Finally, the wait is over! Twenty years in the business, the LA rockers of Buckcherry are back with their sixth full length studio album, which goes by the holy name Confessions. Now that I have your attention, there's no real secret to it. The entire album has been inspired by the seven capital sins, referring to frontman Josh Todd's childhood. In addition, on Confessions, it's time for Buckcherry to confess what they've been up to these last months/years.
Bunker 66 hail from Messina, an historical city on Sicily, Italy. The band debuted in 2009 with the grandiose EP Out Of The Bunker, originally self-released in a limited edition, and re-released later on both CD and vinyl. Infernö Interceptörs is the second studio release (there was a live-EP in mean time, which was brought out as part of Fenriz’ Band Of The Week vinyl series) and this eight-tracker is an enormous step forward in comparison to the former record.
It's always a bit tough to talk about recordings that have never seen broad daylight. Mostly, there has to be some kind of reason for them to be locked away from the bigger crowd. The legendary German rockers of Can are back to release some of their unreleased experimental rock tunes and that's a mouthful to say the least!
Crismon Cult are an Austrian band, that has existed partly for serveral years under the names Stygma IV/ Stigmata and Big Heat. In 2008, Günter Maier (guitars) and Alexander Hilzensauer (bass) have formed the new band and have added new members on vocals (Walter Stüfer) and Peter Bachmayer on drums. In 2009 they released their- debut-album ‘Crimson Cult’. Now they will release their second album ‘Tales Of Doom’ on the Pure Legends Records- label.
Do you know Hatred For Mankind, Dragged Into Sunlight’s debut full length studio record? It was one of my favourite releases from 2008 (the stuff had been re-released in 2010/2011 through their current label, Prosthetic, and was reviewed very positively by colleague Tony, who shared my enthusiasm about this UK-based act; for the review: see the archives section, posted on the very end on October 2010).
Geminy was formed somewhere in 2006 by guitarist Marco Manzani and singer Francesco Filippone. Bassist Francesco Molinelli later joined the band, and after some time Geminy's line up was completed with the arrival of Alessio Pucciano on the guitar.
The band created a blend of Progressive and 80's Heavy Metal, but even tries to put in some sort of storytelling to make it a concept album.
I was very, or better: extremely pleased with late 2011’s release On The Coming Of Darkness (review posted November 12th 2011 - see archives section), and luckily this successor goes on in the very same vein, both musically as lyrically (conceptually). On The Dawning Of Light consists of nine tracks with a total running time of forty seven minutes, and still the project is veiled within mystery and unknown identities (for what this might be worth).
To me, Otep has always been quite the mystery. I've always had the hardest time putting this band in one genre. Perhaps that's a good thing. Too many people have been spending too much time labeling bands nowadays. Time to put an end to this. However, not touring Europe for centuries might be another reason for remaining that same enigma. After the release of Hydra, let's hope this last disappointment alters for the better. Back to Otep's new release now, which goes by the liquid name of Hydra.
Hailing from Switzerland, shEver are a female Doom-formation that started almost a decade ago. After a demo, recorded shortly after the band’s birth, they gained lots of positive responses all over Europe. No, not because they are all women (maybe just a little as well; being female might help sometimes ;o), but because of their nice song writing and impressing live performances. 2007 saw the first shEver full length, Ocean Of Illusions, and in 2009 the band released the highly acclaimed A Dialogue With The Dimensions EP.
Formed by Pete Newdeck (drummer at Eden’s Curse) and Ian Nash. After successfully writing an array of hard hitting music, they quickly enlisted the enthusiastic drummer Mark Cross (Firewind, Helloween). Cross was so impressed by the vocal ability of drummer Newdeck, he booked into a studio for the album F.E.A.R.
