Vulture Neck - Vulture Neck (Album Review)

Release Date: September 04th 2026. Record Label: Self Released. Format: DD

Vulture Neck - Tracklist

1. Höst (2:46)

2. Rat Riders (7:03)

3. Phantom Carriage (5:16)

4. Raining Fire, Raining Stones (3:44)

5. Bright Lights Descending (5:53)

6. Hand Of A Drowning Man (5:55)

7. Abyss Made Of Stone (7:06)

Members

Östen Jäderberg - drums

Magnus Öhrn - vocals and bass

Martin Sällström - vocals and guitar

Elin and Hanna Jäderberg - backing vocals on Bright Lights Descending

Review

Vulture Neck’s debut self-titled album continues with the rebellious Power-Trio attitude they brought on their acclaimed 2023 debut EP but on a more grander scale as they have more time to play with. This allows Vulture Neck to create heavier levels of sludgy surroundings which sees a Stoner Rock attitude develop with areas of Doom, Sludge, Psych sounds to converge on a mountain top of classic hard rock themes. 

The sound is quite raw sounding with a distinctive Garage Rock / Proto-metal attitude forming within the opening tracks of Host and Rat Riders which sees Vulture Neck bring a determined focus into their music. There are small elements of modern day Swedish Sludge/Stoner Metal forming that remind me of the likes of Dozer, Cities Of Mars and Firebreather. The sludgy sounds become quire progressive with Vulture Neck adding a gloomy atmosphere behind the scenes. 

The vocals are not the most refined but they perfectly match the music that Vulture Neck stunningly creates throughout the record. Shades of Doom & Gloom become more commonplace within the album as Vulture Neck bring an end of the world scenario into their music. The lyrics are quite bleak and get straight to the point on tracks such as Rat Riders, Phantom Carriage, “Raining Fire, Raining Stones” and Bright Lights Descending. 

There’s also some great melodic parts of the record which you only begin to notice on repeated listens with Vulture Neck applying some great musical mechanics within both the “HEAVIER” and “QUIETER” aspects of the album. The warped atmospherics constantly moves to the greyer areas of Doom, Sludge and Stoner Metal but Vulture Neck always allow themselves and the listener to have some brief uplifting musical passages which allows the record to be transformed into a wicked Classic Hard Rock sound that remind me of Black Sabbath and Budgie at times. 

Vulture Neck always tries something different with each track and for the most part everything comes off superbly well with the record not afraid to take huge risks that allows the album to be refreshingly different and slightly offbeat at the same time. The instrumental parts are epic and superbly cinematic when they’re fully required to but Vulture Neck always have the balls to apply logical Proto-Metal decisions to disrupt the musical flow which leads to some of the most exciting sounds of the album to fully emerge.

One of the main standouts of the album is the Progressive attitude that Vulture Neck apply to their music that shows shades of the legendary RUSH in places and even Mastodon when the band fully transforms into Progressive Sludge Metal monsters. There’s something for everyone to seek out and fully explore with this excellent recorded and produced record. Vulture Neck delivers the goods with a great supply of grounded melodies and hard hitting grooves that will leave you mightily impressed from start to finish.

Excellent and Highly Recommended.

Words by Steve Howe

Thanks to Good Boy PR for the promo.

Vulture Neck is available to buy now on Digital Download

Links:

Bandcamp | Instagram | Facebook | Spotify | Push.fm

Atmospheric Doomsters LȲKAA sign to Octopus Rising and unveil first single “Izome”

Saxony, Germany-based heavy doom outfit LȲKAA have signed with Octopus Rising, the (un)parallel label of Argonauta Records. The band celebrate the signing with the release of “Izome”, their first single and the first glimpse into their forthcoming debut album “Light Eater”.

Formed during the pandemic winter of 2022 inside an old Cold War bunker, LȲKAA emerged from isolation, tension and decay, turning the atmosphere of their surroundings into a dark and immersive form of heavy music.

The band's sound sits somewhere between doom-laden heavy metal, dark melodicism and post-punk-infused melancholy, creating a dense and emotionally charged atmosphere without relying on occult aesthetics or theatrical imagery. Instead, LȲKAA focus on the darker side of human experience, delivering songs that feel equally haunting, heavy and deeply personal.

“Izome” is the first statement from LȲKAA's new chapter with Octopus Rising, introducing a band whose music draws on the legacy of dark and melodic heavy metal while pushing it into a more atmospheric and contemporary territory.

Watch the official “Izome” visualizer: 

Between 2023 and 2025, LȲKAA took their music to the stage across a series of intense live shows, including appearances alongside Messa and Zhaat, developing an immersive live presence that matches the darkness of their recordings.

With “Light Eater”, their fully produced debut album, now ready for release, LȲKAA join the Octopus Rising roster and open a new chapter for a band built on atmosphere, tension and uncompromising heavy music.

For fans of: Messa, DOOL, In Solitude, The Night Eternal, The Devil's Blood, Jex Thoth, Sonja.

LȲKAA are:

Elly Preussner – lead vocals
Johannes Werner – guitars, keys, vocals
Rasmus Korn – guitars
Đenan Muratagić – bass
Christoph Weilbach – drums

All drums on “Light Eater” were performed by Johannes Ivandic.

“Light Eater” will be released via Octopus Rising / Argonauta Records. Further details coming soon.

For more info:

​https://www.facebook.com/lykaa.band​
​https://www.instagram.com/lykaa.band​
​`https://www.argonautarecords.com/

​

Thanks to Grand Sounds Promotion for the details.

Void Sinker - Pitch Black Sun (EP Review)

Release Date: September 04th 2026. Record Label: Self Released. Format: DD

Pitch Black Sun Neck - Tracklist

1.Pitch 

2.Black

3.Sun

Members

Guglielmo Allegro - Everything

Review

Drone/Doom/Sludge Metal instrumentalist Void Sinker offers another round of distorted miery with their latest chapter called Pitch Black Sun. Influenced by the wretched and cursed summer weather that Guglielmo Allegro experienced in his native home country of Italy, this record continues a similar journey heard on the last record of Cycle. This record has a gut-wrenching drone sound that holds everything down into the depths of Sludge based DOOM METAL. 

There’s a crushing Pitch-Black delivery that allows Void Sinker to create overlapping areas of pure violent distortion with a sweeping Post-Metal sound that has a gloomy aquatic energy that is disturbingly played for long stretches of mind expanding psychological terror.  The three part EP aligns the music closely to the likes of BONG, SUNN O))) and EARTH with no sense of upbeat energy appearing at all.

The thick industrial beats and massive chasms expand even more violently on the epic second track “BLACK” with even more layers of evil sounding DRONE METAL coming up from the depths of hell. The subtle chants can be heard which adds a classic Seventies Horror Movie effect with brief excursions into Cosmic Horror along the way.

Pitch Black Sun lasts for around twenty five minutes but it’s another cautionary and superb record from Void Sinker where they feel rejuvenated by the great use of Black Metal dynamics that perfectly matches the downbeat cover that illustrates what to expect for this record. The Ambient melodies have a distinctive Ambient Metal attitude with Guglielmo performing long drawn out instrumental sounds that feel like a mentally and physically exhausting workout before everything is said and done.

Void Sinker impresses yet again with another sublime release that’s perhaps his most intense, darkest and droned out record in quite some time. This is one perhaps for dedicated followers of Void Sinker only but what a great experience that ultimately awaits them.

Words by Steve Howe

Links 

Facebook | BandCamp | Instagram

POHL & OGIVES BIG BAND Share Details of 'SPLIT' TOUR 2026 This October

We’re thrilled to announce that Sheffield noise trio POHL and Bristol riff powerhouse Ogives Big Band are joining forces for an EU tour and split album on Ripcord Records.

As two of the UK underground’s most progressively heavy bands, POHL and Ogives Big Band share an appetite for colossal riffs, warped psychedelia, experimentation and outright sonic punishment. Split – due for official release this October – brings these two distinct but complementary approaches together with both bands pushing their respective sounds into exciting new territories.

POHL on Bandcamp | Facebook | Instagram

POHL are a genre-bending psychedelic noise rock trio from Sheffield featuring guitarist and vocalist Will Pearce (ex-Hey Colossus), drummer Linda Westman (ex-Old Hope) and Lyra Johnson (Lo Egin) on bass. Following the release of their debut album Mysteries on Wrong Speed Records in July 2024, the band have spent the last two years building a reputation as one of the UK's most compelling and unpredictable live bands, touring with the likes of Dearthworms, Human Leather, and Sleemo, as well as playing dozens of shows across the country.

Their contribution to Split is ‘Flayed Lord Prayer’, a sprawling 17-minute opus that brings together odd time signatures, soaring vocals, tortured screams and nightmares. Wrapped in brutal riffs, while somehow remaining strangely catchy, it was recorded and produced by Pearce as an expansive, abrasive and deeply immersive track, shifting between crushing heaviness and psychedelic disorientation. It represents a natural progression from the approach established on Mysteries but stretches that sound into something even stranger and more imposing.

Ogives Big Band on Bandcamp | Facebook | Instagram

On the flip-side, Ogives Big Band are a Bristol-based riff powerhouse whose monstrously heavy, psychedelic and cerebral sound refuses to sit comfortably within any single genre. Following their first two EPs and 2024 debut LP Boisterous Love, the band have carved out a sound encompassing savage, angular doom, sludge, progressive metal, psychedelic stoner rock and whatever else happens to get caught in the blast radius.

With Split, Ogives Big Band contribute four new tracks that take the band's established vocabulary for complex rhythms and hook-laden refrains, sharpening it into something heavier, and more streamlined. Recorded by James King at Joe's Garage, mixed by Corey Carruthers-Bell at Tree Angle Studios and mastered by Stephen Kerrison. The crushing riffs remain firmly at the centre, and the band's knack for huge, memorable moments endure, as the new material is refined and honed into a more direct and pummelling proposition.

Together, POHL and Ogives Big Band represent two sides of the same instinct: to make heavy music that is adventurous, unpredictable and unconcerned with genre boundaries. 

Both bands take to the road across Europe this October (see dates below) in support of Split, which is released 2nd October 2026 via Ripcord Records | Pre-order

Stream new ‘I'm Glad You Exist’ by Ogives Big Band here

'SPLIT' TOUR 2026:

15/10 – New Cross Inn – London, United Kingdom
16/10 – DND – Dunkirk, France
17/10 – Le Cirque Electrique – Paris, France
18/10 – Cafard’naüm – Saint-Etienne-Les-Remiremont, France
19/10 – Le Chaff – Brussels, Belgium

Thanks to Sheltered Life PR for the details.

Titanosaur - A Thousand Suns (Album Review)

Release Date: September 04th 2026. Record Label: Self Released. Format: DD

A Thousand Suns - Tracklist

1.My Destroyer
2.This Hell
3.Holding On To The Light
4.I Remain
5.The Coming
6.A Thousand Suns
7.Colossus
8.Fire In the Hole
9.Static
10.Fires Blazing
11. Hell Bound

Members

All lyrics and music by Geoff Saavedra, except "Fire In The Hole" lyrics by Kerri Rasmussen

All vocals and instruments played by Geoff Saavedra, except "Fire In The Hole" vocals by Kerri Rasmussen.

Review

A Thousand Suns is the seventh full length album from Doom/Sludge/Stoner Metal collective Titanosaur which is the creative project from Geoff Saavedra. Geoff has experienced a few tough years recently as he underwent a heart transplant back in 2024. Now, Geoff is on the road to recovery where he’s released his heaviest and most emotionally involved record yet. The end result is a glorious and unapologetic mix of Doom, Sludge, Stoner, Psych, Grunge and Punk with a destructive quality which fully taps into the some cosmic gloomy themes along the way.

Geoff’s vocals and lyrical insight are sharp as ever with a fast-paced narrative forming from the very start as this record has a classic Heavy Metal identity which is mostly used through the production side of things. You can hear influences such as High On Fire, Motorhead, Monster Magnet, Pantera and Metallica. The sludgy grooves come right at you at an astonishing pace which gives Titanosaur a violent riff-fuelled energy which is delivered with such ferocity where you may need a few breaks along the way.

The songs follow a similar structure to each other but you know what you’re getting as Titanosaur feels like they’re exorcising a few personal demons they’ve experienced over the last few years but also with Geoff celebrating and highlighting that he's still around to tell the tale. Despite the rough and ready exterior of the Sludge/Stoner Metal melodies, the album does have some emotionally charged lyrics hidden deep within its muscular delivery on tracks such as: My Destroyer, This Hell, Holding On To The Light and A Thousand Suns being the standout tracks on the first half of the album.

Titanosaur moves between the multiple eras of Classic Hard Rock and modern day Heavy Metal with real precision where the different DOOM & GLOOM atmospherics opens the album into different layers of real heaviness. The record works best when Titanosaur aims for a simpler musical style which forces a heavier Sludge/Stoner Metal to appear which becomes one of the albums main strengths especially on the second half of the album.

A Thousand Suns also has some deft experimental movements which Geoff has spliced throughout the album which allows for a more spaced out environment to develop for some real groove laden “HEAD BANGING” moments.

Other great tracks to check out are: Colossus, Fire In The Hole, Static and Fires Blazing.

Titanosaur once again truly delivers the goods with another superb record that proves why they're one of the most essential “solo” acts we currently have in the underground scene right now.

Excellent and Highly Recommended.

Words by Steve Howe

Links

Official | Facebook | BandCamp | Instagram

Chat Pile - Who Loves The Sun (Album Review)

Release Date: September 04th 2026. Record Label: The Flenser. Format: CD/DD/Tape/Vinyl

Who Loves The Sun - Tracklist

1.Creature
2.Deep Blue
3.Same Rules
4.PEN I S MALL
5.Shrine
6.Intruder
7.Christabel ‘26
8.Influence
9.Family Funeral
10.October All The Time

Members

Ray B. - Vocals
L. Manhole - Guitar
Stin - Bass
Drums - Cap’n Ron

Review

Noise/Sludge Metallers Chat Pile return with their highly anticipated third album Who Loves The Sun which once again highlights why they’re one of the most unpredictable, original and most important bands to emerge from the Heavy Metal scene in years. This record shows once again how the band incorporates new elements of music into their ever-growing sound such as Alt Rock, Indie Rock, Shoegaze and Trip-Hop.

Chat Pile demonstrates why they’re so highly thought of with ten tracks that captures the raw essence of the Sludge Metal scene with a grimy and seedy attitude most bands cannot capture. The moody Noise Rock theatrics keeps everything grounded and allows Chat Pile to reinvent themselves yet again with a mixture of Industrial Metal and Post-Punk beats which has a mighty Eighties Rock presence especially within the lyrics and the more somber parts of the record. There’s a great style of vicious melody and rhythm developing which is more focused compared to their previous two albums.

Who Loves The Sun even has brilliantly refined commercial aspects which can easily launch these guys further into the mainstream. The despairing Noise Rock quality reminds me of The Jesus Lizard jamming with the likes of The Melvins and Kowloon Walled City but with Chat Pile keeping their own unflinching approach with bleak lyrics holding everything together. The shift in minimalist Post-Rock, Post-Punk and Sludge Metal is quite refreshing with a subtle Grunge and Psychedelic flavour emerging which adds a real chameleon like effect to the whole journey.

The “Doom & Gloom” essence is stripped apart and rebuilt within the band’s image which they incorporate into almost every track with a filth ridden attitude that can be quite buoyant and gleefully upbeat at times. The raw sounding production values allows Chat Pile to play at their own destructive slow-to-mid paced grooves with a level of sheer heaviness only appearing when it’s really needed.

The first half of the album allows Chat Pile to explore a decaying style of Grunge, Noise and Alt Rock with songs Creature, Same Rules and PEN I S MALL adding a heap of Blackened Sludge themes for a subversive experience. This allows the lead vocals to demonstrate a politically charged energy that really does hammer the points home that Chat Pile are providing this album.

Chat Pile are fully committed to exploring different areas of music for this record on other tracks such as Shrine, Intruder, Family Funeral and October All The Time which have some of the most rewarding moments on the album. The whole mood is constantly engaging with intense progressive musical passages being quite hypnotic and brilliantly surreal. 

Who Loves The Sun isn’t an easy album to listen to but it’s one that offers a must have experience where Chat Pile doesn't even offer any easy answers or solutions. As they leave this up to the listener’s own conclusions. What is guaranteed is another masterful record from Chat Pile that once again cements their status as one of the most important Heavy Rock bands in the world currently playing today. 

This is an absolute masterpiece and is a record everyone needs to own right now!!!

Words by Steve Howe

Thanks to Rarely Unable PR for the promo.

Who Loves The Sun is available to buy now on CD, Digital, Tape and Vinyl.

Links

Official | Facebook | BandCamp | Instagram

BLACK SPACE RIDERS – New Album "Die 8" to be released on November 13th, 2026 / First single and pre-order online!

Four years after their last masterpiece „We Have Been Here Before“, BLACK SPACE RIDERS are finally back with their highly anticipated eighth studio album, "Die 8", arriving on November 13th.

Following the painful departure of founding member and second guitarist SLI, the band reinforced their lineup from within their closest circle: Their long-time audio engineer π, deeply connected to the band and already responsible for the recording and mix of the predecessor, stepped in as an additional guitarist, strengthening the sonic unit on the new album.

Recorded, mixed, and mastered in π's own recording studio, the new work — simply titled "Die 8" — bundles a fresh, untamed energy. It presents itself as a brilliant, eclectic bastard bursting with playfulness, ingenuity, and attention to detail. Molding the best of many genres and different decades into a sonic universe entirely their own, the band creates a soundscape that is psychedelic, heavy, danceable, sometimes tender, sometimes harsh — but always deeply atmospheric, urgent, fluid, and accessible.

Conceptually, the eighth album serves as the cartography of a creeping decay. It delivers the protocols of a relay station at the outermost edge — be it in a distant galaxy or within the digital and social networks of our here and now.

The band comments:

"In eleven frequencies, we navigate through a world where the boundaries between the human mind and algorithmic control are eroding. We encounter the noise of the masses, the arrogance of power, and the leaden silence of isolation. Yet amidst the dystopia, an echo stirs: a ritualistic resistance, a mantra against the cold, an attempt to preserve one's own dignity in the dust of history. 

It's a play with the final eight minutes of light before the sun — or civilization — burns out on the horizon. Beyond the vast expanse, the end of time awaits: a rapturous, unstoppable uprising in lockstep, followed by the bitter realization of our own systemic inertia. But right there, where chronology finally breaks down and we look doom dead in the eye, the unexpected happens: The '8' bends into a horizontal infinity. Because the end of humanity is not the end of everything. The station sinks, everything dissolves into infinite energy — and a new cycle begins."

Open your eyes! What do you see?

Starting today, the video for the first single "Party Is Over (The Last Curfew)" is officially live:

The song fuses dark goth influences, post-punk, and heavy rock into a harsh soundscape with almost theatrical undertones. Set against the symbolic backdrop of a bell tower, a cynical doomsday scenario unfolds. "Party Is Over" functions as a critical commentary on a society that stubbornly ignores its own tipping point.

"Die 8" is available for pre-order starting now: LINK (Linktree)

BLACK SPACE RIDERS Online:

Linktree BSR online

Thanks to Anger Management PR for the details.