Death Metal group Burned in Effigy has released the first single, "Nightfall", from their forthcoming debut album, Rex Mortem, which is set to be released on January 28th, 2022.

This is the work of Mark "Smedy" Smedbron (Vocals), Vito Bellino (Guitar), Brad Dose (Guitar), Matt Watkins (Bass), and Eddie Dec (Drums).

Anatomy Of Habit has released the opening track and lead single, “A Marginal World”, from their forthcoming third album, Even If It Takes A Lifetime, which is due out on December 10th.

This is the Doom Metal of Alex Latus (guitar), Isidro Reyes (metal percussion), Skyler Rowe (drums), Mark Solotroff (vocals), and Sam Wagster (bass + lap steel).

You can catch Anatomy Of Habit on December 8th at Empty Bottle with Child Bite and Human Impact.

Metal band Repentance has released the second single, "No innocence", from their forthcoming EP, "Volume I – Reborn", which is due out on November 26th.

This is the work of Adam Gilley (Vocals), Shaun Glass (Guitar), Eric Burns (Guitar), Eric Karol (Bass), and Brandon White (Drums)

You can catch Repentance on December 11th at Beat Kitchen as part of Forever Deaf Fest III.

D-Beat thrashers Nequient are back with a new EP called "Collective Punishment". This four song collection features two previously unreleased songs, "Collective Punishment" and "Strange Death of Kings", and two pounding live recordings.

You can catch Nequient at Reggie's on December 4th as part of the Peace Simulation Midwest Pop Up.

Immaculate production howls underneath tightly-woven riffs. Fuzz-laden guitars keep time with plodding and full-bodied drums, creating tracks that are dark and heavy, yet still cozy in that uniquely doom and sludge metal way. The music’s density consumes you (not unlike the figure on the album cover). Like a black hole, it swallows you. 

Opener “Metal Slug” winds a path between groovy, mid paced riffs and slowed-down passages. Even at their slowest, the band’s sonic textures are mesmerizing. Death growls reverberate over  thunderous drums in “Devil’s Due,” before the guitar and bass return to rip the track into a gaping sonic chasm. The song eventually breaks down, leaving behind only a haunting, wailing, sparse guitar solo floating over the rubble, before resolving in a few measures of brooding, chugging sludginess.

The titular track begins with an intimate, semi-atmospheric interlude reminiscent of maudlin of the Well or Kayo Dot. Black metal-style vocals are shrieked over the most vast and cinematic song on the album as FOREBODE shifts into their lowest gear, pounding the listener with measured, low tempo riffage and calling back intermittently to the song’s intro. The guitar solo on this track soars, piercing through a low, sludgy foliage of sound lurking underneath. The song feels like a small odyssey, the listener swallowed by the tides of a thrashing and unforgiving sea towards the titular abyss. 

The fourth and final track provides a redemption of sorts (or at least a respite) rom that pit. The music rides high, faster-paced than the sprawling cut preceding it, with tinges of more traditional metal. This is until the halfway point, where the tempo picks up considerably, and a shift to tremolo picking gives the listener surprising flickers of black metal. With The Pit of Suffering, FOREBODE transport the listener to another, darker place in four cathartic tracks, free of the more tedious indulgences to which sludge metal is prone. It is a stick-to-your-ribs kind of release that should be a treat for any doom or sludge listener.

- Tín Rodriguez