Reviews by Rod Whitfield
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Be'lakor
Vessels
By Rod Whitfield | 23 June, 2016
This is one band that has truly improved with every release they’ve put out there, and with Vessels, these Melbourne boys have put themselves fairly and squarely on the world class map.
Vessels is an apt name for thi...
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Lacuna Coil
Delirium
By Rod Whitfield | 30 May, 2016
These Italian masters released their absolute classic album Comalies way back in ’02. That album, similar to Nightwish’s Once, is a true seminal moment in the development of the female fronted gothic metal phenomenon....
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Drown this City
False Idols
By Rod Whitfield | 24 May, 2016
In a heavily crowded post hardcore/melodic metalcore scene veritably bursting at the seams with cookie-cutter bands, this Melbourne-based five piece is poised to take a big step forward and howl ‘look at me!’ at the top of its lungs. A...
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Infernal Outcry
Mass Extinction Requiem I
By Rod Whitfield | 17 May, 2016
These Tassie devils have obviously taken pretty solid cues from their fellow Taswegians Psycroptic. Such comparisons are inevitable when you play tech death and you hail from the Apple Isle (and this EP was even produced by Psycroptic guitarist Jo...
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Levitation Hex, The
Cohesion
By Rod Whitfield | 13 May, 2016
Just like his former band Alchemist, Adam Agius’s latest project The Levitation Hex is a real enigma wrapped up in a mystery inside a riddle. Firstly, with Agius’s unique voice, guitar playing, and, above all, song-writing style, compa...
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Eths
Ankaa
By Rod Whitfield | 03 May, 2016
I must admit I hadn’t heard of this band up until receiving this album for review, despite them having been around for more than a decade and a half. But when I found out that they are: a) French, and b) an ‘experimental modern metal b...
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Rapheumets Well
The Exile
By Rod Whitfield | 06 April, 2016
I’m a massive fan of bands that combine bombastic orchestral flourishes with heavy music, whether it be the female fronted gothic wonder of Nightwish or Epica, the blackened extremities of Dimmu Borgir or Cradle of Filth, or the sheer brutal...
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Fall
The Insatiable Weakness
By Rod Whitfield | 10 February, 2016
I hadn’t heard of this Texan outfit before this album came up on the album review list, but I thought I’d give them a crack anyway. They managed to attain the services of none other than Dirk Verbeuren on the drum stool for this record...
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Fleshgod Apocalypse
King
By Rod Whitfield | 03 February, 2016
This is the album I’ve been waiting for from these Italian maestros. As a massive sucker for bands that combine heavy guitars and pounding drums with bombastic orchestral stylings, I love bands like Nightwish, Epica, Death Cult Armageddo...
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Novelists
Souvenirs
By Rod Whitfield | 30 October, 2015
Novelists are yet another French heavy band adding further illustrious aura to that country’s bountiful scene. I’m not sure what they’re putting in the water over there, but it must be full of ‘heavy metals’, ‘c...
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Gods of Eden
From the End of Heaven
By Rod Whitfield | 23 October, 2015
This Sydney based tech/progressive metal five-piece have massive ambitions for their sound, and this is fantastic. It’s great when bands choose not to operate within the restricting confines of regular, garden variety metal formats. Thinking...
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Caligula's Horse
Bloom
By Rod Whitfield | 16 October, 2015
The term ‘next big thing’ gets bandied around a lot by journos, publicists, and assorted others, and almost as often it turns out to be simply hype. This is one of those rare occasions when it is absolutely justified.
Caligula&r...
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Scale the Summit
V
By Rod Whitfield | 14 October, 2015
All instrumental acts must employ a range of different techniques and explore a wide variety of styles in order to keep their music interesting, without the catchiness and emotion of vocals to provide the colour. And that’s exactly what this...
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Breaking Orbit
Transcension
By Rod Whitfield | 15 September, 2015
This may be the type of review that nauseates some people, but I’m afraid I have to wax lyrical about the second album from Sydney based progressive rock four piece Breaking Orbit. I actually rate their debut of 2012, The Time Traveller<...
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Between the Buried and Me
Coma Ecliptic
By Rod Whitfield | 13 July, 2015
This is this band’s seventh studio album, and boy are they maturing and expanding beyond the avant-garde and tech metal beast that they were to the purveyors of grandiose, expansive pieces of work that we hear here. I’m almost loathe t...
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Arcane
Known/Learned
By Rod Whitfield | 10 April, 2015
Yet more Aussie progressive brilliance
Yet another stunning release from abundant to overflowing Australian progressive rock scene. Arcane are a Brisbane based ‘side-project’ of Jim Grey, frontman for the incredible Cal...
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Soundgarden
King Animal
By Rod Whitfield | 02 February, 2013
Better than expected
Many, many bands who split up only to reform a number of years later (15 years, in Soundgarden’s case), often bring out a sub-par album that sounds like a bunch of old men (or indeed women) trying to make mon...
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Destroy She Said
Down to Dirty
By Rod Whitfield | 28 November, 2012
Well named
These guys are like an even nastier, gnarlier version of 70s era AC/DC. For starters, their singer Simon McCullough sounds remarkably like Bon Scott, and the Acca Dacca influence can clearly be heard in the ballsy, blues bas...
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In Heart's Wake
Divination
By Rod Whitfield | 30 October, 2012
More high quality Aussie heavy music for the masses
There is somewhat of a renaissance going on in Aussie post-hardcore/metalcore/whatever you want to call it-core right now, led by the indomitable Parkway Drive and given very able bod...
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King Parrot
Bite Your Head Off
By Rod Whitfield | 30 October, 2012
A bludgeoning masterpiece
Several words come to mind when listening to a release like this. Words like gnarly, raw, brutal, frenzied and more. This is music that you can imagine serial killers doing their grisly work to.
Having s...
