Reviewed: November, 2020 Released: 2020, Metal Blade Records Rating: 4.5/5 Reviewer: Erich This year, 2020, has been a miserable year. Musicians and bands are suffering as much or more than everyone else, as tours and concert halls remain shuttered in much of the world. When Fates Warning feels the call…
progressive metal
Pyramaze – Epitaph
Reviewed: November, 2020 Released: 2020, AFM Records Rating: 4/5 Reviewer: Erich Pyramaze recently signed with AFM Records and will release their new album, EPITAPH on November 13. Most reading this probably know about the band, but briefly this Danish outfit released their debut album in 2004, sporting a power metal…
Anthea – Illusion
Reviewed: October 2020 Released: 2020, Rockshots Records Rating: 3/5 Reviewer: Lee Carter If you have even a passing interest in rock or metal, it’s quite likely you will have heard some form of either that weaves in symphonic/orchestral elements. Done well, the grand aural spectacle that unfolds can pack the…
Vanishing Point, Chris Porcianko (vocals) interview
Interviewed by Cristóbal Torres Chris Porcianko is a very open and straightforward musician which is something good when it comes not only to create music but also give an interview. From the current curfew back in Melbourne, Australia, this vocalist answered the questions from Metal-Rules.com telling us about the latest…
Okyr – Premorbid Intelligence
Reviewed: September, 2020 Released: 2020, Self-Produced Rating: 3.5/5 Reviewer: Erich Okyr is a new progressive metal band from Brazil that has just released their debut album PREMORBID INTELLIGENCE. The band name is a word from the Kaingang indigenous people from Brazil, and it means “The Sound of History.” Thus, Okyr…
Manticora – To Live To Kill To Live
September 2020 August 28th, 2020 / ViciSolum Productions Rating: 4.5 / 5.0 Reviewer: John Haseltine The mighty Manticora are back with their second conceptual installment of Lars F. Larsen’s horror novel to which is the title of the band’s last effort, TO KILL TO LIVE TO KILL. I do believe…
The Progressive Souls Collective – Sonic Birth
Reviewed: September, 2020 Released: 2020, Metalville Rating: 3.5/5 Reviewer: Erich The Progressive Souls Collective’s release SONIC BIRTH is an interesting project and album. “Not a band, but a very exciting adventure dedicated to the love of heavy progressive music!” claims the not-a-band’s website biography. This release is the brainchild of…
Pain of Salvation – Panther
Reviewed: September 2020 Released: 2020, InsideOut Music Rating: 4.5/5 Reviewer: Kieron Hayes Pain of Salvation are rightly considered consummate heavyweights in the world of progressive music, and Panther aptly demonstrates just why. As always with any album that is inspired by more than a simple desire to keep making enjoyable…
Assignment – Reflections
Reviewed: August, 2020 Released: 2020, Massacre Records Rating: 3.5/5 Reviewer: Erich Germany’s Assignment is a band that I have always intended to explore, but never got around to doing. That has finally changed for the band’s fifth full-length album REFLECTIONS, which will be released August 21 on Massacre Records. The…
Wilderun – Veil of Imagination
Reviewed: July 2020 Released: 2019, Century Media Records Rating: 3.5/5 Reviewer: Demitri Levantis On the surface, Veil of Imagination from the Boston-based Wilderun looks like another progressive or experimental metal album, but once you dig deeper you find there’s plenty more to this band and album than meets the eye.…
Interview with Wilderun
Interview with Evan Berry (vocals, guitar, piano), Dan Muller (bass, synths, orchestrations), and Wayne Ingram (orchestrations) of Wilderun. Wilderun: www.facebook.com/OfficialWilderun www.instagram.com/wilderunband twitter.com/wilderunband With the release of their third studio album “Veil of Imagination” getting closer, we caught up with the symphonic/progressive collective Wilderun to see what the band has in…
Queensryche – The Verdict
Reviewed: February 2020 Released: 2019, Century Media Rating: 4.5/5 Reviewer: JP Believe or not this is the first Queensryche studio album I have reviewed. This seems strange to me because I have been a fan of Queensryche since 1984 and writing for Metal-Rules.com since 2001, which covers seven or eight…
Opeth – In Cauda Venenum
Reviewed: February 2020 Released: 2019 Nuclear Blast Records Rating: 5/5 Reviewer: Peter Atkinson Better rather late than never to tout the 13th studio album by Sweden’s ever-evolving Opeth. Issued in late September, In Cauda Venenum somehow got overlooked here, perhaps in a case of everyone just assuming someone else would…
Lacuna Coil – Black Anima
Reviewed: February 2020 Released: 2019, Century Media Records Rating: 4/5 Reviewer: Lee Carter To many readers, and the many bitter artists whose work has been ripped apart by a cold-hearted, dead-inside cynic, a music critic is a bitter, twisted husk of something once-human that feeds on the maniacal pleasure of…
Dimmu Borgir + Amorphis + Wolves in the Throne Room @ The Kentish Town Forum, London
Dimmu Borgir + Amorphis + Wolves in the Throne Room @ The Kentish Town Forum, London 22 January 2020 Review by Demitri Levantis Photography by Graham Hilling Please follow and like us: