophomore record and Prosthetic Records debut, Beyond the Permafrost. Their combination of thrash and black metal was fairly different compared to what most neo-thrash bands were doing at the time. Now that a couple years have passed, there have … Read more

Black Cloud

Demo
Independent (2009)

Sometimes, there are chances that demos can surprise you while at other times they make you wish that you never put it on your stereo in the first place. Black Cloud's nondescript demo (in the most classic of terms), with its hand made heavy cardstock cover and barely visible cover image and homemade feel, falls squarely in the former category. … Read more

Keelhaul

Keelhaul's Triumphant Return to Obscurity
Hydra Head (2009)

It's been five years since Cleveland-based Keelhaul last graced us with Subject to Change Without Notice. In that time a lot has transpired, and not just in the world of music. And yet it is refreshing to know that even though everything surrounding us appears to be in a state of flux, that there are some things that remain constant. … Read more

Food

Food
Molsook (2009)

Do you know the old bit of folk wisdom that goes something like "Never judge a book by its cover"? Well, substitute record for book, and the old axiom becomes apt the same way. Food's self-titled record is an example of this axiom working in this situation. At first, I completely mistake the cover image for something else because at … Read more

Celan

Halo
Exile on Mainstream (2009)

Celan is an intriguing collection of musicians that is comprised of members of Unsane, Oxbow, Einsturzende Neubauten, and others. Just reading the list of collaborators and knowing their other work definitely forces individuals to take notice as well as wonder at the possibilities of just what this particular effort might be capable of creating. Halo is the debut album from … Read more

Down-Stares

Cobras & Matadors
T.Rex Ate My Face (2008)

A couple of years ago, through my involvement with this website, I crossed paths with Down-Stares' independently released album The Watershed. This was an album that pushed me to my limits as a music critic because, as someone who prefers neatly defined genre categories and, even more so, inaccessibility in my music, Down-Stares is a challenge because of its blatant … Read more

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