Metal 498 Items

The brainchild of Caleb Scofield (cave IN, OLD MAN Gloom), Zozobra formed in 2006 and quickly released two crushing full-lengths of atmospheric sludge metal, Harmonic Tremors (2007) and Bird of Prey (2008). Five years later, the band re-emerged with Savage Masters, their most aggressive and straightforward release to date. Bursting out the gate with a bold, determined purpose, Savage Masters is an unrelenting fury of post-hardcore ferocity and sludge-tinged amplifier crunch. This release, featuring long-time Cave In bandmates Adam Mcgrath (guitars) and J.R. Conners (drums), proves once and for all that Zozobra are a veritable force to be reckoned with

Re-issue of Year OF NO LIGHT's album 'Tocsin'!! Year OF NO LIGHT's lengthy, sprawling compositions of towering walls of guitars and sombre synths irradiate a sense of dire solemniand spiritual gravity, and couldn't be a more fitting soundtrack for such grim medieval scenarios. But there is also the element of element of absolution transcendence in the face of death. Year Of No Light sound dense, rich and lush and yet somehow starved and deprived. “There's a thread running through all of our albums”, the band comments, “an exploration of the sensitive world that obeys a certain telos, first fantasized ("Nord") and reverberated ("Ausserwelt"), then declaimed as a warning ("Tocsin"). The deeper we dig, the more the motifs we have to unveil appear to us. Yes, it's a bit gnostic. This album is invoked after the Tocsin, it's the epiphany of the Fall”.

Over the past near-decade, Lancashire’s medieval metal phenomenon Wytch Hazel have been honing an uncommonly wholesome, rustic and devotional brand of timewarped hard rock that’s all their own, with 2016’s Prelude and 2018’s II: Sojourn summoning to mind fevered images of Robin Hood and his Merry Men grooving to Jethro Tull and Thin Lizzy. Yet within moments of pressing play on their third LP, III: Pentecost, the musty mystical minstrelsy takes a back seat in favour of a rich, sumptuous, anthemic late-night drivetime vibe, passionately embracing the most high-end smash-hit classic rock and metal circa its late 1970s heyday. “I thought I put a lot into the second album, but this album has been an absolute obsession,” stresses the band leader, Colin Hendra. “Every aspect had to be as good as possible. We’ve gone back and forth, Ed was tinkering with it for months on end. There’s quadruple tracking going on with the rhythm parts, then we’ve doubled, tripled and quadrupled all our lead parts to get that richness and fullness of sound, all meticulously planned with pages and pages of organisational notes. It wasn’t just ‘get in the studio and see how it goes!’” he laughs. “One day I did 14 hours of vocal recording. All vocals are double-tracked, I can’t express how much hard work that is. The last album feels like a breeze compared to what we’ve done with this - and I don’t plan on ramping it down!” Musically, there are gorgeous self-professed touches of Black Sabbath, Blue Öyster Cult, Ac/dc and early Scorpions—“With the soloing I was trying to go for Michael Schenker” beams Colin—while the scampering headbanger I Will Not initially took a nod from Angel Witch, who Hendra was helping out on second guitar back in 2015 when the track was composed, before studio treatment made it sound “a lot more Wytch Hazelly”. But perhaps the most lateral comparison is to a band from the opposite spiritual realm, with Archangel an explicit homage to Swedish faux-Satanic devil cult Ghost. “I find them fascinating, Ghost; musically great, the songwriting is spot-on,” enthuses the frontman. “We share an intrinsic connection, with [Bad Omen honcho] Will Palmer being the person who discovered us both. “Music is created for all, it’s a common grace for everyone,” he affirms, “which is why the music that shows the glory of God the most, in my opinion, is not music created by Christians. It’s Black Sabbath!”

Limited to 500 hand numbered copies on 180g vinyl.

"Six tracks of apocalyptic black metal, Wode's newest record unleashes five years of outstanding potential, finding the band on deadly form, wielding enough surprises to suggest that its work in service to the counter-cosmos is far from done."

"Six tracks of apocalyptic black metal, Wode's newest record unleashes five years of outstanding potential, finding the band on deadly form, wielding enough surprises to suggest that its work in service to the counter-cosmos is far from done."

After the mind blowing success of Witchcraft's Legend (2012), mastermind Magnus Pelander outdid himself once again with the band's 2016 offering Nucleus. Combining what made it's predecessor the modern classic it quickly became as well as elements of the band's earlier days makes Nucleus a melancholic, raging, fragile, melodic and at times noisy masterpiece filed somewhere between classic rock, doom and ambient music.

With a renewed line-up (Rage Widerberg on drums and Tobias Anger on bass) the band sounds more hungry and powerful than ever. In combination with the thrilling, yet very down-to-earth production by Pelander, Philip Gabriel Saxin and Anton Sundell, Nucleus throws you in dreamy sonic landscapes that will mesmerize and haunt you alike.

Svart Records are proud to re-release Nucleus on black-, green- and Svart exclusive purple/turquoise marble vinyl on May 19th.