Become a Believer in Autotheism

For fans of Between the Buried and Me, Opeth and Necrophagist

If you’re a fan of The Faceless, you’re probably wondering why I’ve listed Opeth and Between the Buried and Me as similar artists.  “The Faceless is technical death metal, not progressive,” you’re probably saying, while starting arguments in the comments section of a Youtube video.  True, their previous releases were tech metal through and through.  However, Autotheism, which was released on August 14th, is about as progressive as it gets.  Yes, it’s a strange transition.  But it still freaking rocks.

Incurso Will Devour Your Soul

For fans of Necrophagist, Obscura, The Faceless and Origin

I’m going to start off by saying  HOLY SHIT, LOOK AT THE ALBUM ARTWORK!!!  It’s like H.P. Lovecraft combined his worst nightmares with the darkest and most horrifying secrets of the universe, which subsequently birthed a creature so vile that its very existence is a fundamental contradiction of logic.  Seriously, don’t stare at it too long, you’ll lose your mind.

Periphery II: Back With a Vengeance

Here we are with Periphery II, the second album from melodic djent-metalers (I know they probably hate that term by now) Periphery. I’ve been following Periphery for a while now, through all the different singer changes, and I have to admit that somehow this release had fallen off my radar a bit.

Maybe the lack of enthusiasm stemmed from the last album basically being a bunch of Bulb (guitarist Misha Mansoor’s alter ego) songs being redone. To be honest, I can’t even to begin to count how many times I’ve been let down by new releases by some of my favorite bands. Call it the sophomore slump, or whatever else, but it almost seems pointless to build anticipation for an upcoming album these days.

Wretched Returns with Son of Perdition

For fans of Between the Buried and Me, The Black Dahlia Murder, and Opeth

I never expected Wretched’s 2010 sophmore release, Beyond the Gate, to be as good as it was. It was leaps and bounds ahead of its predecessor, The Exodus of Autonomy, and featured some of the most impressively original songwriting I had heard from an American death-metal band in a very long time. Well, the Northern Carolina metalheads have returned with their follow-up, Son of Perdition, last month, and though it may not be as huge a leap forward as Beyond the Gate was, it’s another strong offering from one of the most underrated emerging bands in death metal.

The Conceal Pull No Stunts

I’m not going to lie, I’m fighting off a massive hangover today. The only music existing in my media library that can supplement how shitty I feel is the debut release from San Jose natives The Conceal, entitled Endless River | Stunted Prayer, which just hit the internet like a cheap whiskey-infused dirty bomb last Monday. Since then, my ears have been giving it a lot of attention and I am enthusiastically impressed by this new act coming from the South Bay (aka that place where a bunch of bands try to sound like Dredg, Circa Survive, and anything Post-Rock).

The Conceal is a reboot of Flood Peak, headed by Mike McClatchey (ex-Clearing Autumn Skies, Apiary, Early Graves) that features a few down-tuned, slower rehashes of songs from Flood Peak’s EP Filling Flasks along with mostly new material. This being said, anyone expecting The Conceal to be anything like its former incarnation will be in for a big surprise. Endless River | Stunted Prayer is a 45 minute masterpiece of doom, sludge, feedback, and industrial influenced shit-rock that brings a refreshing sense of creativity to heavy music. There is no mimicry or trend-following here, only trendsetting.

The Koloss is in the Building

Anybody else see this and think of a really fucked up Magic Eye? No? Alright.

It’s hard to put into words how I feel about the new Meshuggah album, Koloss, but if I had to choose just one word to describe it, without a doubt, it’d be the word massive. From start to finish, Koloss is simply crushing, and there’s just something about the tones and grooves used on this record that will simply floor you. Koloss begs the question that many of Meshuggah’s albums have: how the HELL is Meshuggah going to top this?

The Collective Boners of the World Are Rizing for Rize of the Fenix

The D is back.

The Tenacious fucking D is back.

Casket of Cassandra Debut New Single, “Breathless”

Longtime readers of Wrecked or Bay Area locals should be familiar with Casket of Cassandra. In case you need a reminder, Casket of Cassandra, the female-fronted metalcore outfit from Concord, was featured on our site when they played the Bay Area Metal Fest last summer, put on by our good buddies in Nemesis Records. Well, we take our eyes off these guys for a minute, and Nemesis ends up signing Casket of Cassandra behind our backs. Where’s our record deal, Nemesis? Whatever, any music we’d put together would just be too progressive and too ahead of its time. It’s cool.

Anyway, Nemesis has agreed to let us stream Casket of Cassandra’s new single exclusively on Wrecked for a short period of time. Check it out after the jump.

Eclipse Leaves Listeners in the Dark

My first thought upon hearing the first few minutes of Veil of Maya’s new record: “ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME?!?!?!?!” I couldn’t tell if this was some kind of joke. It sounds exactly like the last record. And the last record sounded exactly like the one before that. I’m really at a loss as to how the band could put this record out and not think it sounds too much like their previous albums.

[Heart]Breaking News: Fallujah Cancels Tour with Hate Eternal

They all need a hug. And a beer.

This is a truly unfortunate story.  What’s even more unfortunate is that it happens all the time during these unforgiving winter months.

The Fallout: Dolving Leaves The Haunted [Again]

Dolving truly was a mad man, it's going to be a tough pair of shoes to fill.

Fans of The Haunted on Facebook woke up to some very distressing news this morning. Peter Dolving, long time vocalist for swedish thrash-metallers The Haunted, has left the band permanently… again.

February Underground Update

It’s February! You know what that means: Valentine’s Day, Presidents Day, Black History Month, and most important of all…another edition of the Underground Update!

Vicious Circles

Veil of Maya have just premiered the song “Vicious Circles,” the single from their upcoming album Eclipse.

Happy Saturday, Go Niners! Here’s a Video Montage of Gatling Guns!

AMERICA!!!!!

Happy Saturday from Wrecked! Go Niners! Have fun watching a video montage of Gatling Guns with some Metallica in the background.

[UPDATED] Original Killswitch Engage Vocalist Returns

Coolest shirt ever. Both Howard and his shirts will be missed.

There have been some rumblings on the internet these last few days about Killswitch Engage regarding Howard Jones’ future in the band. As many of you know, Jones had to temporarily leave the band RIGHT before they embarked on a North American tour, and the band called up fellow Massachusetts-native Phil Labonte (All That Remains) to fill in for the tour. Well, the news just broke that Howard Jones is officially leaving the band. Here’s his official statement, via the band’s official Facebook page:

January Underground Update

With the new year, I present to you the inaugural edition of the Underground Update! Hear what’s coming out from the world of metal and hardcore in the Bay Area (and beyond).

Get Some ‘R&R’

Mureau play a style of music that’s familiar yet uncommon. They mix what I’ll call “djenty chug-core” along with hard rock choruses. Separately, these genres are extremely common. However, I’m hard pressed to think of many bands that sound like this. The first one that comes to mind is Bad News era Ligeia. For whatever reason, this is a style that hasn’t gained a lot of popularity, but Mureau are quite successful at executing it.

Crawl Into The Harvest Wombs

I don't know what's happening here, but I'm sure it's awesome.

As I’ve mentioned before, Metal is a hit-or-miss genre. It’s rare to find a band that plays incredible music while still being able to experiment with their sound. There are a few names that come to mind when I say that: Opeth, Meshuggah, The Black Dahlia Murder, Obscura, among others. However, when a band comes virtually out of nowhere and puts out a stellar album with all the right skill, sound and experimentation, it’s truly a thing of beauty. The reason I say this is because a band has just recently done exactly that. A band from right here in the San Francisco Bay Area. They’re called Fallujah, and they’ve set a new standard for Technical and Atmospheric Death Metal with their first full length album, The Harvest Wombs.

The Legendary Secret

Have you seen this man?

DEAD ON ARRIVAL: What happened to you Metallica? You used to be cool.

This Dead on Arrival is a little different, normally done about an album, game or movie. This time, about four concerts that haven’t even happened yet. Say whaaaat?!

Metallica’s 30th anniversary is this year, and to celebrate they will be playing four shows December 5th, 7th, 9th and 10th at the Fillmore for $6 a show or $19.81(get it?) for all four. Really? One of the biggest metal bands of all time, playing shows at a historic intimate venue and I don’t have to max out my credit card? Sounds pretty fucking awesome! Wait…What’s the catch?