Graves of Valor – “Salarian Gate” Released May 26, 2009 on Relapse Apparently Job for a Cowboy are releasing two albums this year. Seriously, though, this album sounds identical to the aforementioned group. Not only are they stylistically similar, but they also have the strange interludes (6 and 9) that JFAC used on “Genesis”. To make things even closer, this album is also fairly conceptual, being based on the fall of the Roman Empire. There are a few minor things that differentiate them, however. Graves of Valor incorporate an Electric Wizard-esque method of making all vocals distorted, just adding to the already [...read more]

Cattle Decapitation – “The Harvest Floor Released January 10, 2009 on Metal Blade With past album titles like Humanure, Human Jerky, and Homovore, it would not be a huge leap of the imagination to call Cattle Decapitation a joke band. Though possibly true in the past, this is certainly an album to take seriously. It is difficult to really pinpoint an exact genre to place these guys in. They are primarily grindcore, but incorporate stuff from black, death, prog, and nu metal. The vocals are some of the most dynamic I have heard. Travis Ryan’s pipes range from Lee [...read more]

No other heavy rock band is as fiercely independent and consistently satisfying as Clutch. This is the Maryland band’s first new material on their own imprint (unless you count The Bakerton Group’s El Rojo earlier this year), and you can tell they wanted to impress.

Rating: 3.5/5
…
Every song has a little something worth revisiting, and there’s a couple of rock solid gems. For the realms of metal, it’s lighter fare, but in the company of melodic hard rock bands, they’re an 800 lb gorilla.

Madder Mortem – “Eight Ways” released June 23, 2009 on Peaceville So rarely am I brought to the verge of tears by music these days, least of all by any of the flocking female-fronted metal bands blotting the landscape. Agnete Kirkevaag possesses Grace Slick’s timbre with an even wider range, inviting moving moments that vary from sweet to savage. “Formaldehyde” is the strongest and most evocative track, its jazzy lead-in counterbalanced with graduated heaviness, featuring feral screams and smooth croons. Sometimes-gentler and pointedly assertive, “The Little Things” gives way to the progressive layers of “Armour” that deftly flex under [...read more]

Killswitch Engage – “Killswitch Engage” released July 6, 2009 on Roadrunner It takes some balls to release a second self-titled album (the first being their debut with former vocalist Jesse Leach). Is this truly a defining moment in their career? Absolutely. It reinforces that KsE is too safe, too middle-of-the road, and should not strike even a novice listener as anything new. They regurgitate the formula they helped create, with big ol’ choruses and song titles repeated ad nauseum (which is what typically halts any forward momentum they generate). Most of the lyrics are way egocentric, focusing on personal issues [...read more]

The tenth studio album from the first word in prog metal is drenched in death; an exhausting and challenging endeavor that is ultimately satisfying once it processes. Their darkest album to date is also their most unified body of work since Awake, and a return to form following the more accessible execution of their last effort, Systematic Chaos.

Judas Priest – “A Touch Of Evil” released July 14, 2009 on Epic Records The Metal Gods present their first live offering since reuniting with Rob Halford, and it’s the best since Unleashed In The East. Comprised of a breadth of songs spanning thirty years of their career, seven albums are represented, with all but two tracks (6, 11) making their first appearances on a live Priest release. The selections are from their 2005 & 2008 world tours, and they’re very particular about including the strongest performances, with minimum crowd noise. The focus is well-kept on this ageless band, [...read more]