O septic savior, O drain most profane, may thy maw remain uncloggéd. This week we’ve got volcano-core, Bubonic backers, and doouublee vooweel thraash. Don thy galoshes, fam—we’re wading for you.

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Farsot – Life Promised Death (Lupus Lounge) [Post-Black]

Life Promised Death envelops listeners in a thick fog, obscuring the boundaries of genre. Farsot’s DSBM roots remain deeply embedded in the soil, absorbing tears of the bereft, but total despondency never arrives. For every dispassionate, shoegazing vocal (I’m reminded of Agalloch), there’s a black ‘n roll groove to convey a sense of movement through the mist; to avoid stagnation and give purpose to our wanderings. Wisps of dissoblack, neofolk, grunge, and sludge arise and dissipate in the grey, evoking a range of emotions without resorting to the clumsy tonal shifts that tend to plague progressive music. I’m not sure what to expect from the rest of the album, but I’m ready to lose sight of the trail and travel to whatever strange locales await. -Roldy

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Abandon All – Strong (Inverse Records) [Heavy Metal]

Aelvica – Aelvica IV: The Curse (Independent) [Blackened Death]

Blood Red Delusion – Ruthless Behaviour (Independent) [Deathrash]

Cercenatory – Goresphere (Comatose Music) [Brutal Death]

Cloud of Souls – A Constant State of Flux (Independent) [Doom / Heavy Metal]

Contortion – The Common Thread (Independent) [Groove / Thrash]

Dispersion – Monochrome (Independent) [Post-Black]

Durbin – Screaming Steel (Frontiers Records) [Heavy Metal]

Eternal Storm – A Giant Bound to Fall (Transcending Obscurity Records) [Melodeath]

Far Beyond – The End of My Road (Independent) [Symphonic Melodeath]

Fupa Goddess – Ripped in Half (Independent) [Goregrind / Noise]

Garden of Stone – Tides of Decay (Independent) [Melodeath / Heavy Metal]

GregFilth/Without the Sky – Unending Sorrow/Digging My Own Grave (Rotting Sun Records) [Raw/Lo-Fi Black / Sludge]

Grin – Hush (Independent) [Sludge/Stoner Metal]

Groove Therapist – Monologue (Independent) [Prog Metal]

Ihsahn – Ihsahn (Candlelight Records) [Prog Metal / Experimental]

In Autumn – What’s Done Is Done (My Kingdom Music) [Doom / Melodeath]

Kalah – And Yet It Dreams (Nova Era Records) [Electronic / Prog Metalcore]

Monovoth – Pleroma Mortem Est (Trepanation Recordings) [Funeral Doom]

Dungeon Keeper/Morbid Rituals – Split (Fucking Kill Records) [Crust Punk / Doom]

Morphine – Dysphoria II (Pit of Plagues) [Raw/Lo-Fi Black / DSBM]

Nefariant – NOCT (Independent) [Prog Metal]

Northwind Saga – The Mythical Ring (Independent) [Symphonic Power]

Paradoxx – 逆説のSingularity (Flying Cat Records) [Heavy Metal]

Pestilength – Solar Clorex (Debemur Morti Productions) [Black/Doom Metal]

Phlegmesis – The New Wave of Rotten Fornication (Independent) [Death Metal]

Praise the Plague – Suffocating in the Current of Time (Lifeforce Records) [Blackened Death/Doom]

Refore – Illusion of Existence (Smile Music) [Deathrash]

Shaark – Hybrid War (Smile Music) [Thrash]

Shades of Deep Water – Cold Heart (Independent) [Funeral Doom]

Silenzio Profondo – Terra madre (Andromeda Relix) [Heavy Metal]

Sujin – Save Our Souls (Scarlet Records) [Melodeath / Metalcore]

Sun of Nothing – Maze (Venerate Industries) [Post-Black]

The Obsessed – Gilded Sorrow (Ripple Music) [Doom / Heavy Metal]

Thy Shining Curse – Theurgia (ViciSolum Productions) [Symphonic Melodeath]

Ukć – Coming Out – Love & Hate Diaries (Theogonia Records) [Prog Black]

Vanir – Epitome (Mighty Music) [Symphonic Melodeath]

Vile Light – The Black Dawn (Independent) [Blackened Death / Grindcore]

Volucrine – Etna (Inverse Records) [Prog Death / Groove / Metalcore]

Witchorious – Witchorious (Independent) [Doom]

Zelion – TUV (Independent) [Heavy Metal]