Blindfolded and Led to the Woods: Methlehem (2023) 2023 promises to be an incredible year for New Zealand metal and rock, and one album everyone is looking forward to is the forthcoming Rejecting […]

Living State: Black White Man (2023) single A few years ago I was at Dead Witch when someone came up to and introduced themselves as Lex, and that he was bassist in a band called Living State and […]

The Wax Birds: Yellowhammer (2023) Although I work in Auckland on North Island (New Zealand’s largest city), I call home a small farm close to a township called Oxford on South Island, a […]

Armored Saint: March of the Saint (1984) Even though Armored Saint have now been in existence for more than 40 years, and I have of course been aware of the name (primarily due to John Bush, who […]

Armored Saint: Delirious Nomad (1985) 1985 saw the band follow up their debut with the same line-up, although Phil Sandoval left during the recording and only played on a few tracks. The logo […]

Armored Saint: Raising Fear (1987) 1987 saw the band back with their third album, by now solidly a quartet (although Sandoval would return later). The first three albums are normally seen […]

Insomnium: Shadows of the Dying Sun (2014) Finnish band Insomnium are often described as melodic death metal, yet they also bring in atmospheric elements of black metal and so many other elements […]

Suicide Silence: You Can't Stop Me (2014) Released in 2014, Suicide Silence’s fourth album ‘You Can’t Stop Me” was the first without original lead vocalist Mitch Lucker who was killed in a motob […]

Dimmu Borgir: Puritanical Euphoric Misanthropia (Remixed & Remastered) (2022) Can it really be more than 20 years since One of Norway’s most creative black metal bands released ‘Puritanical Euphoric Misanthropia’? At the time they […]

Nazareth: Surviving the Law (2022) Nazareth are one of the longest-running and most important rock bands to ever come out of Scotland, and even if we discount the years that most of the […]

System Exit –Avalon EP (2023)   New Zealand 12 mins Rating 90/100 Under the formidable shadow of Mount Taranaki, on the West coast of New Zealand’s North Island, is to be […]

Crying Club: Big Water Bottle EP (2023) It is some 18 months since I last reviewed a recording by Crying Club, which was the single Taxi Man, but I did see them at EmoFest last year where three […]

Flying Man: Under The Stars (2023) single Flying Man is the stage name of Dunedin based Irish-born live-looping guitarist and singer/songwriter Alan Ned Gray. Flying Man’s song-writings sit in t […]