#fellowship — Public Fediverse posts

The following hashtags are trending across South African Mastodon instances:

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#women
#bible
#church
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The following hashtags are trending across South African Mastodon instances:

#faith
#women
#bible
#church
#fellowship

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The following hashtags are trending across South African Mastodon instances:

#faith
#women
#bible
#church
#fellowship

Based on recent posts made by non-automated accounts. Posts with more boosts, favourites, and replies are weighted higher.

The following hashtags are trending across South African Mastodon instances:

#bible
#faith
#church
#fellowship

Based on recent posts made by non-automated accounts. Posts with more boosts, favourites, and replies are weighted higher.

The following hashtags are trending across South African Mastodon instances:

#bible
#faith
#church
#fellowship

Based on recent posts made by non-automated accounts. Posts with more boosts, favourites, and replies are weighted higher.

The following hashtags are trending across South African Mastodon instances:

#bible
#faith
#church
#fellowship

Based on recent posts made by non-automated accounts. Posts with more boosts, favourites, and replies are weighted higher.

The following hashtags are trending across South African Mastodon instances:

#bible
#faith
#church
#fellowship

Based on recent posts made by non-automated accounts. Posts with more boosts, favourites, and replies are weighted higher.

This spring, fancy a picnic on the lawn? The Women of Bedfordview Methodist Church will be presenting a picnic and tea garden on the grounds of our recently revamped property at 4 De Wet street. Happening on Saturday 26 September at 10:00, it promises to be a beautiful way to spend your mid-morning. Tickets are only R100, and you can book yours by emailing [email protected]

#Church #Fellowship

Photo Of The Day 15th August 2026.

https://mancavgeek.co.uk/2026/08/15/photo-of-the-day-15th-august-2026/

Manchester Monday 18th May 2026.

https://mancavgeek.co.uk/2026/05/18/manchester-monday-18th-may-2026/

Typically, you can judge a cheesy power metal album just from its cover art. Look at the laser-powered sharks/dinos from Victorius, the D&D fantasy elements of Power Paladin, or the stuffed assembly of characters on Angus McSix, and you know you’re getting yourself a heap of cheddar. The covers are busy, bombastic, and as brightly-colored as Frida Ohlin’s hair (see band photo below). Sweden’s Rexoria bucks that trend. The cover art for Fallen Dimension looks like it belongs on a work of dystopian prog like Vanderlust. They deliver something far more light-hearted, though—symphonic power metal. Rexoria deem themselves the birth of a genre called “Royal Metal”—it’s in their name. Rex means king, and Oria means gold. Royal metal. Get it? So just what is this new tag? More importantly, would you like your royale with cheese?

Fallen Dimension blends old school heavy metal with modern power metal and a dash of keyboard synths. While they boast of symphonics in their promo sheet, Rexoria have more in common with Unleash the Archers than Mystfall. They combine the joyful energy of Frozen Crown with the straightforward approach of Sabaton. With honed pop structures, Rexoria set aside the wankery of many power metal bands and dive quickly into their anthemic choruses. Blink, and you might miss the music that happens between the opening spoken word segment and hooky chorus on opener “Metallic Rain.” If you like the bop and energy of power metal without its often masturbatory shredding, then this is for you. Rexoria has solos, but they’re in and out in a flash, all to ensure songs end in a (mostly) tidy 3-4 minutes. The downside is that where bands like Frozen Crown and Unleash the Archers do some really cool stuff with their guitars, the guitars on Fallen Dimension sound generic and bland.

Frontwoman Frida Ohlin gives Rexoria a more distinctive sound relative to more recent power metal bands. She has a gritty voice akin to Joan Jett rather than the smooth and joyful tone of Frozen Crown’s Giada Etro. She delivers some really good choruses, bringing to life the likes of “Break the Wave” and “Running with the Stars” with her energetic delivery. She even shows a more tender side on the rock ballad, “Heart of Sorrow,” a duet with Johnny Gioeli (Axel Rudi Pell). Her grit keeps the bouncy, formulaic songs from going too far down the road of pop music. It’s not that the other players are incompetent—they just don’t have much to work with. The drums are standard, galloping blast beats, and the guitar riffs are competent if uninspired. Rexoria brought in a new bassist (Adam Nordquist) for Fallen Dimension, but I rarely heard him. Usually a record like this benefits from outside hooks, and the synths tend to be hit or miss. There are some good ones, such as those on “Metallic Rain,” but on follow-up “Awakening,” I couldn’t help but wonder if they started recycling synth lines.

In general, Fallen Dimension is a pleasant listen that’s also forgettable due to its jack-of-all-trades nature. Rexoria’s plug-and-chug approach allows for an enjoyable energy and choruses that hit the right notes. Yet there’s very little to distinguish them from the power metal pack. The opening riff on “Wasted Land” sounds a lot like something from a Fellowship record, while a majority of their other riffs are hardly more creative than your run-of-the-mill radio rock music. I didn’t dislike any of the songs, yet nothing really grabbed me either. Some of the choruses stuck in my head for a little while, but without any real emotional impact. Rexoria has all the pieces in place—they’re just missing that extra something to make them shine.

Power metal serves as a bridge between extreme and popular music. It often contains pop structures that appeal to a wider audience, yet can still stretch the limits with exciting musical prose that can appeal to thrill-seeking extremists. The pitfall of flirting with more commercial styles is that it often leads to formulaic and watered-down music. Rexoria boasts in their promo sheet of millions of Spotify streams and half a million YouTube views, so clearly they are finding success. It would just be nice to see them take some risks. Too often, success gets in the way of art. I hope Rexoria can continue to find success while also developing the art of their music.

Rating: 2.5/5.0
DR: N/A | Format Reviewed: Stream
Label: Black Lodge Records
Websites: Bandcamp | Facebook | Official Site
Releases Worldwide: May 8th, 2026

#Chancen | Postdoctoral Fellow in the Study of Contemporary Antisemitism | Katz Center for Advanced Judaic Studies at the University of Pennsylvania | Details: https://www.jewishstudies.de/de/nachrichten/postdoctoral-fellow-in-the-study-of-contemporary-antisemitism-penn-university/

#Fellowship

Deadline for applications: April 20, 2026

A quotation from Montaigne

A good marriage, if there are such, rejects the company and conditions of love; it strives to show forth those of friendship. It is a calm fellowship of life, full of fidelity, of trust, and of an endless number of useful and substantial mutual duties and obligations.
 
[Un bon mariage, s’il en est, refuse la compagnie & conditions de l’amour : il tasche à representer celles de l’amitié. C’est une douce societé de vie, pleine de constance, de fiance, & d’un nombre infiny d’utiles & solides offices, & obligations mutuelles.]

Michel de Montaigne (1533-1592) French essayist
Essays, Book 3, ch. 5 (3.5), “Of Some Verses of Virgil [Sur des vers de Virgile]” (1586) [tr. Ives (1925)]

More about (and translations of) this quote: wist.info/montaigne-michel-de/…

#quote #quotes #quotation #qotd #montaigne #micheldemontaigne #assistance #duties #fellowship #fidelity #friendship #love #marriage #mutualrespect #mutualsupport #obligations #passion #trust

RIFS awards a Klaus #Töpfer #Sustainability #Fellowship: The projects should have a lasting impact. Applicants should bring innovative ideas from their fields and demonstrate professional experience in #international and #intercultural settings.
https://www.rifs-potsdam.de/en/news/klaus-topfer-sustainability-fellowship-building-bridges-between-science-and-policymaking

RIFS awards a Klaus #Töpfer #Sustainability #Fellowship: The projects should have a lasting impact. Applicants should bring innovative ideas from their fields and demonstrate professional experience in #international and #intercultural settings.
https://www.rifs-potsdam.de/en/news/klaus-topfer-sustainability-fellowship-building-bridges-between-science-and-policymaking

RIFS awards a Klaus #Töpfer #Sustainability #Fellowship: The projects should have a lasting impact. Applicants should bring innovative ideas from their fields and demonstrate professional experience in #international and #intercultural settings.
https://www.rifs-potsdam.de/en/news/klaus-topfer-sustainability-fellowship-building-bridges-between-science-and-policymaking

RIFS awards a Klaus #Töpfer #Sustainability #Fellowship: The projects should have a lasting impact. Applicants should bring innovative ideas from their fields and demonstrate professional experience in #international and #intercultural settings.
https://www.rifs-potsdam.de/en/news/klaus-topfer-sustainability-fellowship-building-bridges-between-science-and-policymaking

RIFS awards a Klaus #Töpfer #Sustainability #Fellowship: The projects should have a lasting impact. Applicants should bring innovative ideas from their fields and demonstrate professional experience in #international and #intercultural settings.
https://www.rifs-potsdam.de/en/news/klaus-topfer-sustainability-fellowship-building-bridges-between-science-and-policymaking

oh jeez I almost forgot

Happy Frodo and the Fellowship leave Rivendell Day to all those who celebrate!

#frodo #fellowship #rivendell

oh jeez I almost forgot

Happy Frodo and the Fellowship leave Rivendell Day to all those who celebrate!

#frodo #fellowship #rivendell

oh jeez I almost forgot

Happy Frodo and the Fellowship leave Rivendell Day to all those who celebrate!

#frodo #fellowship #rivendell

oh jeez I almost forgot

Happy Frodo and the Fellowship leave Rivendell Day to all those who celebrate!

#frodo #fellowship #rivendell

oh jeez I almost forgot

Happy Frodo and the Fellowship leave Rivendell Day to all those who celebrate!

#frodo #fellowship #rivendell

Stuck in the Filter: October 2025’s Angry Misses

By Kenstrosity

They say it’s going to be a harsh winter this year. They always say that, and it’s almost never true, at least not from where I’ve set up camp. However, no matter the weather I am a harsh taskmaster, doling out grueling hours, no pay or benefits, and probably the worst coffee on the planet to my dutiful minions. It takes a special kind of person, motivated by pure unadulterated greed to ravenously scour the filter for dusty, almost-forgotten gems like they do.

But we are thankful for them for being exactly that! And we also benefit, in the form of quality(ish) chunks of glimmery, shimmery metal. BEHOLD!

Kenstrosity’s Riffy Representation

Xaoc // Repulsive Summoning [October 31, 2025 – Edgewood Arsenal Records]

Xaoc’s history is one of the more confusing I’ve encountered in my time writing for this blog. After breaking up in 2008, a new lineup spawned in 2022 to record and release Proxime Mortis from the ashes of songs written pre-breakup, supported by Edgewood Arsenal. At some point this year, two more members spawned in anticipation of this new slab Repulsive Summoning. But the band’s labeled as Split Up already on Metallum? I don’t understand what’s going on there, but at least I can say that Repulsive Summoning is a turbo banger! These riffs are bonkers, full of verve and swagger, brimming with groove and muscularity. A happy mix of Vomitory and Dormant Ordeal, this Virginian outfit know how to throw down. Highlights like “Ave Solva Coagula,” “Antima Samskara,” “The Great Perfected Ones,” and the entire “Degenerate Era” three-part suite reduce my body into a fine slurry by the grinding, vicious power of their riffs alone. But the rabid growls, ballistic percussion, and meaty guitar tones contain more than enough fuel to propel those riffs across this tight and thunderous 35-minute runtime. It’s a simple record, built to beat me down and leave me broken and bloodied, but it’s also an effortlessly memorable affair that leaves me wanting more despite the mounting medical bills. Don’t sleep on Xaoc!

Andy-War-Hall’s Succulent Surplus

Canvas of Silence // As the World Tree Fell [October 31st, 2025 – Rockshots Records]

Finnish symphonic metallers Canvas of Silence describe themselves as “prog-influenced chorus metal,” and that description goes far in outlining their debut As the World Tree Fell. Their core sound resembles a progged-out Nightwish moonlighting as a melodeath band, committing ludicrous bombast on symphonic-heavy cuts like “The Great Unknown” and “Wayfarer” amidst a sharp Gothenburg riff attack in “Watching the World Tree Fall” and “Drown.” Canvas of Silence mete out a balanced approach of light and dark sounds between Theocracyesque prog-power (“One With the Wind,” “Humanimal”) and Madder Mortem-like gothic twists (“Drown,” “Anthem for Ashes”), all reined in by the commanding vocal presence of singer Loimu Satakieli.1 Sitting somewhere between Anette Olzon (ex-Nightwish, The Dark Element) and Agnete Kierkevaag (Madder Mortem), her impassioned and heavily-layered singing turns As the World Tree Fell into a smörgåsbord of lush, catchy and anthemic tunes of an uplifting, sing-along nature. Optimism permeates As the World Tree Fell, felt at a fever pitch on the enormous choral bridge of “Humanimal” and the folky power metal jaunt of “One With the Wind.” Even on lyrically dark/mournful passages like “Wayfarer” and “Garden of the Fallen,” Canvas of Silence deliver soaring, hopeful crescendos that at times reach Fellowship levels of good cheer. Canvas of Silence can craft sincerely beautiful moments, and though As the World Tree Fell’s production can be sterile and overly loud2 I am nothing but excited to see what these Finns can cook up next.

Spicie Forrest’s Punky Proferrings

Violent Testimony // Aggravate [October 17th, 2025 – Horror Pain Gore Death Productions]

Do you wish there was more grind in your life? Well, Cheyenne, Wyoming’s Violent Testimony just assumed you would. Combining the punky flair of Napalm Death with the lead foot ethos of early Pig Destroyer and Cattle Decapitation, debut LP Aggravate is 26 minutes of delicious grindy goodness. From the opening salvo of “God Complex Massacre” to the final detonations of “Hit N’ Run,” Violent Testimony shows absolutely no restraint. D.N.’s Gatling drums mow down everything in their path while T.W.’s serpentine bass clears the chaff and flattens any obstruction. Shrapnel propelled by N.Y.’s brutish, breakneck riffing can be seen burying itself in concrete walls, still quivering (“Rider in the Night,” “Psychotic Episode”). Caustic growls and vitriolic screams tear from T.W.’s throat at mach fuck (“Flashbang Celebration,” “Obligatory Manifestation of Infinite Grind”). With only two tracks exceeding the two-minute mark, Violent Testimony screams their piece with as much sound and fury as possible before moving on and picking their next bone with the system. This keeps Aggravate a lean, densely-packed offering. If you need to get pissed off right now and even the fastest death metal is too slow, Violent Testimony is all too happy to decimate the opposition with you.

Uaar // Galger og Brann [October 17th, 2025 – Fysisk Format Records]

Hailing from Oslo, Norway, crust outfit Uaar celebrates their tenth birthday by releasing their debut LP. Galger og Brann, which means “Gallows and Fire” in Norwegian, expands on the foundations laid by established acts like Skitsystem and Tragedy. With one foot firmly planted in black metal and the other in hardcore, Uaar unleashes a cacophony of rage unfettered. D-beats abound, courtesy of Truls Friesl Berg, creating a frantic, enraged atmosphere. Dag Schaug Carlsen’s blackened rasps are so cold they burn, matching the evil pall hanging over tracks like “Galeås” and “Den siste.” Post-flecked, Ancsty tendencies (“Alt Skal Brenne,” “Overalt”) peek through the feral hardcore riffage (“Håpet forsvinner”) of guitarists Erik Berg Friesl and Jon Schaug Carlsen, while bassist Stian S. Evensen provides the muscle to convince you these guys aren’t screwing around. Uaar is well-versed in their base genres, alternating between and mixing black metal and hardcore effortlessly. The occasional blues-tinged heavy metal lead—as in “Overalt” and “Dolken”—keep Galger og Brann from being a one-note affair. With a dearth of standout blackened hardcore releases this year, Uaar’s Galger og Brann is a welcome—if late—addition to the list.

Scorching Tomb // Ossuary [October 24th, 2025 – Time to Kill Records]

I’ll be honest, I’ve never considered Montreal, Canada, to be prime death metal territory. Luckily, Scorching Tomb doesn’t care what I think. Debut LP Ossuary is an aural violation born of Tren-induced hardcore aggression and filthy old school death metal. With a guitar tone (Philippe Lelbanc) like sandpaper and a bass like swallowing gravel (Miguel Lepage), Scorching Tomb plays in the same cesspools as Bloodgutter and Rotpit. We normally associate melted faces with guitar solos, but that honor belongs to whatever corrosive noises issue forth from vocalist Vincent Patrick Lajeunesse’s guts. Drummer Émile Savard loves a blast beat, often detonating them in short bursts to support an already bone-breaking assault (“Feel the Blade”). “Stalagmite3 Impalement” and “Sanctum of Bones (Ossuary)” are particularly savage, with tetanus-inflicting riffs and bloodthirsty screams threatening to drag you into the crypt to be used for meal prep. On “Skullcrush,” Sanguisugabogg’s Devin Swank perfectly matches Scorching Tomb’s vile depravity, cementing them as a promising new act in the scene. Ossuary is raging, muscle-bound, caveman death metal drowned in a vat of viscera and sewage, and it tastes incredible.

ClarkKent’s Gratifying Goodies

Sutratma // Adrift [October 3rd, 2025 – Self-Release]

While I didn’t purposely seek out more doom during my self-imposed month of picking only doom promos, Sutratma’s fifth full-length, Adrift, ranks as one of the better doom albums I listened to in November. This California four-piece has been writing funeral doom for 15 years, and it shows in their ability to craft effective melancholic slow-burns that strike a balance between melody and crushingly heavy. Adrift impresses straight out the gate with the piano-drenched “Wind and Sea.” This song nicely melds the sorrowful softness of the piano with punishing guitar riffs and impressive growls. Just like stalwarts My Dying Bride, Sutratma mixes growls with cleans, and Daniel Larios’s cleans effectively hit you right in the feels while the growls take on a more despairing note. There’s plenty of variety from song to song, with organs stealing the show on “Guiding Star” and a lovely melody on “The Great Bereaver” that builds up to a moving finale. Just like with Oromet, there’s a serenity to the music that is calming, and the skilled songwriting and musicianship lends a poignancy to it all. With the frenzy of list season upon us, it’s nice to have something like this to remind us that it’s okay to just slow down—even when an angry ape is berating you for more content.

Starer // Ancient Monuments and Modern Sadness [October 10th, 2025 – Fiadh Productions]

Josh Hines, the one man behind black metal project, Starer, has been very busy. Since forming Starer in 2020, he has released four EPs and now, with the release of Ancient Monuments and Modern Sadness, four LPs. I first became acquainted with this band on 2023’s Wind, Breeze, or Breath and was taken in by Hines’s aggressively atmospheric take on black metal. Ancient Monuments and Modern Sadness hits the ground running on “I Cry Your Mother’s Blood” with some aggressively catchy melodies. The aggression continues on “Il-Kantilena” with its icy riffs and pumping blast beats. Meanwhile, “The Field of Reeds” combines the black n’ roll of Fell Omen with the fuzzy reverb of atmoblack for a rollicking good time. Hines screams into the void as subdued symphonics add layers of melody, providing a surprising amount of depth to each song. Because of the frenetic pace, the 50-minute runtime flies right by, even as songs like “Song of the Harper” do their best to vary the tempo. For black metal, the production is lush and gorgeous, giving air to all instruments. The epic, ten-minute finale is the culmination of Hines’s ability to put together complex and compelling music that both excites by its aggression and dazzles with its atmospherics. Black metal fans should not miss this one.

Grin Reaper’s Haunted Harvest

Black Cross Hotel // Songs for Switches [October 31st, 2025 – Someoddpilot Records]

Three years after dropping their favorably reviewed debut Hex, keys-drenched and industrialized outfit Black Cross Hotel returns bearing Songs for Switches. 80s-inspired synths, mid-paced chugs, and dance-ready grooves pack neatly into forty-one minutes of grubby fun, sure to interest fans of Ministry and Killing Joke, or anyone with a predilection for leather. Where Hex boasted a wider assortment of tempos, Songs for Switches narrows its focus to mid-paced songs with a keener emphasis on keyboard melodies. Averting a direction that could have been limiting, Black Cross Hotel smartly sidesteps this by shaving down song lengths and arranging the tracks for optimal pacing. Individual moments across the album evoke Me and That Man (“Eyes from Nowhere”), Soulfly (“Blood Dance”), and Joy Division (“Typo”), casting an eclectic array of sounds into Mount Gloom to forge ten dangerously fun tracks. Though I liked the album at first listen, it took multiple spins for Songs for Switches’ distilled aesthetic to fully unfurl, and once it did, my appreciation redoubled. With a sinister atmosphere designed as much for pain as pleasure, Black Cross Hotel has readied your room for a night you won’t forget.

Miasmata // Subterrania [October 31st, 2025 – Naturmacht Productions]

Still hawking their distinctive blend of meloblack and heavy metal, Miasmata dropped sophomore platter Subterrania on what was one of the most congested release days of 2025.4 In addition to the recurring influences of Windir (“Die at the Right Time”) and Iron Maiden (the intro to “Subterrania” smacks of The X Factor), Subterrania adds a dollop of thrash into the mix. Opener “Those Who Cross the Flame” struts out with a punky riff that wouldn’t be out of place on an Anthrax record, while “Full of the Devil” tastes as much like Testament or Havok as Diamond Head. The beauty of Miasmata, both on debut Unlight: Songs of Earth and Atrophy and Subterrania, is one-man mastermind Mike Wilson’s aptitude to synthesize a mighty host of influences into a unique sonic palette all his own. As Sharky noted in Unlight’s review, Miasmata has a knack for remarkable restraint. Subterrania clocks under forty minutes, layering slithery riffs upon one another in a way that propels the music in constant motion, shifting and unfolding so organically that the album slips by before you realize it’s over (an especially impressive feat considering the self-titled closer’s near fourteen-minute runtime). If you missed Miasmata’s latest on release day, go rectify that. Don’t let Subterrania get lost to the underground.

Dolphin Whisperer’s Autumnal Anomoly

夢遊病者 // РЛБ300119225 [October 28th, 2025 – Self Release]

As if plucked into lucidity from amidst a hazy, proggy machination, РЛБ30011922 steps into its narrative—an exploration of a beloved figure in its creator’s life, including sound clips describing the trials through which she persisted—with an entrancing stumble. Through an understated math rock lens, tight kit rhythms with a tension-building hi-hat clashes strut against a loud and leading bass voice across 37 minutes of fluid guitar textures. Whether it’s the chunky fusion reminiscent of Hackett-era Gordian Knot, the playful rhythmic post-rock that evokes a band like toe, or the fuzzed-out punctuation that tell a prog tale as ’70s King Crimson would, 夢遊病者, also known as Sleepwalker, makes their love of sound as clear as their love of РЛБ30011922’s inspiration. In a setting this free and detailed, not a single moment of this one-long-song opus passes by without taking a moment to focus on a given performer’s escalation in the drama of the movement. Wielding short guitar solos as segues into popping double-kick trots, spoken word exposition as pedal switch-up opportunities, all leading to a crescendo of bent and bluesy expression, 夢遊病者 succeeds in more than just holding an audience captive with their jammy and heartfelt statement. РЛБ30011922, like the shorter form releases that have graced these halls before, will have you coming back time and time again to explore its sentiments, which feel both traced from a dream yet rooted in rich, earthly tone pleasures.

Saunders’ Slinky Sneaks

Enragement // Extinguish All Existence [October 31st, 2025 – Transcending Obscurity]

The back end of 2025 has thrown down some delightfully vicious, chunkified, and straightforward death metal gems, courtesy of the likes of Depravity, Glorious Depravity and Terror Corpse. Not to be discounted, Finland’s Enragement dropped their own intense slab of brutal death on fourth LP, Extinguish All Existence. Cutting with any pleasantries, Enragement get down to business, slamming through a tight, burly collection of Americanized death, keenly treading a balance between thuggish beatdowns, chest-busting blasts, slammy, pig-squealing grooves, and more traditional, though deceptively diverse brutal death fare. Despite the certifiably crushing formula deployed, there is an air of accessibility, perhaps attributed to the clean but suitably beefy production job, bludgeoning, addictive grooves and sinister currents of atmospheric melody flowing through the album’s riff-centric veins. Thrashy, straightforward bursts of fury are tempered by more technical flourishes and an impressively versatile vocal assault. The likes of Devourment, Deeds of Flesh, Dawn of Demise and Benighted are perhaps fitting reference points, however, Enragement blast their own path of uncompromisingly heavy destruction.

Stephen Brodsky // Cut to the Core Vol. 1 [October 3rd, 2025 – Pax Aeturnum]

There are a couple of ways to broach this latest solo endeavor from lovable rogue and Cave In/Mutoid Man mastermind Stephen Brodsky. Brodsky delivers refreshed interpretations of various ’90s hardcore songs, reimagined in acoustic form. Those familiar with the original compositions will likely have fun dissecting and comparing the original anthems. While others, such as myself, largely unfamiliar with the originals, can enjoy these polished takes in their reimagined form, without comparison. Over the years, I have developed a strong connection with Brodsky’s works and come to appreciate his softer, acoustic flavorings. The likes of Snapcase, Converge, Texas is the Reason, Threadbare and By the Grace of God are some of the acts covered with typical style, zest, and emotion. Brodsky’s expressive and emotive delivery showcases both a loving appreciation of the material and deeper emotional connection that bleeds through the often darker, melancholic vibes of the acoustic constructions. The collection is remarkably consistent and infectious, highlighted by Brodsky’s crisp and soulful acoustic playing and distinctive singing voice on standout cuts, including “Windows” (Snapcase), “Benchwarmer” (Lincoln), “Fissures” (By the Grace of God), “Farewell Note to This City” (Converge), and “Voice” (Sense Field).

Soul Blind // Red Sky Mourning [October 10th, 2025 – Closed Casket Activities]

Riding a familiar wave of early ’00s alt-rock/metal and ’90s grungy nostalgia, New York’s Soul Blind emerge with sophomore LP, Red Sky Mourning. Although they tread dangerously close to overt derivation of prominent influences, including Alice in Chains, Deftones, and Helmet, Soul Blind manage to just stay afloat on their own terms. The dreamy melodies, chunky alt metal riffs, and soaring, Cantrell-esque vocal melodies cultivate some earwormy hooks and fuzzy, 90s/’00s feels. Soul Blind possess a knack for writing textured, mildly sludgy, infectious rock ditties, dabbling in shoegazing atmospherics, and sturdier alt metal territories along the way. Soul Blind relish in AIC inspired earworms (“Dyno,” “Hide Your Evil”), grittier, more aggressive alt metal fare (‘Billy,’ “New York Smoke”) and airy, indie pop-rock (“Thru the Haze”). Soul Blind have work to do to stand out from their influences and develop a more unique sound and robust character. However, the signs are positive for better things to come. Red Sky Mourning is a solid throwback album and handy companion piece to the equally nostalgia-inspired album from Bleed earlier in the year.

#2025 #Acoustic #Adrift #Aggravate #AliceInChains #AmericanMetal #AncientMonumentsAndModernSadness #Ancst #Anthrax #AsTheWorldTreeFell #AtmosphericBlackMetal #BlackCrossHotel #BlackMetal #Bleed #Bloodgutter #ByTheGraceOfGod #CanadianMetal #CanvasOfSilence #CattleDecapitation #CaveIn #ClosedCasketActivities #Converge #Crust #CutToTheCoreVol1 #DeathMetal #Deftones #Depravity #DiamondHead #DormantOrdeal #EdgewoodArsenalRecords #Enragement #ExtinguishAllExistence #FellOmen #Fellowship #FiadhProductions #FinnishMetal #FuneralDoom #FysiskFormatRecords #GalgerOgBrann #GloriousDepravity #GordianKnot #GrooveMetal #Grunge #HardRock #Hardcore #Havok #HeavyMetal #Helmet #HorrorPainGoreDeathProductions #IndependentRelease #IndustrialMetal #InternationalMetal #IronMaiden #JapaneseMetal #KillingJoke #KingCrimson #Lincoln #MadderMortem #MeAndThatMan #MelodicBlackMetal #Miasmata #Ministry #MutoidMan #MyDyingBride #NapalmDeath #NaturmachtProductions #NewZealandMetal #Nightwish #NorwegianMetal #Oct25 #Oromet #Ossuary #PaxAeternum #PigDestroyer #ProgressiveMetal #ProgressiveRock #RedSkyMourning #RepulsiveSummoning #Review #Reviews #RockshotsRecords #Rotpit #Sanguisugabogg #ScorchingTomb #SelfRelease #SelfReleased #SenseField #Skitsystem #Snapcase #SomeoddpilotReocrds #SongsForSwitches #SoulBlind #Soulfly #Starer #StephenBrodsky #StuckInTheFilter #StuckInTheFilter2025 #Subterrania #Sutratma #SymphonicMetal #TerrorCorpse #Testament #TexasIsTheReason #TheDarkElement #Theocracy #Threadbare #TimeToKillRecords #toe #Tragedy #TranscendingObsurityRecords #Uaar #ViolentTestimony #Vomitory #Windir #Xaoc #РЛБ30011922 #夢遊病者

Fellowship: dungeon WoW + combat Diablo/LoL! Accessibile, sfida scalabile, loot personale, classi varie. Early access su Steam con sconto lancio! #GiochiIndie #GiochiPC #NotizieVideogiochi #Videogiochi #Fellowship #Indie #PCGaming

👉 https://www.absolutegamer.it/il-nuovo-dungeon-crawler-fellowship-concentra-i-momenti-piu-memorabili-di-world-of-warcraft-in-un-arpg-che-valorizza-il-tuo-tempo/

Terra Atlantica – Oceans Review

By Kenstrosity

I had almost forgotten about German four-banger Terra Atlantica since I last covered them five years ago. Once my memory refreshed, I recalled what compelled me to snag Age of Steam in the first place: my love for steampunk. Far from the most dedicated—and perhaps even farther away from the best—piece of media based on that universe, Terra Atlantica nonetheless did sound appropriately grounded in a world propelled by superheated water. But their songwriting was too inconsistent to make a big splash with this sponge. With follow-up Oceans in tow, is their hope that Terra Atlantica will hoist my sails properly this time?

With a new lead guitarist, Terra Atlantica finds themselves armed with a more folk-driven base that sends their sea-faring stories even further into open water than ever before. Veering into jaunty pirate metal territory, Oceans boasts a wide variety of baubles and decorative deviations scattered around their cookie-cutter power metal foundation. Terra Atlantica’s unusually reedy vocals carry over from the last record, evoking a certain Muppet-y personality that I don’t hate, but which many could. Canned strings and horns make a resurgence as well, pushing Oceans deeper into symphonic territory. In short, Oceans is as cheesy a power metal record as can be without being Fellowship, only without even half the songwriting acumen.

In fact, songwriting is Oceans’ greatest downfall. Numbers that could’ve been great on their own merit find themselves stranded by downright infuriating choices. The greatest offenders are “Hoist the Sail,” ruined almost immediately once Terra Atlantica cribs the legendary “The Rake Hornpipe” for an overlong bridge and solo; and overblown closer “Oceans of Eternity,” which once again copies and pastes more than one segment from a piece of well-known classical music1 to pad its runtime without doing anything meaningful with them. Outside of those rage-inducing moments, though, there’s still very little substance to Oceans. Due to its dogged reliance on basic genre building blocks and banal lyrics, Oceans is effectively wall-to-wall tropes and fairytale pirate stereotypes (“Back to the Sea,” “Where My Brothers Await,” “Land of Submarines”).

Indeed, Oceans reminds me of a metallized The Muppet Treasure Island soundtrack, minus that masterpiece’s compositional excellence. Nonetheless, flashes of brilliance give me some hope that Terra Atlantica have the potential to write showstoppers worthy of positive comparisons to that iconic OST. “Raven in the Dark,” for example, might be the album’s strongest whole song, pumping a stadium-ready melody and boasting a sticky chorus and fun hair-metal solo. “Caribbean Shores,” too, maximizes its fun factor with a novel bit of tropical songwriting not often heard in power metal, unless you are Twilight Force. Additionally, I do appreciate the injection of real heft and a vaguely thrashy personality in “Turn of the Tide.” If these novelties and convincing attributes were integrated more successfully into a greater portion of Ocean’s runtime, the record would feel quite a bit different than what metal fans have been taught to expect from the symphonic power scene.

Unfortunately, Terra Atlantica only reinforce what metal fans learned to dread. To wit, a dearth of musical creativity in relation to material density, an overt abuse of classical standbys in the place of what should be original material (or at least a creative use of reference), and clear and present stereotyping in writing, theme, and lyrical content. What little hints of potential Terra Atlantica leave for listeners across Oceans’ relatively tight 49 minutes do not make up for the burden of uninspiring, sometimes outright annoying, material offered. Steer clear of this if you know what’s good for you, lads!

Rating: Bad
DR: 5 | Format Reviewed: 320 kb/s mp3
Label: Scarlet Records
Websites: terra-atlantica.de | facebook.com/terraatlantica
Releases Worldwide: September 26th, 2025

Show 1 footnote

1. We all know each of these melodies well, and I am almost completely sure they’re Mozart, but I cannot for the life of me find the name of the composition they’re from. ↩

#15 #2025 #Fellowship #FolkMetal #GermanMetal #Mozart #Oceans #PirateMetal #PowerMetal #Review #Reviews #ScarletRecords #Sep25 #SymphonicMetal #TerraAtlantica #TwilightForce

📣 A reminder that we have an open call for applications for a Postdoctoral Research Fellowship under the project 'SMS — Shared Memories of Solidarity. An oral and visual history (Portugal 1960-1974)', coordinated by Giulia Strippoli.

📅 Deadline: 25 August 2025

👉 https://ihc.fcsh.unl.pt/en/prf-sms-2025/

@histodons
@histodon
@anthropology

#Histodons #Anthropodons #OralHistory #Solidarity #EstadoNovo #HistóriaContemporânea #HistóriaOral #ArtesVisuais #Solidariedade #Fellowship #BolsaDeInvestigação #SMS

Calling #PostDocs and #Professors across disciplines!

At the University of Freiburg, one of Germany’s oldest and most prestigious universities, the Freiburg Institute for Advanced Studies (FRIAS) offers fellowships for researchers from all countries and disciplines to pursue their projects within a vibrant academic community.

Our programme for the Academic Year 2026/27:

🔹 Early Career Fellowships
- PhD obtained within the last 8 years
- at least 6 months of international academic experience
- duration: 4–10 months

🔹 Senior Fellowships
- PhD and at least 8 years of postdoc experience
- at least 6 months of international academic experience
- duration: 3–8 months

🔹 Sustainable Governance Senior Fellowship for researchers based in Africa
- Affiliated with an African academic institution
- PhD and 8+ years of postdoc experience
- at least 6 months of international academic experience
- Fields: Humanities & Social Sciences
- Duration: 6 months

Please check the link for detailed eligibility criteria: https://uni-freiburg.de/frias/funding/frias-fellowship-programmes/

📅 Deadline: 13 September 2025, 13:00 (CEST)

#FRIAS #Fellowship #Fellowships #ResearchFunding #Academicjobs

📣 We have opened a call for applications for a Postdoctoral Research Fellowship under the project 'SMS — Shared Memories of Solidarity. An oral and visual history (Portugal 1960-1974)', coordinated by Giulia Strippoli.

📅 Deadline: 25 August

👉 https://ihc.fcsh.unl.pt/en/prf-sms-2025/

@histodons
@histodon
@anthropology

#Histodons #Anthropodons #VisualArts #OralHistory #Solidarity #EstadoNovo #HistóriaContemporânea #HistóriaOral #ArtesVisuais #Solidariedade #Fellowship #BolsaDeInvestigação #SMS

Back to Flausch? Wie bekommen wir das "Social" in Social Media zurück? Lasst uns austauschen, diskutieren, rumspinnen und eine gemeinsame Vision entwickeln!

Helft mir und beantwortet meine erste Umfrage:
https://forms.gle/mqMbFoE32QPndZQx9

#ReinventSocialPlattforms #Fellowship #Reclaim

#callforapplications

Fellowships at the Käte Hamburger Research Centre "global dis:connect" Munich for the Academic Year 2026/2027

Deadline: 27 July 2025

👉 Further information: https://www.performing-arts.eu/de/news/newsstream/call-for-applications-fellowships-at-the-kate-hamburger-research-centre-global-disconnect/

#postdoctoralresearch #humanities #globalisation #PostDocFellowship #fellowship #munich #lmumunich

Panthalassan – From the Shallows of the Mantle Review

By GardensTale

Angry Metal Guy is an institution, and not just a mental one. Artists often dip into our comment section to express a fondness for our site specifically, and the review requests that land in our contact form are even more devoted (or attempting to ingratiate themselves by pretending to be; politics plays a part too!). The case of Panthalassan is a step further, though. It’s a one-man band inspired by bands we have hawked relentlessly: Lör and Wilderun. After playing guitar for Viathyn and Ravenous, Jake Wright sought to carve his own path, striking out on his own with only the drums of session musician and Viathyn bandmate Dave Crnković to accompany him. Have the AMG classics steered him true?

Well, it’s clear that one has had more pull than the other, because From the Shallows of the Mantle will sound fairly familiar for anyone who’s heard Lör’s In Forgotten Sleep. Lithe, winding guitars dish out multi-layered riffs and whirling solos alike, largely at dazzling speeds. The compositions are progressive, and though they don’t eschew choruses altogether, the tracks are arranged in a free-flowing form, prioritizing a musical narrative thread over rigid structure. And it must be said, Wright is a crack at the axe. There are enough great solos dotted across the running time to supply 3 albums, and the rapid and evolving melodic riffs thrill without fail. Just check the triumphant ascending chords that kick off “Coral Throne” or the Fellowship-worthy “By Shank’s Mare.” Cheesy? Sure. But it is some of the catchiest riffing I’ve heard yet this year.

Which is why it’s such a shame that both vocals and lyrics weigh on the album like an anchor. It’s not a technical disaster. Wright does glance off pitch on occasion, but he doesn’t veer completely wild. But sometimes I wish he would, because as adventurous as the guitars are, so safe and consequently flat is the vocal performance, leaving little room for emotional involvement. Exacerbating this issue are the lyrics. The text itself is not awful when read on paper; the problem is the near-total lack of flow, which is ironic considering its oceanic themes. I’m of the opinion that a good flow is the most important and oft-overlooked element of lyrics in music. You can sing about utter nonsense and I’ll suck it up like a sponge if you get your cadance and prosody right. But Panthalassan sounds stilted and awkward across most of the album, with ‘The gasp that slips my lips’ the tongue-twisting nadir. The difference it makes when it does fall into place, in the closer’s chorus, is downright startling. It makes me wonder how much better From the Shallows of the Mantle could have been with this issue resolved.

The quality of the instrumentation might have been enough to overcome the above issue, and it almost does. Besides the sweet guitars, Crnković does a solid job keeping up the pace on the drums, and the tracks weave enough variation and supplementary instruments into the compositions to stay reasonably fresh. Even so, more than an hour is a long sit, and most of the tracks that push past 7 minutes should not. “Worth My Salt” overuses the title phrase, and the extended outro on the back of the otherwise excellent “Embers on our Shore” drags it out even further. On the bright side, I do enjoy the production, which is light but doesn’t lack in power. The guitars are crystalline and the bass gets enough space; the only unfortunate consequence of the mix is the attention the vocals get, putting more emphasis on the shortcomings there.

Still, From the Shallows of the Mantle is a very promising debut for Panthalassan. Most of the issues with the album are surface-level, not fundamental. A re-examination of how to write vocal parts that flow well is in order, and that might in turn help entice a more passionate performance. I’m also curious to hear how Wright would fare trying to move away from the trappings of Lör’s fairly specific sound, something I’m convinced he has the chops to. That, as well as keeping the album more concise, would be more than enough to make the next installment of this oceanic saga a smash hit, because the bones are all there: solid songcraft, virtuoso play on every instrument, and a knack for a good hook.

Rating: 2.5/5.0
DR: 7 | Format Reviewed: PCM
Label: Self-released
Websites: panthalassan.bandcamp.com | facebook.com/panthalassan
Releases Worldwide: March 28th, 2025

#25 #2025 #CanadianMetal #Fellowship #FromTheShallowsOfTheMantle #Lör #Mar25 #Panthalassan #PowerMetal #ProgressiveMetal #Ravenous #Review #Reviews #SelfReleased #Viathyn #Wilderun

Panthalassan – From the Shallows of the Mantle Review

By GardensTale

Angry Metal Guy is an institution, and not just a mental one. Artists often dip into our comment section to express a fondness for our site specifically, and the review requests that land in our contact form are even more devoted (or attempting to ingratiate themselves by pretending to be; politics plays a part too!). The case of Panthalassan is a step further, though. It’s a one-man band inspired by bands we have hawked relentlessly: Lör and Wilderun. After playing guitar for Viathyn and Ravenous, Jake Wright sought to carve his own path, striking out on his own with only the drums of session musician and Viathyn bandmate Dave Crnković to accompany him. Have the AMG classics steered him true?

Well, it’s clear that one has had more pull than the other, because From the Shallows of the Mantle will sound fairly familiar for anyone who’s heard Lör’s In Forgotten Sleep. Lithe, winding guitars dish out multi-layered riffs and whirling solos alike, largely at dazzling speeds. The compositions are progressive, and though they don’t eschew choruses altogether, the tracks are arranged in a free-flowing form, prioritizing a musical narrative thread over rigid structure. And it must be said, Wright is a crack at the axe. There are enough great solos dotted across the running time to supply 3 albums, and the rapid and evolving melodic riffs thrill without fail. Just check the triumphant ascending chords that kick off “Coral Throne” or the Fellowship-worthy “By Shank’s Mare.” Cheesy? Sure. But it is some of the catchiest riffing I’ve heard yet this year.

Which is why it’s such a shame that both vocals and lyrics weigh on the album like an anchor. It’s not a technical disaster. Wright does glance off pitch on occasion, but he doesn’t veer completely wild. But sometimes I wish he would, because as adventurous as the guitars are, so safe and consequently flat is the vocal performance, leaving little room for emotional involvement. Exacerbating this issue are the lyrics. The text itself is not awful when read on paper; the problem is the near-total lack of flow, which is ironic considering its oceanic themes. I’m of the opinion that a good flow is the most important and oft-overlooked element of lyrics in music. You can sing about utter nonsense and I’ll suck it up like a sponge if you get your cadance and prosody right. But Panthalassan sounds stilted and awkward across most of the album, with ‘The gasp that slips my lips’ the tongue-twisting nadir. The difference it makes when it does fall into place, in the closer’s chorus, is downright startling. It makes me wonder how much better From the Shallows of the Mantle could have been with this issue resolved.

The quality of the instrumentation might have been enough to overcome the above issue, and it almost does. Besides the sweet guitars, Crnković does a solid job keeping up the pace on the drums, and the tracks weave enough variation and supplementary instruments into the compositions to stay reasonably fresh. Even so, more than an hour is a long sit, and most of the tracks that push past 7 minutes should not. “Worth My Salt” overuses the title phrase, and the extended outro on the back of the otherwise excellent “Embers on our Shore” drags it out even further. On the bright side, I do enjoy the production, which is light but doesn’t lack in power. The guitars are crystalline and the bass gets enough space; the only unfortunate consequence of the mix is the attention the vocals get, putting more emphasis on the shortcomings there.

Still, From the Shallows of the Mantle is a very promising debut for Panthalassan. Most of the issues with the album are surface-level, not fundamental. A re-examination of how to write vocal parts that flow well is in order, and that might in turn help entice a more passionate performance. I’m also curious to hear how Wright would fare trying to move away from the trappings of Lör’s fairly specific sound, something I’m convinced he has the chops to. That, as well as keeping the album more concise, would be more than enough to make the next installment of this oceanic saga a smash hit, because the bones are all there: solid songcraft, virtuoso play on every instrument, and a knack for a good hook.

Rating: 2.5/5.0
DR: 7 | Format Reviewed: PCM
Label: Self-released
Websites: panthalassan.bandcamp.com | facebook.com/panthalassan
Releases Worldwide: March 28th, 2025

#25 #2025 #CanadianMetal #Fellowship #FromTheShallowsOfTheMantle #Lör #Mar25 #Panthalassan #PowerMetal #ProgressiveMetal #Ravenous #Review #Reviews #SelfReleased #Viathyn #Wilderun

Panthalassan – From the Shallows of the Mantle Review

By GardensTale

Angry Metal Guy is an institution, and not just a mental one. Artists often dip into our comment section to express a fondness for our site specifically, and the review requests that land in our contact form are even more devoted (or attempting to ingratiate themselves by pretending to be; politics plays a part too!). The case of Panthalassan is a step further, though. It’s a one-man band inspired by bands we have hawked relentlessly: Lör and Wilderun. After playing guitar for Viathyn and Ravenous, Jake Wright sought to carve his own path, striking out on his own with only the drums of session musician and Viathyn bandmate Dave Crnković to accompany him. Have the AMG classics steered him true?

Well, it’s clear that one has had more pull than the other, because From the Shallows of the Mantle will sound fairly familiar for anyone who’s heard Lör’s In Forgotten Sleep. Lithe, winding guitars dish out multi-layered riffs and whirling solos alike, largely at dazzling speeds. The compositions are progressive, and though they don’t eschew choruses altogether, the tracks are arranged in a free-flowing form, prioritizing a musical narrative thread over rigid structure. And it must be said, Wright is a crack at the axe. There are enough great solos dotted across the running time to supply 3 albums, and the rapid and evolving melodic riffs thrill without fail. Just check the triumphant ascending chords that kick off “Coral Throne” or the Fellowship-worthy “By Shank’s Mare.” Cheesy? Sure. But it is some of the catchiest riffing I’ve heard yet this year.

Which is why it’s such a shame that both vocals and lyrics weigh on the album like an anchor. It’s not a technical disaster. Wright does glance off pitch on occasion, but he doesn’t veer completely wild. But sometimes I wish he would, because as adventurous as the guitars are, so safe and consequently flat is the vocal performance, leaving little room for emotional involvement. Exacerbating this issue are the lyrics. The text itself is not awful when read on paper; the problem is the near-total lack of flow, which is ironic considering its oceanic themes. I’m of the opinion that a good flow is the most important and oft-overlooked element of lyrics in music. You can sing about utter nonsense and I’ll suck it up like a sponge if you get your cadance and prosody right. But Panthalassan sounds stilted and awkward across most of the album, with ‘The gasp that slips my lips’ the tongue-twisting nadir. The difference it makes when it does fall into place, in the closer’s chorus, is downright startling. It makes me wonder how much better From the Shallows of the Mantle could have been with this issue resolved.

The quality of the instrumentation might have been enough to overcome the above issue, and it almost does. Besides the sweet guitars, Crnković does a solid job keeping up the pace on the drums, and the tracks weave enough variation and supplementary instruments into the compositions to stay reasonably fresh. Even so, more than an hour is a long sit, and most of the tracks that push past 7 minutes should not. “Worth My Salt” overuses the title phrase, and the extended outro on the back of the otherwise excellent “Embers on our Shore” drags it out even further. On the bright side, I do enjoy the production, which is light but doesn’t lack in power. The guitars are crystalline and the bass gets enough space; the only unfortunate consequence of the mix is the attention the vocals get, putting more emphasis on the shortcomings there.

Still, From the Shallows of the Mantle is a very promising debut for Panthalassan. Most of the issues with the album are surface-level, not fundamental. A re-examination of how to write vocal parts that flow well is in order, and that might in turn help entice a more passionate performance. I’m also curious to hear how Wright would fare trying to move away from the trappings of Lör’s fairly specific sound, something I’m convinced he has the chops to. That, as well as keeping the album more concise, would be more than enough to make the next installment of this oceanic saga a smash hit, because the bones are all there: solid songcraft, virtuoso play on every instrument, and a knack for a good hook.

Rating: 2.5/5.0
DR: 7 | Format Reviewed: PCM
Label: Self-released
Websites: panthalassan.bandcamp.com | facebook.com/panthalassan
Releases Worldwide: March 28th, 2025

#25 #2025 #CanadianMetal #Fellowship #FromTheShallowsOfTheMantle #Lör #Mar25 #Panthalassan #PowerMetal #ProgressiveMetal #Ravenous #Review #Reviews #SelfReleased #Viathyn #Wilderun

Panthalassan – From the Shallows of the Mantle Review

By GardensTale

Angry Metal Guy is an institution, and not just a mental one. Artists often dip into our comment section to express a fondness for our site specifically, and the review requests that land in our contact form are even more devoted (or attempting to ingratiate themselves by pretending to be; politics plays a part too!). The case of Panthalassan is a step further, though. It’s a one-man band inspired by bands we have hawked relentlessly: Lör and Wilderun. After playing guitar for Viathyn and Ravenous, Jake Wright sought to carve his own path, striking out on his own with only the drums of session musician and Viathyn bandmate Dave Crnković to accompany him. Have the AMG classics steered him true?

Well, it’s clear that one has had more pull than the other, because From the Shallows of the Mantle will sound fairly familiar for anyone who’s heard Lör’s In Forgotten Sleep. Lithe, winding guitars dish out multi-layered riffs and whirling solos alike, largely at dazzling speeds. The compositions are progressive, and though they don’t eschew choruses altogether, the tracks are arranged in a free-flowing form, prioritizing a musical narrative thread over rigid structure. And it must be said, Wright is a crack at the axe. There are enough great solos dotted across the running time to supply 3 albums, and the rapid and evolving melodic riffs thrill without fail. Just check the triumphant ascending chords that kick off “Coral Throne” or the Fellowship-worthy “By Shank’s Mare.” Cheesy? Sure. But it is some of the catchiest riffing I’ve heard yet this year.

Which is why it’s such a shame that both vocals and lyrics weigh on the album like an anchor. It’s not a technical disaster. Wright does glance off pitch on occasion, but he doesn’t veer completely wild. But sometimes I wish he would, because as adventurous as the guitars are, so safe and consequently flat is the vocal performance, leaving little room for emotional involvement. Exacerbating this issue are the lyrics. The text itself is not awful when read on paper; the problem is the near-total lack of flow, which is ironic considering its oceanic themes. I’m of the opinion that a good flow is the most important and oft-overlooked element of lyrics in music. You can sing about utter nonsense and I’ll suck it up like a sponge if you get your cadance and prosody right. But Panthalassan sounds stilted and awkward across most of the album, with ‘The gasp that slips my lips’ the tongue-twisting nadir. The difference it makes when it does fall into place, in the closer’s chorus, is downright startling. It makes me wonder how much better From the Shallows of the Mantle could have been with this issue resolved.

The quality of the instrumentation might have been enough to overcome the above issue, and it almost does. Besides the sweet guitars, Crnković does a solid job keeping up the pace on the drums, and the tracks weave enough variation and supplementary instruments into the compositions to stay reasonably fresh. Even so, more than an hour is a long sit, and most of the tracks that push past 7 minutes should not. “Worth My Salt” overuses the title phrase, and the extended outro on the back of the otherwise excellent “Embers on our Shore” drags it out even further. On the bright side, I do enjoy the production, which is light but doesn’t lack in power. The guitars are crystalline and the bass gets enough space; the only unfortunate consequence of the mix is the attention the vocals get, putting more emphasis on the shortcomings there.

Still, From the Shallows of the Mantle is a very promising debut for Panthalassan. Most of the issues with the album are surface-level, not fundamental. A re-examination of how to write vocal parts that flow well is in order, and that might in turn help entice a more passionate performance. I’m also curious to hear how Wright would fare trying to move away from the trappings of Lör’s fairly specific sound, something I’m convinced he has the chops to. That, as well as keeping the album more concise, would be more than enough to make the next installment of this oceanic saga a smash hit, because the bones are all there: solid songcraft, virtuoso play on every instrument, and a knack for a good hook.

Rating: 2.5/5.0
DR: 7 | Format Reviewed: PCM
Label: Self-released
Websites: panthalassan.bandcamp.com | facebook.com/panthalassan
Releases Worldwide: March 28th, 2025

#25 #2025 #CanadianMetal #Fellowship #FromTheShallowsOfTheMantle #Lör #Mar25 #Panthalassan #PowerMetal #ProgressiveMetal #Ravenous #Review #Reviews #SelfReleased #Viathyn #Wilderun

Angry Metal Guy’s Top Ten(ish) of 2024

By Angry Metal Guy

Starting 2025 with a bang was always important, and I elected the “being 26 days late with your Record o’ the Year post” as the best possible way to give everyone that patented Angry Metal Guy feeling of waiting and waiting only to be smacked in the face with 5000 words that you disagree with entirely. Welcome to the Wonderful World of Executive Dysfunction! Let’s make a list!1

Fifteen years of Angry Metal Guy and year 15 will be remembered as a genuinely good year for metal. There were several excellent releases I was genuinely excited about and as the year went on, things got even better. For the first time in a while, I felt like I had a glut of options and felt guilty about what was and wasn’t making the list. In terms of total performance, year 15 at AMG stayed roughly on par with 2023. We wrote 691 posts (mostly reviews), which, in terms of raw numbers, dropped to lower than 2023 and was once again the lowest since 2015. We made up for it in girth, however, with the average post sporting a whopping 955 words! This might be a case of the self-fulfilling prophecy biting me in the ass for consistently yelling at everyone for being overwriters at which point they see themselves as overwriters and begin to overwrite. Or, maybe it’s because we had fewer reviews to balance out the longer posts. Regardless, we finished with a “big-boned” 660,024 total words in 2024. We averaged 38,617 views a day, leading us to our second-highest annual readership numbers ever at 14,129,320 total page views; a tick down from last year, but that’s not surprising when we’re writing fewer posts.

The readership of AMG is as global as ever, but the USA, UK, and Canada retained their spots as 1, 2, and 3 on our Top 10(ish) Biggest Readerships. Germans continued to flock here in droves, maintaining their position at number 4 on our list with Australia coming in at healthy 5. I’m a bit surprised at Australia for not taking umbrage at getting beat by the Germans last year, but when you live in constant fear of your absolutely frightening environs, I guess that’s the least of your worries.2 Spots 6-9 are the same as last year with Netherlands, Sweden, France, and Spain. But coming in at number 10 was Finland! Our strategy of lauding Finnish bands is finally paying off. “How” you ask? Well, if I can get to celebrity status in Finland, I intend to go there so I can be awkwardly ignored in social situations by an entirely new population of Scandinavians. I was happy to see Poland sneak up to the coveted “ish” spot on the list, but that means Brazil dropped out of the Top 10(ish) and that sucks.3 We were once again visited a single time by a mysterious robed reader from the Vatican City and I want to extend a warm Angry Metal Guy welcome to the lone citizen of Micronesia who found their way to our sacred halls.

The biggest, coolest thing that happened in 2024 (following one of the shittiest things to happen in 2024) was, of course, helping Kenstrosity deal with the catastrophe that was his life following Hurricane Helene. It was so cool and gratifying to see just how generous and amazing the fans of AMG were and we’ll never forget your generosity. We also added n00bs—welcoming Alekhines Gun, Tyme, and Killjoy as new blood for the Bloodgod (with more coming, we promise)—and saw the return of the illustrious Mark Z. We lost—at least for the time being—Ferox at the end of the year and that sucks for all of us. But losing him to a burgeoning career as a showrunner and movie director seems like the kind of thing that isn’t such a bitter pill to swallow. Personally, alas, 2024 was pretty much the worst year of my life. The reason I equivocate is because every time I think something like that I can only think of Homer Simpson saying: “So far! The worst year of your life so far!” But 2024 was marred by a breakup I did not want and struggles with both my physical health and the obvious consequences thereof. I re-read my Top 10(ish) of 2023 and was amused in that “oh, sweet summer child” kind of way when I read:

On a personal note, this year [2023] was supposed to be one of the best of my life. It has been an unmitigated pile of shit, with only a few bright spots. As usual, I’ll try to make 2024 a better year, where I am Angry Metal Guy in practice, not just in spirit. A new year always brings unreasonable and unrealistic goals that get broken in shame by April, doesn’t it? Well, that’s mine.

Alas, that ended up being quite a bit more prescient than I could’ve anticipated given that it was the 31st of March when the Behind the Music voiceover guy had to step in: “Then tragedy struck…”

So, 2024 turned out to be significantly worse for me than 2023. That said, I did, in fact, work a lot more on AMG than I have in previous years and it’s helped me to create a map of how that’s possible for the future. Furthermore, I’m finally starting to understand the things at the root of my BS—beyond unfortunate and frustrating life circumstances or the fact that I’m a big worthless loser4—and I hope that results in some real progress. Because, when all is said and done, Angry Metal Guy has stood the test of time for a reason and I’m proud of it and want to be involved in it. I like the music, I like most of the people, I like hazing n00bs, and I like arguing incessantly about opinions. Even if I feel a little out of lockstep with metal trends in recent years, I still think that my voice is important here and I want to have it here. And it’s thanks to everyone here, particularly Steel Druhm, Dr. Grier, and the other helpers, as well as the writers and of course, the readers, who have kept this all afloat while I am trying to solve the mystery that is my brain.

To moderate expectations for 2025! Here’s the Top 10(ish) of 2024.

#ish 2: Dawn Treader // Bloom & Decay [August 24th | Liminal Dread Productions | Bandcamp] — I’m relatively certain that if you had polled the writers and readers of AngryMetalGuy.com and asked them to predict this list, Dawn Treader’s Bloom & Decay would not have come even remotely close to placing on my Top 10(ish). And it makes sense. Dawn Treader traffics in a genre of black metal that I rail on at every chance. At this point, my personality is basically constructed of jokes about how calling something atmospheric just means they use a lot of reverb. And yeah, Bloom & Decay uses inordinate amounts of reverb, I can’t deny it. But better, Ross Connell subverts the ‘one-man black metal project’ tropes by being good, actually. The record is emotionally poignant, musically rich, and laden with pathos—causing that aching bloom in my chest while listening to what feels at times like sad songs playing in major keys. If there’s one reason I haven’t been back to this album as much as other things, it’s because it’s hard to listen to at times. The messages contained here and the way they are delivered can be challenging at times; long discursive samples that are hard to have repeated back at you time and again in a time of a lot of despair. Still, that’s hardly a knock against Dawn Treader’s work, there are a lot of people who would suggest that it’s exactly that which makes Bloom & Decay art. And there’s no question in my mind that Bloom & Decay is a work of art.

#ish 1: Verikalpa // Tuomio [April 19th, 2024 | Scarlet Records | Bandcamp] — But then again, who needs serious emotionally poignant works of art when you can listen to Finnish guys writing amazing blackened melodeath that heavily features faux accordion and lyrics, presumably, about drinking? I feel a bit guilty that these guys have yet to make a number on the list—having previously been relegated to an -ish—but they are getting better and better and Tuomio has been a joy to listen to in a year where almost nothing else brought me joy. In a way, Verikalpa’s sound is a form of nostalgiacore for me—with its 2004 production, its 2004 riffs, and my 2004 urge to drink beer and headbang. But, as Steel Druhm would argue out of pure self-interest, some things are timeless and change is bad, so this isn’t a critique. And while the metal-listening public lost its taste for folk metal after the glut that was released in the late 2000s, I find Verikalpa avoids the pitfalls of the sound, delivering only the highest quality riffs and blasts. Loaded with groove and chunky riffs, Verikalpa knows how to write solid, speedy, fun, and brutal metal that will make you want to drink a beer and lift some weights. And again, what more can we truly ask of any metal band? If you aren’t listening to and loving Verikalpa by now, you’re missing out. Of all the Finnish releases with dated sounds this year, Tuomio is the best.

#10: Grendel’s Sÿster // Katabasis into the Abaton [August 30th, 2024 | Sur Del Cruz Music | Bandcamp] — If there was a major “I did not see that coming” moment in 2024, it was that Grendel’s Sÿster never left my playlist once I heard it for the first time. An addictive record, I summed it up best when I wrote that “this German four-piece drops metal that reeks of patchouli and ‘Atomkraft? Nein, Danke!‘ to surprising effect. The core of Grendel’s Sÿster’s sound is the combination of fuzzy guitars, bubbly p-bass, and boxy drums into something that will undoubtedly call to mind the ’70s hard rock of your choice: Wishbone Ash, Jethro Tull, Thin Lizzy or nostalgia merchants like Gygax.” And that sound—not a sound that I spend my free time chasing down—could be directly shot into my veins and I couldn’t be happier. There’s something pure and honest and beautiful about this music. It is both poppy and niche, both pretentious and utterly not; it breaks down binaries and exists in the interstices. And goddammit, it’s what one roadie for Porcupine Tree once said of Blaze’s first three records, “it’s good, honest heavy metal.” And that’s it. The cream rises to the top; good songwriting always wins. And Katabasis into the Abaton is loaded with great songs, fun ideas, and idiosyncratic vocals. It’s surprising in all the right ways.

#9: Oceans of Slumber // Where Gods Fear to Speak [September 13th, 2024 | Season of Mist | Bandcamp] — Some experiences are unforgettable, and getting to see Oceans of Slumber in the summer of 2024 and really hear Cammie Beverly live was one such experience. There are few people in the world who truly have a Voice with a capital V and Cammie is one of them. The band’s performance was entrancing and her presence was commanding. It was literal goosebumps. I had been enjoying Where Gods Fear to Speak for a few weeks at that point, but seeing Oceans of Slumber live transformed my entire understanding of the unique strengths contained herein. Between her voice, genuinely progressive—and at times challenging—songwriting, and the fantastic performances, Where Gods Fear to Speak sounds like the culmination of the band’s career. Having learned from the past and meshed it all, listeners are left with something transcendent, beautiful, and the perfect balance of heavy and delicate. If there’s one knock on this record, it’s that people may struggle with a flowing relationship to song structure and hooks. But for the sophisticated listener, each song on Where Gods Fear to Speak is a beautiful step on an unforgettable journey.

#8: Iotunn // Kinship [October 25th, 2024 | Metal Blade Records | Bandcamp] — Hard truth time: I was never super enamored in Access All Worlds. While the blog and the commentariat were busy heaping praise upon the best band to come out of Denmark since Mercyful Fate, I held my tongue and gave them the spotlight they deserved because I was in a definite minority. But the record never inspired me. So, I approached Kinship with skepticism. I love Jón’s voice—this is no secret—but at 68 minutes long with 10-minute songs and one record in the bag I hadn’t felt… you know how it goes. I was happily surprised when Kinship hooked me hard. Jón’s voice brings everything together, but the blackened undercurrent spicing up the melodeath riffing (pretty sure Amon Amarth called their lawyers about a couple of the riffs in “The Anguished Ethereal”) matched with an epic scope that could be carried only by someone with the brass timbre and Grondesque vocal power of Aldará. I have been back to this again and again since I broke down and dropped it on the proverbial turntable. It is deep enough to keep me coming back, it’s hooky enough to kick that dopamine into high gear, and it’s beautiful and well-crafted with that aching Scandy melancholy that I crave. Bravo, Iotunn, this is a real first step towards me forgiving your spelling of ‘jotun’ and the Stockholm Bloodbath.

#7: Fellowship // The Skies above Eternity [November 22nd, 2024 | Scarlet Records | Bandcamp] — I am hardly the first person to note that it’s difficult to follow a beloved record. I think it’s even harder to follow a beloved debut. And I doubt there’s an album that’s been released in recent years that is as beloved as Fellowship’s debut, The Saberlight Chronicles. Putting the hopes and fate of the Europower scene in the hands of these tiny pastoral persons and sending them off to Mordor was never a good idea. But surprise, surprise, they survived!5 And they’re back with an album that has inspired the kind of dedication that only the rare band ever gets close to, landing super high on people’s lists despite being a late November release. And you can hear why. The Skies above Eternity is yet another 45ish minutes of fantastic, guitar-driven melodic power metal that simultaneously rules and takes itself seriously enough to have good, interesting, relatable, and at times inspiring lyrics while also embracing the fun and natural, inherent silliness of power metal. That’s a hard balance to strike and Fellowship nails it with aplomb. They say you don’t want to be the guy who follows The Guy, you want to be the guy who follows the guy who follows The Guy. I suspect The Skies above Eternity will always be slightly underrated because it isn’t The Saberlight Chronicles. But fuck me if it isn’t excellent.

#6: Devenial Verdict // Blessing of Despair [October 4th | Transcending Obscurity Records | Bandcamp] — I knew that these kids from Finland were alright when I jokingly called them “Morbid Angelcore” on Instagram and they took it with grace.6 Honestly, of all the stuff that the “No Fun, Only Reverb and Feels!” flank of AMG has dredged up and dumped hyperbolic praise on, Devenial Verdict is one of the bands to which I feel the most grateful to have been exposed. Often sold as either “dissodeath” or “atmospheric death metal,” because they’re both wildly popular subgenres of death metal, both feel like misnomers. Rather, Blessing of Despair is an album loaded with memorable moments and melodies, and while it does, indeed, employ a lot of “atmosphere,”7 I was not prepared for the elite-level Azagthoth-on-LSD riffs that litter Blessing of Despair. I wouldn’t say that Blessing of Despair is OSDM, but the riffing evokes the masters in ways both direct and subtle and it gives the record an impeccable vibe. Devenial Verdict has wrought a brilliant death metal album where riffs abound, the atmosphere is set on the “Cathedral” setting, and every song is better than the last. Maybe the best word to use to describe their x factor is gravitas. But whatever it is, Devenial Verdict’s got it in spades.

#5: Octoploid // Beyond the Aeons [July 5th, 2024 | Reigning Phoenix Music | Bandcamp] — The amount of love that Beyond the Aeons isn’t receiving is one of the scandals of 2024, in my opinion. This started with our own positive—but tepid, if I’m honest—review of Beyond the Aeons and has continued through Listurnalia. As a passive, but legitimate, autocrat of Angry Metal Guy, I have half a mind to shut this place down over this deep disrespect for Amorphiscore. Honestly, it pains me not to make Beyond the Aeons the #1 album,8 because I have listened to these 33 minutes of extreme metal—occasionally tremmy and black, but mostly just solid melodeath—more than almost anything else this year. Tracks like “Coast of the Drowned Sailors” feed my need for new Amorphis and my secret wish that they were heavier. And that’s one thing I’ll give Octoploid, unlike Barren Earth, Beyond the Aeons doesn’t dwell too long on anything. It kicks off and speeds along, hitting you with catchy leads in the key of Moomin and doubled with synth—as one does. Don’t sleep on Octoploid. Beyond the Aeons is energetic, fun, catchy, and worth at least a couple of spins a week six months after it was released.

#4: Opeth // The Last Will and Testament [November 22nd, 2024 | Moderbolaget] — What Opeth has accomplished on The Last Will and Testament is remarkable. Unlike so many bands, Opeth’s reimaginations of its sound still speak to me. The Last Will and Testament is a smart, coherent, and melodramatic record that does Mikael Åkerfeldt and crew credit. The reason that this record elevates itself above the ceiling that most Newpeth lived under, however, is that they are finally able to turn the music up to 11 again compositionally. After more than a decade without the emotional and compositional peak (and release) of a guttural growl released from the diaphragm over a particularly chunky riff or heavy drums, The Last Will and Testament continues the band’s development but gives them a release valve—”§4″ being the highlight for me, where they transition from Opethro Tull—a jazz flute solo—to Deathro Tull with some operatic, but dour, death metal. And it simply feels good to hear them doing both of these things simultaneously. Having gone through and relistened to the discography at length, it is striking how Opeth circa 2024 sounds very little like the band I fell in love with in the late-’90s/early aughts. To be able to both be markedly different and feel like the same band is a deeply underrated trait. This could have been higher if I’d had longer with it.

#3: Fleshgod Apocalypse // Opera [August 23rd, 2024 | Nuclear Blast Records | Bandcamp] — I knew almost immediately that Opera was going to be a controversial record. I was not prepared for the hyperbolic pushback that Opera garnered from fans of Italy’s death metal answer to [Luca (Turilli / Lione)’s] Rhapsody [of Fire] for being, as I wrote myself, “undeniably poppy.” Sometimes I think that we fans of the extreme metal scene have lost sight of what pop music really is. The fact that people have been heaping scorn on Fleshgod Apocalypse for writing operatic death metal because Veronica Bordacchini doesn’t only sing using proper operatic technique and the band simplified some of its compositional tendencies is, to put it lightly, patently absurd. Opera is fun! It’s energetic and well-crafted, and it has a better excuse for writing more palatable and less grandiose music that uses more traditional pop and rock compositional structures than Nightwish ever had,9 and it literally has dramatic choirs arpeggiating in Latin behind grinding blast beats and death metal growls as I’m writing this blurb! Fucking get over yourselves. Go enjoy the shit out of Opera. No one sounds like Fleshgod Apocalypse and when they hit, they fucking hit. And Opera hits! It is thematically interesting, deeply personal, and cohesive in the way that the best albums are while featuring a diverse and excellent performance from Bordacchini. Easily one of the best records of 2024.

#2: Kanonenfieber // Die Urkatastrophe [September 20th, 2024 | Century Media | Bandcamp] — One of the things that makes the work at Angry Metal Guy interesting after 15 years is editing other writers’ work. It’s a pleasure to get to talk to, work with, and help guide the brilliant writers that we have working here. And because I want to hear what I’m reading about at the same time, I listen to a lot of music I would not necessarily have chosen to listen to myself. Noise’s work—such as 2023’s #5 record Leiþa—has come to my attention because of the work that Carcharodon has done in covering his projects. So, when I went to edit Die Urkatastrophe, well aware of the impending 5.0, I was edified to read a well-argued analysis that highlighted for me exactly what it was that appealed to me so much about Kanonenfieber’s critically acclaimed10 platter. Die Urkatastrophe is a powerful album that walks the line between black and death metal, with surprisingly polished and smooth production and artfully crafted songs. Like so many of the best albums, it is both thematically coherent and full of standout moments. Arresting moments like the gunshot at the end of “Der Maulwurf,” the best-placed samples since Velvet Darkness They Fear, and a superb flow make Die Urkatastrophe a triumph that we’ll return to for years.

#1: Hamferð // Men Guðs hond er sterk [March 22nd, 2024 | Metal Blade Records | Bandcamp] — The best album of 2024 was an undeniably easy choice this year. Released the day after my life started falling to pieces, Hamferð’s third masterpiece is a tale of tragedy (with a smidgen of hope), driven by strong songwriting and stronger performances. There are plenty of things that one can point to that help to differentiate Men Guðs hond er sterk from the field this year: the band’s sound is expertly crafted, and with pristine production, and the band—who apparently records without a click track?!—carries the emotional weight of their music perfectly despite the largely opaque language in which it’s presented.11 Furthermore, enough cannot be said about the powerhouse of a vocalist that Hamferð is fortunate enough to have. Jón Aldará’s vocals carry the day with a brassy baritone that evokes the mourning that all doom peddlers are chasing but so few nail. Men Guðs hond er sterk is tight, it’s heavy—though not as heavy as its predecessor, which I missed—but more importantly it’s complete and brilliant and my Record o’ the Year for 2024.

Honorable Mentions:

In Vain // Solemn [April 19th, 2024 | Indie Recordings | Bandcamp] — Having been released when I was in the moment of absolute denial and despair as my life fell apart, you’ll forgive me for not having heard this album until the last couple months of 2024. And I suspect that if I had been able to spend more time with it, it would have worked its way onto the list proper (though, man, it’s hard to know what would go). Once again, In Vain does such an outstanding job of balancing all the different sounds and influences, and I will never get sick of any clean vocals from the brothers Nedland (RIP Solefald). These guys are great and Solemn keeps them batting 1.000.

Ulcerate // Cutting the Throat of God [June 14th | Debemur Morti Productions | Bandcamp] — Another album that should’ve been higher on my list (but where would I have put Verikalpa then, guys!?). Ulcerate has been awesome and it’s almost unremarkable that they continue to be awesome in new and different ways. The thing that I keep coming back to Cutting the Throat of God for is the fact that these are probably the band’s most addictive and hypnotic riffs. Their sound has always had a fluidity that made them unique, but there are times when I feel like a snake being charmed as I’m listening to Ulcerate pump out fascinating, liquid riffs that seem to morph in scope and feel without ever breaking stride. Another record that is getting the shaft on this list.

Sonata Arctica // Clear Cold Beyond [March 8th, 2024 | Atomic Fire Records] — I started out skeptical about Clear Cold Beyond, and then I ended up loving it. The problem is that this was another record caught up in the Great Dumping o’ 2024 and got lost in the mix. This album has the benefit of having some really fun “we’re sorry we wrote Talviyö and then released two fucking acoustic cover records in a row” moments, but it’s not just an apology tour.12 The strength of Clear Cold Beyond is watching Kakko do the things he’s best at: write about creepy dudes with seriously bad boundaries (“Dark Empath”); write awkward lyrics about social topics that are kind of funny but also maybe not (“California”); and most importantly is his transformation into Dad Rocker (“The Best Things”). This record didn’t ever threaten to be Top 10, but it also deserves a nod for bringing me a ton of joy, even if I can’t listen to “The Best Things” without getting choked up.

Anciients // Beyond the Reach of the Sun [August 30th, 2024 | Season of Mist | Bandcamp] — I have been a little back and forth with Anciients, but Beyond the Reach of the Sun was an absolute banger that got snubbed for a Record o’ the Month spot, despite receiving an excellently written, laudatory review from Saunders. And perpetual self-editing complaints aside, Anciients is one of those bands whose ability to craft Riffs is unmatched. Every single song on this album has one of those Riffs—not just riffs, gotta capitalize that R so everyone knows that we’re talking about iconic stuff here—and I am, frankly, jealous of the feel and groove that these guys seem to have as second nature. This album clicked for me when I put it in the cans on a flight and just sat and listened to it and man, we are spoiled with an absolute embarrassment of riches in metal. These guys are an honorable mention? It’s unfair.

Caligula’s Horse // Charcoal Grace [January 26th, 2024 | InsideOut Records | Bandcamp] — After it was summarily 3.0’d by the guy who brought you the Angra list everyone thought was absolute crap, I feel like everyone just forgot about Charcoal Grace. But I’m going to be honest with you, this record deserved a lot better than it got at the hands of the traitorous reviewer who poo-poohed it and then, allegedly, went on to kick his dog and demand his wife make him a sandwich. This is a more subtle Caligula’s Horse, I admit. How they seem to be swapping places with Haken becomes more manifest with every release. But this record is a true headphones album that deserves a hi-def version of the release, serious cans, and a dark room. It’s loaded with great riffs and fantastic songs and has a particularly poignant and powerful closing. Also, the level of detail here is unreal. Appreciate what you have while they are still putting out amazing albums.

Noxis // Violence Inherent in the System [June 28th, 2024 | Rotted Life Records | Bandcamp] — One of the surprises of the year is an album named after one of the funniest jabs at the anarchosyndicalists in our lives. Noxis’ brand of frantic, technical death metal—complete with my favorite snare of the year—has swept through the Angry Metal Guy staff for a reason. The reason? It’s fucking great. At 45 minutes, Violence Inherent in the System is a record with the energy and addictiveness of Gorod, even if the songwriting chops aren’t quite on that level yet. But you don’t have to be Gorod-good to be good and Noxis is good. I’m looking forward to their sophomore release Scimitars Thrown in Farcical Aquatic Ceremonies, due Q4 2025/Q1 2026.

Madder Mortem // Old Eyes, New Heart [January 26th, 2024 | Dark Essence Records | Bandcamp] — In my Record o’ the Month blurb for Old Eyes, New Heart, I wrote “What Old Eyes, New Heart does is show Madder Mortem as alive and creative as ever, showcasing a more vulnerable, introspective side of themselves. Tracks like ‘Here and Now’ and ‘Cold Hard Rain’ weep with power and raw emotion, giving fans all the feelz they yearn for, and there’s simmering anger girding the material as well. As GardensTale noted, regarding the very personal, intense feeling of the new music: ‘Old Eyes, New Heart will stand as one of the most intimate and therapeutic albums we’re bound to get this year.’ And who isn’t going to need a little bit of therapy in 2024?” Yeah, I found myself listening to this album a lot this year because it expresses what I couldn’t. Again, prescient.

Blood Incantation // Absolute Elsewhere [October 4th, 2024 | Century Media Records | Bandcamp] — Yeah, it’s fine I guess. A little overhyped in the comment section, though. Remember that time when it got released and everyone who hadn’t heard it yet was like “RECORD OF THE YEAR!!!!!!1!” five minutes later? Pepperidge Farms remembers.

Top 10(ish) Songs o’ the Year:

#ish: Karol G // “Si Antes Te Hubiera Conocido” — Fuck you.

#10: Sonata Arctica // “The Best Things” — Fans of the band and this album are going to laugh, but this song kills me. Dad rock. I love it.

#9: Wintersun // “Storm” — When I saw everyone sporting “Silver Leaves” as the highlight of Time II, I had to do a double-take. As I covered at length in my review, the one song that I felt lived up to Jaari’s potential as a player and composer was “Storm,” and this track is a fucking doozy. This track perfectly executes both the blend of blackened death metal and power metal that makes Wintersun’s inability to produce something truly epic frustrating. If I had only heard “Ominous Clouds” and “Storm,” Time II would’ve gotten a 4.5. This is the only memorable thing he wrote on the entire album.

#8: Oceans of Slumber // “Wish” — It’s weird the tracks that call to you on an album. I love this whole record for a bunch of different reasons, but on “Wish” there are little melodic things that Cammie does here that make my heart ache. The lyrics, too. I feel ’em. Deeply underrated record.

#7: Fellowship // “Victim” — “I swear, I won’t always feel like a victim! I won’t always fight on my own! So, forgive me these transgressions as I live a life of lessons and I grow to overshadow darker thrones! This king is king alone!”

#6: Opeth // “§4” — No more perfect encapsulation of why Opeth is impressive than how hard they nailed this song. Love the porn beat with the Ian Anderson flute solo (Deathro Tull, lol) that gives way to stadium rock that gives way to grindy death metal. Just inject that fucking shit straight into my fucking veins. Unff.

#5: Grendel’s Sÿster // “Cosmogony” — This song is metal as fuck. I love the fun little extra beat they drop in to make it feel like a slightly lopsided wheel rolling along. But there’s nothing about this that doesn’t live up to what I wrote above: good, honest heavy metal. Catchy, riffy, and fun to listen to. Top it off with a bass-heavy section and a gallop carried on the guitar and you’ve got yourself a recipe for an epic, addictive track. More of this, plz.

#4: Fleshgod Apocalypse // “Morphine Waltz” — This song fucking rules. From the opening strains with the horn section in the orchestra to the 3/4 time signature (y’know, ’cause it’s actually a waltz), to the raw, punky performance from Bordacchini. Extra points for the fucking balls to the wall bridge with the huge choirs before the guitar solo. Like, how do you fucking people not think this is one of the best albums of the year? JFC.

#3: Caligula’s Horse // “Mute” — One of Caligula’s Horse’s strongest traits is their ability to write epic conclusions to their albums. “Mute” is up there with “Graves” in terms of the sheer weightiness of the whole thing—though this time it’s more delicate. Beautiful.

#2: Anciients // “Despoiled” — Riff of the year at 3:57. Gives me involuntary metal face. Love the vocal melodies, too. Great stuff.

#1: Madder Mortem // “Things I’ll Never Do” — This song fucking kills me. Has anyone checked on their lyricist recently?

#2024 #Anciients #AngryMetalGuy #AngryMetalGuySRecordSOTheYear #AngryMetalGuySTop10Ish_ #BeyondTheAeons #BlessingOfDespair #BloodIncantation #BloomDecay #CaligulaSHorse #DawnTreader #DevenialVerdict #DieUrkatastrophe #Fellowship #FleshgodApocalypse #GrendelSSÿster #Hamferð #InVain #Iotunn #Kanonenfieber #KarolG #KatabasisIntoTheAbaton #Kinship #Listurnalia2024 #MadderMortem #MenGuðsHondErSterk #Noxis #OceansOfSlumber #Octoploid #Opera #Opeth #SonataArctica #TheLastWillAndTestament #TheSkiesAboveEternity #TimeII #Tuomio #Ulcerate #Verikalpa #WhereGodsFearToSpeak #Wintersun

Angry Metal Guy’s Top Ten(ish) of 2024

By Angry Metal Guy

Starting 2025 with a bang was always important, and I elected the “being 26 days late with your Record o’ the Year post” as the best possible way to give everyone that patented Angry Metal Guy feeling of waiting and waiting only to be smacked in the face with 5000 words that you disagree with entirely. Welcome to the Wonderful World of Executive Dysfunction! Let’s make a list!1

Fifteen years of Angry Metal Guy and year 15 will be remembered as a genuinely good year for metal. There were several excellent releases I was genuinely excited about and as the year went on, things got even better. For the first time in a while, I felt like I had a glut of options and felt guilty about what was and wasn’t making the list. In terms of total performance, year 15 at AMG stayed roughly on par with 2023. We wrote 691 posts (mostly reviews), which, in terms of raw numbers, dropped to lower than 2023 and was once again the lowest since 2015. We made up for it in girth, however, with the average post sporting a whopping 955 words! This might be a case of the self-fulfilling prophecy biting me in the ass for consistently yelling at everyone for being overwriters at which point they see themselves as overwriters and begin to overwrite. Or, maybe it’s because we had fewer reviews to balance out the longer posts. Regardless, we finished with a “big-boned” 660,024 total words in 2024. We averaged 38,617 views a day, leading us to our second-highest annual readership numbers ever at 14,129,320 total page views; a tick down from last year, but that’s not surprising when we’re writing fewer posts.

The readership of AMG is as global as ever, but the USA, UK, and Canada retained their spots as 1, 2, and 3 on our Top 10(ish) Biggest Readerships. Germans continued to flock here in droves, maintaining their position at number 4 on our list with Australia coming in at healthy 5. I’m a bit surprised at Australia for not taking umbrage at getting beat by the Germans last year, but when you live in constant fear of your absolutely frightening environs, I guess that’s the least of your worries.2 Spots 6-9 are the same as last year with Netherlands, Sweden, France, and Spain. But coming in at number 10 was Finland! Our strategy of lauding Finnish bands is finally paying off. “How” you ask? Well, if I can get to celebrity status in Finland, I intend to go there so I can be awkwardly ignored in social situations by an entirely new population of Scandinavians. I was happy to see Poland sneak up to the coveted “ish” spot on the list, but that means Brazil dropped out of the Top 10(ish) and that sucks.3 We were once again visited a single time by a mysterious robed reader from the Vatican City and I want to extend a warm Angry Metal Guy welcome to the lone citizen of Micronesia who found their way to our sacred halls.

The biggest, coolest thing that happened in 2024 (following one of the shittiest things to happen in 2024) was, of course, helping Kenstrosity deal with the catastrophe that was his life following Hurricane Helene. It was so cool and gratifying to see just how generous and amazing the fans of AMG were and we’ll never forget your generosity. We also added n00bs—welcoming Alekhines Gun, Tyme, and Killjoy as new blood for the Bloodgod (with more coming, we promise)—and saw the return of the illustrious Mark Z. We lost—at least for the time being—Ferox at the end of the year and that sucks for all of us. But losing him to a burgeoning career as a showrunner and movie director seems like the kind of thing that isn’t such a bitter pill to swallow. Personally, alas, 2024 was pretty much the worst year of my life. The reason I equivocate is because every time I think something like that I can only think of Homer Simpson saying: “So far! The worst year of your life so far!” But 2024 was marred by a breakup I did not want and struggles with both my physical health and the obvious consequences thereof. I re-read my Top 10(ish) of 2023 and was amused in that “oh, sweet summer child” kind of way when I read:

On a personal note, this year [2023] was supposed to be one of the best of my life. It has been an unmitigated pile of shit, with only a few bright spots. As usual, I’ll try to make 2024 a better year, where I am Angry Metal Guy in practice, not just in spirit. A new year always brings unreasonable and unrealistic goals that get broken in shame by April, doesn’t it? Well, that’s mine.

Alas, that ended up being quite a bit more prescient than I could’ve anticipated given that it was the 31st of March when the Behind the Music voiceover guy had to step in: “Then tragedy struck…”

So, 2024 turned out to be significantly worse for me than 2023. That said, I did, in fact, work a lot more on AMG than I have in previous years and it’s helped me to create a map of how that’s possible for the future. Furthermore, I’m finally starting to understand the things at the root of my BS—beyond unfortunate and frustrating life circumstances or the fact that I’m a big worthless loser4—and I hope that results in some real progress. Because, when all is said and done, Angry Metal Guy has stood the test of time for a reason and I’m proud of it and want to be involved in it. I like the music, I like most of the people, I like hazing n00bs, and I like arguing incessantly about opinions. Even if I feel a little out of lockstep with metal trends in recent years, I still think that my voice is important here and I want to have it here. And it’s thanks to everyone here, particularly Steel Druhm, Dr. Grier, and the other helpers, as well as the writers and of course, the readers, who have kept this all afloat while I am trying to solve the mystery that is my brain.

To moderate expectations for 2025! Here’s the Top 10(ish) of 2024.

#ish 2: Dawn Treader // Bloom & Decay [August 24th | Liminal Dread Productions | Bandcamp] — I’m relatively certain that if you had polled the writers and readers of AngryMetalGuy.com and asked them to predict this list, Dawn Treader’s Bloom & Decay would not have come even remotely close to placing on my Top 10(ish). And it makes sense. Dawn Treader traffics in a genre of black metal that I rail on at every chance. At this point, my personality is basically constructed of jokes about how calling something atmospheric just means they use a lot of reverb. And yeah, Bloom & Decay uses inordinate amounts of reverb, I can’t deny it. But better, Ross Connell subverts the ‘one-man black metal project’ tropes by being good, actually. The record is emotionally poignant, musically rich, and laden with pathos—causing that aching bloom in my chest while listening to what feels at times like sad songs playing in major keys. If there’s one reason I haven’t been back to this album as much as other things, it’s because it’s hard to listen to at times. The messages contained here and the way they are delivered can be challenging at times; long discursive samples that are hard to have repeated back at you time and again in a time of a lot of despair. Still, that’s hardly a knock against Dawn Treader’s work, there are a lot of people who would suggest that it’s exactly that which makes Bloom & Decay art. And there’s no question in my mind that Bloom & Decay is a work of art.

#ish 1: Verikalpa // Tuomio [April 19th, 2024 | Scarlet Records | Bandcamp] — But then again, who needs serious emotionally poignant works of art when you can listen to Finnish guys writing amazing blackened melodeath that heavily features faux accordion and lyrics, presumably, about drinking? I feel a bit guilty that these guys have yet to make a number on the list—having previously been relegated to an -ish—but they are getting better and better and Tuomio has been a joy to listen to in a year where almost nothing else brought me joy. In a way, Verikalpa’s sound is a form of nostalgiacore for me—with its 2004 production, its 2004 riffs, and my 2004 urge to drink beer and headbang. But, as Steel Druhm would argue out of pure self-interest, some things are timeless and change is bad, so this isn’t a critique. And while the metal-listening public lost its taste for folk metal after the glut that was released in the late 2000s, I find Verikalpa avoids the pitfalls of the sound, delivering only the highest quality riffs and blasts. Loaded with groove and chunky riffs, Verikalpa knows how to write solid, speedy, fun, and brutal metal that will make you want to drink a beer and lift some weights. And again, what more can we truly ask of any metal band? If you aren’t listening to and loving Verikalpa by now, you’re missing out. Of all the Finnish releases with dated sounds this year, Tuomio is the best.

#10: Grendel’s Sÿster // Katabasis into the Abaton [August 30th, 2024 | Sur Del Cruz Music | Bandcamp] — If there was a major “I did not see that coming” moment in 2024, it was that Grendel’s Sÿster never left my playlist once I heard it for the first time. An addictive record, I summed it up best when I wrote that “this German four-piece drops metal that reeks of patchouli and ‘Atomkraft? Nein, Danke!‘ to surprising effect. The core of Grendel’s Sÿster’s sound is the combination of fuzzy guitars, bubbly p-bass, and boxy drums into something that will undoubtedly call to mind the ’70s hard rock of your choice: Wishbone Ash, Jethro Tull, Thin Lizzy or nostalgia merchants like Gygax.” And that sound—not a sound that I spend my free time chasing down—could be directly shot into my veins and I couldn’t be happier. There’s something pure and honest and beautiful about this music. It is both poppy and niche, both pretentious and utterly not; it breaks down binaries and exists in the interstices. And goddammit, it’s what one roadie for Porcupine Tree once said of Blaze’s first three records, “it’s good, honest heavy metal.” And that’s it. The cream rises to the top; good songwriting always wins. And Katabasis into the Abaton is loaded with great songs, fun ideas, and idiosyncratic vocals. It’s surprising in all the right ways.

#9: Oceans of Slumber // Where Gods Fear to Speak [September 13th, 2024 | Season of Mist | Bandcamp] — Some experiences are unforgettable, and getting to see Oceans of Slumber in the summer of 2024 and really hear Cammie Beverly live was one such experience. There are few people in the world who truly have a Voice with a capital V and Cammie is one of them. The band’s performance was entrancing and her presence was commanding. It was literal goosebumps. I had been enjoying Where Gods Fear to Speak for a few weeks at that point, but seeing Oceans of Slumber live transformed my entire understanding of the unique strengths contained herein. Between her voice, genuinely progressive—and at times challenging—songwriting, and the fantastic performances, Where Gods Fear to Speak sounds like the culmination of the band’s career. Having learned from the past and meshed it all, listeners are left with something transcendent, beautiful, and the perfect balance of heavy and delicate. If there’s one knock on this record, it’s that people may struggle with a flowing relationship to song structure and hooks. But for the sophisticated listener, each song on Where Gods Fear to Speak is a beautiful step on an unforgettable journey.

#8: Iotunn // Kinship [October 25th, 2024 | Metal Blade Records | Bandcamp] — Hard truth time: I was never super enamored in Access All Worlds. While the blog and the commentariat were busy heaping praise upon the best band to come out of Denmark since Mercyful Fate, I held my tongue and gave them the spotlight they deserved because I was in a definite minority. But the record never inspired me. So, I approached Kinship with skepticism. I love Jón’s voice—this is no secret—but at 68 minutes long with 10-minute songs and one record in the bag I hadn’t felt… you know how it goes. I was happily surprised when Kinship hooked me hard. Jón’s voice brings everything together, but the blackened undercurrent spicing up the melodeath riffing (pretty sure Amon Amarth called their lawyers about a couple of the riffs in “The Anguished Ethereal”) matched with an epic scope that could be carried only by someone with the brass timbre and Grondesque vocal power of Aldará. I have been back to this again and again since I broke down and dropped it on the proverbial turntable. It is deep enough to keep me coming back, it’s hooky enough to kick that dopamine into high gear, and it’s beautiful and well-crafted with that aching Scandy melancholy that I crave. Bravo, Iotunn, this is a real first step towards me forgiving your spelling of ‘jotun’ and the Stockholm Bloodbath.

#7: Fellowship // The Skies above Eternity [November 22nd, 2024 | Scarlet Records | Bandcamp] — I am hardly the first person to note that it’s difficult to follow a beloved record. I think it’s even harder to follow a beloved debut. And I doubt there’s an album that’s been released in recent years that is as beloved as Fellowship’s debut, The Saberlight Chronicles. Putting the hopes and fate of the Europower scene in the hands of these tiny pastoral persons and sending them off to Mordor was never a good idea. But surprise, surprise, they survived!5 And they’re back with an album that has inspired the kind of dedication that only the rare band ever gets close to, landing super high on people’s lists despite being a late November release. And you can hear why. The Skies above Eternity is yet another 45ish minutes of fantastic, guitar-driven melodic power metal that simultaneously rules and takes itself seriously enough to have good, interesting, relatable, and at times inspiring lyrics while also embracing the fun and natural, inherent silliness of power metal. That’s a hard balance to strike and Fellowship nails it with aplomb. They say you don’t want to be the guy who follows The Guy, you want to be the guy who follows the guy who follows The Guy. I suspect The Skies above Eternity will always be slightly underrated because it isn’t The Saberlight Chronicles. But fuck me if it isn’t excellent.

#6: Devenial Verdict // Blessing of Despair [October 4th | Transcending Obscurity Records | Bandcamp] — I knew that these kids from Finland were alright when I jokingly called them “Morbid Angelcore” on Instagram and they took it with grace.6 Honestly, of all the stuff that the “No Fun, Only Reverb and Feels!” flank of AMG has dredged up and dumped hyperbolic praise on, Devenial Verdict is one of the bands to which I feel the most grateful to have been exposed. Often sold as either “dissodeath” or “atmospheric death metal,” because they’re both wildly popular subgenres of death metal, both feel like misnomers. Rather, Blessing of Despair is an album loaded with memorable moments and melodies, and while it does, indeed, employ a lot of “atmosphere,”7 I was not prepared for the elite-level Azagthoth-on-LSD riffs that litter Blessing of Despair. I wouldn’t say that Blessing of Despair is OSDM, but the riffing evokes the masters in ways both direct and subtle and it gives the record an impeccable vibe. Devenial Verdict has wrought a brilliant death metal album where riffs abound, the atmosphere is set on the “Cathedral” setting, and every song is better than the last. Maybe the best word to use to describe their x factor is gravitas. But whatever it is, Devenial Verdict’s got it in spades.

#5: Octoploid // Beyond the Aeons [July 5th, 2024 | Reigning Phoenix Music | Bandcamp] — The amount of love that Beyond the Aeons isn’t receiving is one of the scandals of 2024, in my opinion. This started with our own positive—but tepid, if I’m honest—review of Beyond the Aeons and has continued through Listurnalia. As a passive, but legitimate, autocrat of Angry Metal Guy, I have half a mind to shut this place down over this deep disrespect for Amorphiscore. Honestly, it pains me not to make Beyond the Aeons the #1 album,8 because I have listened to these 33 minutes of extreme metal—occasionally tremmy and black, but mostly just solid melodeath—more than almost anything else this year. Tracks like “Coast of the Drowned Sailors” feed my need for new Amorphis and my secret wish that they were heavier. And that’s one thing I’ll give Octoploid, unlike Barren Earth, Beyond the Aeons doesn’t dwell too long on anything. It kicks off and speeds along, hitting you with catchy leads in the key of Moomin and doubled with synth—as one does. Don’t sleep on Octoploid. Beyond the Aeons is energetic, fun, catchy, and worth at least a couple of spins a week six months after it was released.

#4: Opeth // The Last Will and Testament [November 22nd, 2024 | Moderbolaget] — What Opeth has accomplished on The Last Will and Testament is remarkable. Unlike so many bands, Opeth’s reimaginations of its sound still speak to me. The Last Will and Testament is a smart, coherent, and melodramatic record that does Mikael Åkerfeldt and crew credit. The reason that this record elevates itself above the ceiling that most Newpeth lived under, however, is that they are finally able to turn the music up to 11 again compositionally. After more than a decade without the emotional and compositional peak (and release) of a guttural growl released from the diaphragm over a particularly chunky riff or heavy drums, The Last Will and Testament continues the band’s development but gives them a release valve—”§4″ being the highlight for me, where they transition from Opethro Tull—a jazz flute solo—to Deathro Tull with some operatic, but dour, death metal. And it simply feels good to hear them doing both of these things simultaneously. Having gone through and relistened to the discography at length, it is striking how Opeth circa 2024 sounds very little like the band I fell in love with in the late-’90s/early aughts. To be able to both be markedly different and feel like the same band is a deeply underrated trait. This could have been higher if I’d had longer with it.

#3: Fleshgod Apocalypse // Opera [August 23rd, 2024 | Nuclear Blast Records | Bandcamp] — I knew almost immediately that Opera was going to be a controversial record. I was not prepared for the hyperbolic pushback that Opera garnered from fans of Italy’s death metal answer to [Luca (Turilli / Lione)’s] Rhapsody [of Fire] for being, as I wrote myself, “undeniably poppy.” Sometimes I think that we fans of the extreme metal scene have lost sight of what pop music really is. The fact that people have been heaping scorn on Fleshgod Apocalypse for writing operatic death metal because Veronica Bordacchini doesn’t only sing using proper operatic technique and the band simplified some of its compositional tendencies is, to put it lightly, patently absurd. Opera is fun! It’s energetic and well-crafted, and it has a better excuse for writing more palatable and less grandiose music that uses more traditional pop and rock compositional structures than Nightwish ever had,9 and it literally has dramatic choirs arpeggiating in Latin behind grinding blast beats and death metal growls as I’m writing this blurb! Fucking get over yourselves. Go enjoy the shit out of Opera. No one sounds like Fleshgod Apocalypse and when they hit, they fucking hit. And Opera hits! It is thematically interesting, deeply personal, and cohesive in the way that the best albums are while featuring a diverse and excellent performance from Bordacchini. Easily one of the best records of 2024.

#2: Kanonenfieber // Die Urkatastrophe [September 20th, 2024 | Century Media | Bandcamp] — One of the things that makes the work at Angry Metal Guy interesting after 15 years is editing other writers’ work. It’s a pleasure to get to talk to, work with, and help guide the brilliant writers that we have working here. And because I want to hear what I’m reading about at the same time, I listen to a lot of music I would not necessarily have chosen to listen to myself. Noise’s work—such as 2023’s #5 record Leiþa—has come to my attention because of the work that Carcharodon has done in covering his projects. So, when I went to edit Die Urkatastrophe, well aware of the impending 5.0, I was edified to read a well-argued analysis that highlighted for me exactly what it was that appealed to me so much about Kanonenfieber’s critically acclaimed10 platter. Die Urkatastrophe is a powerful album that walks the line between black and death metal, with surprisingly polished and smooth production and artfully crafted songs. Like so many of the best albums, it is both thematically coherent and full of standout moments. Arresting moments like the gunshot at the end of “Der Maulwurf,” the best-placed samples since Velvet Darkness They Fear, and a superb flow make Die Urkatastrophe a triumph that we’ll return to for years.

#1: Hamferð // Men Guðs hond er sterk [March 22nd, 2024 | Metal Blade Records | Bandcamp] — The best album of 2024 was an undeniably easy choice this year. Released the day after my life started falling to pieces, Hamferð’s third masterpiece is a tale of tragedy (with a smidgen of hope), driven by strong songwriting and stronger performances. There are plenty of things that one can point to that help to differentiate Men Guðs hond er sterk from the field this year: the band’s sound is expertly crafted, and with pristine production, and the band—who apparently records without a click track?!—carries the emotional weight of their music perfectly despite the largely opaque language in which it’s presented.11 Furthermore, enough cannot be said about the powerhouse of a vocalist that Hamferð is fortunate enough to have. Jón Aldará’s vocals carry the day with a brassy baritone that evokes the mourning that all doom peddlers are chasing but so few nail. Men Guðs hond er sterk is tight, it’s heavy—though not as heavy as its predecessor, which I missed—but more importantly it’s complete and brilliant and my Record o’ the Year for 2024.

Honorable Mentions:

In Vain // Solemn [April 19th, 2024 | Indie Recordings | Bandcamp] — Having been released when I was in the moment of absolute denial and despair as my life fell apart, you’ll forgive me for not having heard this album until the last couple months of 2024. And I suspect that if I had been able to spend more time with it, it would have worked its way onto the list proper (though, man, it’s hard to know what would go). Once again, In Vain does such an outstanding job of balancing all the different sounds and influences, and I will never get sick of any clean vocals from the brothers Nedland (RIP Solefald). These guys are great and Solemn keeps them batting 1.000.

Ulcerate // Cutting the Throat of God [June 14th | Debemur Morti Productions | Bandcamp] — Another album that should’ve been higher on my list (but where would I have put Verikalpa then, guys!?). Ulcerate has been awesome and it’s almost unremarkable that they continue to be awesome in new and different ways. The thing that I keep coming back to Cutting the Throat of God for is the fact that these are probably the band’s most addictive and hypnotic riffs. Their sound has always had a fluidity that made them unique, but there are times when I feel like a snake being charmed as I’m listening to Ulcerate pump out fascinating, liquid riffs that seem to morph in scope and feel without ever breaking stride. Another record that is getting the shaft on this list.

Sonata Arctica // Clear Cold Beyond [March 8th, 2024 | Atomic Fire Records] — I started out skeptical about Clear Cold Beyond, and then I ended up loving it. The problem is that this was another record caught up in the Great Dumping o’ 2024 and got lost in the mix. This album has the benefit of having some really fun “we’re sorry we wrote Talviyö and then released two fucking acoustic cover records in a row” moments, but it’s not just an apology tour.12 The strength of Clear Cold Beyond is watching Kakko do the things he’s best at: write about creepy dudes with seriously bad boundaries (“Dark Empath”); write awkward lyrics about social topics that are kind of funny but also maybe not (“California”); and most importantly is his transformation into Dad Rocker (“The Best Things”). This record didn’t ever threaten to be Top 10, but it also deserves a nod for bringing me a ton of joy, even if I can’t listen to “The Best Things” without getting choked up.

Anciients // Beyond the Reach of the Sun [August 30th, 2024 | Season of Mist | Bandcamp] — I have been a little back and forth with Anciients, but Beyond the Reach of the Sun was an absolute banger that got snubbed for a Record o’ the Month spot, despite receiving an excellently written, laudatory review from Saunders. And perpetual self-editing complaints aside, Anciients is one of those bands whose ability to craft Riffs is unmatched. Every single song on this album has one of those Riffs—not just riffs, gotta capitalize that R so everyone knows that we’re talking about iconic stuff here—and I am, frankly, jealous of the feel and groove that these guys seem to have as second nature. This album clicked for me when I put it in the cans on a flight and just sat and listened to it and man, we are spoiled with an absolute embarrassment of riches in metal. These guys are an honorable mention? It’s unfair.

Caligula’s Horse // Charcoal Grace [January 26th, 2024 | InsideOut Records | Bandcamp] — After it was summarily 3.0’d by the guy who brought you the Angra list everyone thought was absolute crap, I feel like everyone just forgot about Charcoal Grace. But I’m going to be honest with you, this record deserved a lot better than it got at the hands of the traitorous reviewer who poo-poohed it and then, allegedly, went on to kick his dog and demand his wife make him a sandwich. This is a more subtle Caligula’s Horse, I admit. How they seem to be swapping places with Haken becomes more manifest with every release. But this record is a true headphones album that deserves a hi-def version of the release, serious cans, and a dark room. It’s loaded with great riffs and fantastic songs and has a particularly poignant and powerful closing. Also, the level of detail here is unreal. Appreciate what you have while they are still putting out amazing albums.

Noxis // Violence Inherent in the System [June 28th, 2024 | Rotted Life Records | Bandcamp] — One of the surprises of the year is an album named after one of the funniest jabs at the anarchosyndicalists in our lives. Noxis’ brand of frantic, technical death metal—complete with my favorite snare of the year—has swept through the Angry Metal Guy staff for a reason. The reason? It’s fucking great. At 45 minutes, Violence Inherent in the System is a record with the energy and addictiveness of Gorod, even if the songwriting chops aren’t quite on that level yet. But you don’t have to be Gorod-good to be good and Noxis is good. I’m looking forward to their sophomore release Scimitars Thrown in Farcical Aquatic Ceremonies, due Q4 2025/Q1 2026.

Madder Mortem // Old Eyes, New Heart [January 26th, 2024 | Dark Essence Records | Bandcamp] — In my Record o’ the Month blurb for Old Eyes, New Heart, I wrote “What Old Eyes, New Heart does is show Madder Mortem as alive and creative as ever, showcasing a more vulnerable, introspective side of themselves. Tracks like ‘Here and Now’ and ‘Cold Hard Rain’ weep with power and raw emotion, giving fans all the feelz they yearn for, and there’s simmering anger girding the material as well. As GardensTale noted, regarding the very personal, intense feeling of the new music: ‘Old Eyes, New Heart will stand as one of the most intimate and therapeutic albums we’re bound to get this year.’ And who isn’t going to need a little bit of therapy in 2024?” Yeah, I found myself listening to this album a lot this year because it expresses what I couldn’t. Again, prescient.

Blood Incantation // Absolute Elsewhere [October 4th, 2024 | Century Media Records | Bandcamp] — Yeah, it’s fine I guess. A little overhyped in the comment section, though. Remember that time when it got released and everyone who hadn’t heard it yet was like “RECORD OF THE YEAR!!!!!!1!” five minutes later? Pepperidge Farms remembers.

Top 10(ish) Songs o’ the Year:

#ish: Karol G // “Si Antes Te Hubiera Conocido” — Fuck you.

#10: Sonata Arctica // “The Best Things” — Fans of the band and this album are going to laugh, but this song kills me. Dad rock. I love it.

#9: Wintersun // “Storm” — When I saw everyone sporting “Silver Leaves” as the highlight of Time II, I had to do a double-take. As I covered at length in my review, the one song that I felt lived up to Jaari’s potential as a player and composer was “Storm,” and this track is a fucking doozy. This track perfectly executes both the blend of blackened death metal and power metal that makes Wintersun’s inability to produce something truly epic frustrating. If I had only heard “Ominous Clouds” and “Storm,” Time II would’ve gotten a 4.5. This is the only memorable thing he wrote on the entire album.

#8: Oceans of Slumber // “Wish” — It’s weird the tracks that call to you on an album. I love this whole record for a bunch of different reasons, but on “Wish” there are little melodic things that Cammie does here that make my heart ache. The lyrics, too. I feel ’em. Deeply underrated record.

#7: Fellowship // “Victim” — “I swear, I won’t always feel like a victim! I won’t always fight on my own! So, forgive me these transgressions as I live a life of lessons and I grow to overshadow darker thrones! This king is king alone!”

#6: Opeth // “§4” — No more perfect encapsulation of why Opeth is impressive than how hard they nailed this song. Love the porn beat with the Ian Anderson flute solo (Deathro Tull, lol) that gives way to stadium rock that gives way to grindy death metal. Just inject that fucking shit straight into my fucking veins. Unff.

#5: Grendel’s Sÿster // “Cosmogony” — This song is metal as fuck. I love the fun little extra beat they drop in to make it feel like a slightly lopsided wheel rolling along. But there’s nothing about this that doesn’t live up to what I wrote above: good, honest heavy metal. Catchy, riffy, and fun to listen to. Top it off with a bass-heavy section and a gallop carried on the guitar and you’ve got yourself a recipe for an epic, addictive track. More of this, plz.

#4: Fleshgod Apocalypse // “Morphine Waltz” — This song fucking rules. From the opening strains with the horn section in the orchestra to the 3/4 time signature (y’know, ’cause it’s actually a waltz), to the raw, punky performance from Bordacchini. Extra points for the fucking balls to the wall bridge with the huge choirs before the guitar solo. Like, how do you fucking people not think this is one of the best albums of the year? JFC.

#3: Caligula’s Horse // “Mute” — One of Caligula’s Horse’s strongest traits is their ability to write epic conclusions to their albums. “Mute” is up there with “Graves” in terms of the sheer weightiness of the whole thing—though this time it’s more delicate. Beautiful.

#2: Anciients // “Despoiled” — Riff of the year at 3:57. Gives me involuntary metal face. Love the vocal melodies, too. Great stuff.

#1: Madder Mortem // “Things I’ll Never Do” — This song fucking kills me. Has anyone checked on their lyricist recently?

Show 12 footnotes

1. This joke is fucking hilarious but only a few of you are going to get it. ↩
2. I kid because I’m scared shitless of your country and will never visit it. – AMG ↩
3. Wondering where you are? 11. Poland; 12. Brazil; 13. Norway; 14. Belgium; 15. Italy; 16. Greece; 17. Denmark; 18. Czechia; 19. Austria; 20. Russia; 21: Mexico; 22. Portugal; 23. Switzerland; 24. Romania; 25. Hungary. ↩
4. Not that I’m *not* a big worthless loser, just that there’s more to it. ↩
5. They suffered unduly and cast a lot of longing stares at each other, but they survived! ↩
6. Because fucking Morbid Angel is the best, obviously. ↩
7. Read: reverb. ↩
8. Tell you what, guys, how ’bout Jón Aldará joins Octoploid and y’all start writing 15-minute songs? Then you can both be #1! ↩
9. And don’t get me started Steven Wilson. “Ooh, I should be famous, why haven’t I had a number one record when Nick Beggs has had one?!” 🙄 ↩
10. This is true because I am busy acclaiming it. ↩
11. Obviously, largely opaque for most of us. People from the Faroe Islands do, indeed, speak the language in which this album is sung. My AI translator does not. ↩
12. And if it is, it is obviously their best-executed one to date. ↩

#2024 #Anciients #AngryMetalGuy #AngryMetalGuySRecordSOTheYear #AngryMetalGuySTop10Ish_ #BeyondTheAeons #BlessingOfDespair #BloodIncantation #BloomDecay #CaligulaSHorse #DawnTreader #DevenialVerdict #DieUrkatastrophe #Fellowship #FleshgodApocalypse #GrendelSSÿster #Hamferð #InVain #Iotunn #Kanonenfieber #KarolG #KatabasisIntoTheAbaton #Kinship #Listurnalia2024 #MadderMortem #MenGuðsHondErSterk #Noxis #OceansOfSlumber #Octoploid #Opera #Opeth #SonataArctica #TheLastWillAndTestament #TheSkiesAboveEternity #TimeII #Tuomio #Ulcerate #Verikalpa #WhereGodsFearToSpeak #Wintersun

Angry Metal Guy’s Top Ten(ish) of 2024

By Angry Metal Guy

Starting 2025 with a bang was always important, and I elected the “being 26 days late with your Record o’ the Year post” as the best possible way to give everyone that patented Angry Metal Guy feeling of waiting and waiting only to be smacked in the face with 5000 words that you disagree with entirely. Welcome to the Wonderful World of Executive Dysfunction! Let’s make a list!1

Fifteen years of Angry Metal Guy and year 15 will be remembered as a genuinely good year for metal. There were several excellent releases I was genuinely excited about and as the year went on, things got even better. For the first time in a while, I felt like I had a glut of options and felt guilty about what was and wasn’t making the list. In terms of total performance, year 15 at AMG stayed roughly on par with 2023. We wrote 691 posts (mostly reviews), which, in terms of raw numbers, dropped to lower than 2023 and was once again the lowest since 2015. We made up for it in girth, however, with the average post sporting a whopping 955 words! This might be a case of the self-fulfilling prophecy biting me in the ass for consistently yelling at everyone for being overwriters at which point they see themselves as overwriters and begin to overwrite. Or, maybe it’s because we had fewer reviews to balance out the longer posts. Regardless, we finished with a “big-boned” 660,024 total words in 2024. We averaged 38,617 views a day, leading us to our second-highest annual readership numbers ever at 14,129,320 total page views; a tick down from last year, but that’s not surprising when we’re writing fewer posts.

The readership of AMG is as global as ever, but the USA, UK, and Canada retained their spots as 1, 2, and 3 on our Top 10(ish) Biggest Readerships. Germans continued to flock here in droves, maintaining their position at number 4 on our list with Australia coming in at healthy 5. I’m a bit surprised at Australia for not taking umbrage at getting beat by the Germans last year, but when you live in constant fear of your absolutely frightening environs, I guess that’s the least of your worries.2 Spots 6-9 are the same as last year with Netherlands, Sweden, France, and Spain. But coming in at number 10 was Finland! Our strategy of lauding Finnish bands is finally paying off. “How” you ask? Well, if I can get to celebrity status in Finland, I intend to go there so I can be awkwardly ignored in social situations by an entirely new population of Scandinavians. I was happy to see Poland sneak up to the coveted “ish” spot on the list, but that means Brazil dropped out of the Top 10(ish) and that sucks.3 We were once again visited a single time by a mysterious robed reader from the Vatican City and I want to extend a warm Angry Metal Guy welcome to the lone citizen of Micronesia who found their way to our sacred halls.

The biggest, coolest thing that happened in 2024 (following one of the shittiest things to happen in 2024) was, of course, helping Kenstrosity deal with the catastrophe that was his life following Hurricane Helene. It was so cool and gratifying to see just how generous and amazing the fans of AMG were and we’ll never forget your generosity. We also added n00bs—welcoming Alekhines Gun, Tyme, and Killjoy as new blood for the Bloodgod (with more coming, we promise)—and saw the return of the illustrious Mark Z. We lost—at least for the time being—Ferox at the end of the year and that sucks for all of us. But losing him to a burgeoning career as a showrunner and movie director seems like the kind of thing that isn’t such a bitter pill to swallow. Personally, alas, 2024 was pretty much the worst year of my life. The reason I equivocate is because every time I think something like that I can only think of Homer Simpson saying: “So far! The worst year of your life so far!” But 2024 was marred by a breakup I did not want and struggles with both my physical health and the obvious consequences thereof. I re-read my Top 10(ish) of 2023 and was amused in that “oh, sweet summer child” kind of way when I read:

On a personal note, this year [2023] was supposed to be one of the best of my life. It has been an unmitigated pile of shit, with only a few bright spots. As usual, I’ll try to make 2024 a better year, where I am Angry Metal Guy in practice, not just in spirit. A new year always brings unreasonable and unrealistic goals that get broken in shame by April, doesn’t it? Well, that’s mine.

Alas, that ended up being quite a bit more prescient than I could’ve anticipated given that it was the 31st of March when the Behind the Music voiceover guy had to step in: “Then tragedy struck…”

So, 2024 turned out to be significantly worse for me than 2023. That said, I did, in fact, work a lot more on AMG than I have in previous years and it’s helped me to create a map of how that’s possible for the future. Furthermore, I’m finally starting to understand the things at the root of my BS—beyond unfortunate and frustrating life circumstances or the fact that I’m a big worthless loser4—and I hope that results in some real progress. Because, when all is said and done, Angry Metal Guy has stood the test of time for a reason and I’m proud of it and want to be involved in it. I like the music, I like most of the people, I like hazing n00bs, and I like arguing incessantly about opinions. Even if I feel a little out of lockstep with metal trends in recent years, I still think that my voice is important here and I want to have it here. And it’s thanks to everyone here, particularly Steel Druhm, Dr. Grier, and the other helpers, as well as the writers and of course, the readers, who have kept this all afloat while I am trying to solve the mystery that is my brain.

To moderate expectations for 2025! Here’s the Top 10(ish) of 2024.

#ish 2: Dawn Treader // Bloom & Decay [August 24th | Liminal Dread Productions | Bandcamp] — I’m relatively certain that if you had polled the writers and readers of AngryMetalGuy.com and asked them to predict this list, Dawn Treader’s Bloom & Decay would not have come even remotely close to placing on my Top 10(ish). And it makes sense. Dawn Treader traffics in a genre of black metal that I rail on at every chance. At this point, my personality is basically constructed of jokes about how calling something atmospheric just means they use a lot of reverb. And yeah, Bloom & Decay uses inordinate amounts of reverb, I can’t deny it. But better, Ross Connell subverts the ‘one-man black metal project’ tropes by being good, actually. The record is emotionally poignant, musically rich, and laden with pathos—causing that aching bloom in my chest while listening to what feels at times like sad songs playing in major keys. If there’s one reason I haven’t been back to this album as much as other things, it’s because it’s hard to listen to at times. The messages contained here and the way they are delivered can be challenging at times; long discursive samples that are hard to have repeated back at you time and again in a time of a lot of despair. Still, that’s hardly a knock against Dawn Treader’s work, there are a lot of people who would suggest that it’s exactly that which makes Bloom & Decay art. And there’s no question in my mind that Bloom & Decay is a work of art.

#ish 1: Verikalpa // Tuomio [April 19th, 2024 | Scarlet Records | Bandcamp] — But then again, who needs serious emotionally poignant works of art when you can listen to Finnish guys writing amazing blackened melodeath that heavily features faux accordion and lyrics, presumably, about drinking? I feel a bit guilty that these guys have yet to make a number on the list—having previously been relegated to an -ish—but they are getting better and better and Tuomio has been a joy to listen to in a year where almost nothing else brought me joy. In a way, Verikalpa’s sound is a form of nostalgiacore for me—with its 2004 production, its 2004 riffs, and my 2004 urge to drink beer and headbang. But, as Steel Druhm would argue out of pure self-interest, some things are timeless and change is bad, so this isn’t a critique. And while the metal-listening public lost its taste for folk metal after the glut that was released in the late 2000s, I find Verikalpa avoids the pitfalls of the sound, delivering only the highest quality riffs and blasts. Loaded with groove and chunky riffs, Verikalpa knows how to write solid, speedy, fun, and brutal metal that will make you want to drink a beer and lift some weights. And again, what more can we truly ask of any metal band? If you aren’t listening to and loving Verikalpa by now, you’re missing out. Of all the Finnish releases with dated sounds this year, Tuomio is the best.

#10: Grendel’s Sÿster // Katabasis into the Abaton [August 30th, 2024 | Sur Del Cruz Music | Bandcamp] — If there was a major “I did not see that coming” moment in 2024, it was that Grendel’s Sÿster never left my playlist once I heard it for the first time. An addictive record, I summed it up best when I wrote that “this German four-piece drops metal that reeks of patchouli and ‘Atomkraft? Nein, Danke!‘ to surprising effect. The core of Grendel’s Sÿster’s sound is the combination of fuzzy guitars, bubbly p-bass, and boxy drums into something that will undoubtedly call to mind the ’70s hard rock of your choice: Wishbone Ash, Jethro Tull, Thin Lizzy or nostalgia merchants like Gygax.” And that sound—not a sound that I spend my free time chasing down—could be directly shot into my veins and I couldn’t be happier. There’s something pure and honest and beautiful about this music. It is both poppy and niche, both pretentious and utterly not; it breaks down binaries and exists in the interstices. And goddammit, it’s what one roadie for Porcupine Tree once said of Blaze’s first three records, “it’s good, honest heavy metal.” And that’s it. The cream rises to the top; good songwriting always wins. And Katabasis into the Abaton is loaded with great songs, fun ideas, and idiosyncratic vocals. It’s surprising in all the right ways.

#9: Oceans of Slumber // Where Gods Fear to Speak [September 13th, 2024 | Season of Mist | Bandcamp] — Some experiences are unforgettable, and getting to see Oceans of Slumber in the summer of 2024 and really hear Cammie Beverly live was one such experience. There are few people in the world who truly have a Voice with a capital V and Cammie is one of them. The band’s performance was entrancing and her presence was commanding. It was literal goosebumps. I had been enjoying Where Gods Fear to Speak for a few weeks at that point, but seeing Oceans of Slumber live transformed my entire understanding of the unique strengths contained herein. Between her voice, genuinely progressive—and at times challenging—songwriting, and the fantastic performances, Where Gods Fear to Speak sounds like the culmination of the band’s career. Having learned from the past and meshed it all, listeners are left with something transcendent, beautiful, and the perfect balance of heavy and delicate. If there’s one knock on this record, it’s that people may struggle with a flowing relationship to song structure and hooks. But for the sophisticated listener, each song on Where Gods Fear to Speak is a beautiful step on an unforgettable journey.

#8: Iotunn // Kinship [October 25th, 2024 | Metal Blade Records | Bandcamp] — Hard truth time: I was never super enamored in Access All Worlds. While the blog and the commentariat were busy heaping praise upon the best band to come out of Denmark since Mercyful Fate, I held my tongue and gave them the spotlight they deserved because I was in a definite minority. But the record never inspired me. So, I approached Kinship with skepticism. I love Jón’s voice—this is no secret—but at 68 minutes long with 10-minute songs and one record in the bag I hadn’t felt… you know how it goes. I was happily surprised when Kinship hooked me hard. Jón’s voice brings everything together, but the blackened undercurrent spicing up the melodeath riffing (pretty sure Amon Amarth called their lawyers about a couple of the riffs in “The Anguished Ethereal”) matched with an epic scope that could be carried only by someone with the brass timbre and Grondesque vocal power of Aldará. I have been back to this again and again since I broke down and dropped it on the proverbial turntable. It is deep enough to keep me coming back, it’s hooky enough to kick that dopamine into high gear, and it’s beautiful and well-crafted with that aching Scandy melancholy that I crave. Bravo, Iotunn, this is a real first step towards me forgiving your spelling of ‘jotun’ and the Stockholm Bloodbath.

#7: Fellowship // The Skies above Eternity [November 22nd, 2024 | Scarlet Records | Bandcamp] — I am hardly the first person to note that it’s difficult to follow a beloved record. I think it’s even harder to follow a beloved debut. And I doubt there’s an album that’s been released in recent years that is as beloved as Fellowship’s debut, The Saberlight Chronicles. Putting the hopes and fate of the Europower scene in the hands of these tiny pastoral persons and sending them off to Mordor was never a good idea. But surprise, surprise, they survived!5 And they’re back with an album that has inspired the kind of dedication that only the rare band ever gets close to, landing super high on people’s lists despite being a late November release. And you can hear why. The Skies above Eternity is yet another 45ish minutes of fantastic, guitar-driven melodic power metal that simultaneously rules and takes itself seriously enough to have good, interesting, relatable, and at times inspiring lyrics while also embracing the fun and natural, inherent silliness of power metal. That’s a hard balance to strike and Fellowship nails it with aplomb. They say you don’t want to be the guy who follows The Guy, you want to be the guy who follows the guy who follows The Guy. I suspect The Skies above Eternity will always be slightly underrated because it isn’t The Saberlight Chronicles. But fuck me if it isn’t excellent.

#6: Devenial Verdict // Blessing of Despair [October 4th | Transcending Obscurity Records | Bandcamp] — I knew that these kids from Finland were alright when I jokingly called them “Morbid Angelcore” on Instagram and they took it with grace.6 Honestly, of all the stuff that the “No Fun, Only Reverb and Feels!” flank of AMG has dredged up and dumped hyperbolic praise on, Devenial Verdict is one of the bands to which I feel the most grateful to have been exposed. Often sold as either “dissodeath” or “atmospheric death metal,” because they’re both wildly popular subgenres of death metal, both feel like misnomers. Rather, Blessing of Despair is an album loaded with memorable moments and melodies, and while it does, indeed, employ a lot of “atmosphere,”7 I was not prepared for the elite-level Azagthoth-on-LSD riffs that litter Blessing of Despair. I wouldn’t say that Blessing of Despair is OSDM, but the riffing evokes the masters in ways both direct and subtle and it gives the record an impeccable vibe. Devenial Verdict has wrought a brilliant death metal album where riffs abound, the atmosphere is set on the “Cathedral” setting, and every song is better than the last. Maybe the best word to use to describe their x factor is gravitas. But whatever it is, Devenial Verdict’s got it in spades.

#5: Octoploid // Beyond the Aeons [July 5th, 2024 | Reigning Phoenix Music | Bandcamp] — The amount of love that Beyond the Aeons isn’t receiving is one of the scandals of 2024, in my opinion. This started with our own positive—but tepid, if I’m honest—review of Beyond the Aeons and has continued through Listurnalia. As a passive, but legitimate, autocrat of Angry Metal Guy, I have half a mind to shut this place down over this deep disrespect for Amorphiscore. Honestly, it pains me not to make Beyond the Aeons the #1 album,8 because I have listened to these 33 minutes of extreme metal—occasionally tremmy and black, but mostly just solid melodeath—more than almost anything else this year. Tracks like “Coast of the Drowned Sailors” feed my need for new Amorphis and my secret wish that they were heavier. And that’s one thing I’ll give Octoploid, unlike Barren Earth, Beyond the Aeons doesn’t dwell too long on anything. It kicks off and speeds along, hitting you with catchy leads in the key of Moomin and doubled with synth—as one does. Don’t sleep on Octoploid. Beyond the Aeons is energetic, fun, catchy, and worth at least a couple of spins a week six months after it was released.

#4: Opeth // The Last Will and Testament [November 22nd, 2024 | Moderbolaget] — What Opeth has accomplished on The Last Will and Testament is remarkable. Unlike so many bands, Opeth’s reimaginations of its sound still speak to me. The Last Will and Testament is a smart, coherent, and melodramatic record that does Mikael Åkerfeldt and crew credit. The reason that this record elevates itself above the ceiling that most Newpeth lived under, however, is that they are finally able to turn the music up to 11 again compositionally. After more than a decade without the emotional and compositional peak (and release) of a guttural growl released from the diaphragm over a particularly chunky riff or heavy drums, The Last Will and Testament continues the band’s development but gives them a release valve—”§4″ being the highlight for me, where they transition from Opethro Tull—a jazz flute solo—to Deathro Tull with some operatic, but dour, death metal. And it simply feels good to hear them doing both of these things simultaneously. Having gone through and relistened to the discography at length, it is striking how Opeth circa 2024 sounds very little like the band I fell in love with in the late-’90s/early aughts. To be able to both be markedly different and feel like the same band is a deeply underrated trait. This could have been higher if I’d had longer with it.

#3: Fleshgod Apocalypse // Opera [August 23rd, 2024 | Nuclear Blast Records | Bandcamp] — I knew almost immediately that Opera was going to be a controversial record. I was not prepared for the hyperbolic pushback that Opera garnered from fans of Italy’s death metal answer to [Luca (Turilli / Lione)’s] Rhapsody [of Fire] for being, as I wrote myself, “undeniably poppy.” Sometimes I think that we fans of the extreme metal scene have lost sight of what pop music really is. The fact that people have been heaping scorn on Fleshgod Apocalypse for writing operatic death metal because Veronica Bordacchini doesn’t only sing using proper operatic technique and the band simplified some of its compositional tendencies is, to put it lightly, patently absurd. Opera is fun! It’s energetic and well-crafted, and it has a better excuse for writing more palatable and less grandiose music that uses more traditional pop and rock compositional structures than Nightwish ever had,9 and it literally has dramatic choirs arpeggiating in Latin behind grinding blast beats and death metal growls as I’m writing this blurb! Fucking get over yourselves. Go enjoy the shit out of Opera. No one sounds like Fleshgod Apocalypse and when they hit, they fucking hit. And Opera hits! It is thematically interesting, deeply personal, and cohesive in the way that the best albums are while featuring a diverse and excellent performance from Bordacchini. Easily one of the best records of 2024.

#2: Kanonenfieber // Die Urkatastrophe [September 20th, 2024 | Century Media | Bandcamp] — One of the things that makes the work at Angry Metal Guy interesting after 15 years is editing other writers’ work. It’s a pleasure to get to talk to, work with, and help guide the brilliant writers that we have working here. And because I want to hear what I’m reading about at the same time, I listen to a lot of music I would not necessarily have chosen to listen to myself. Noise’s work—such as 2023’s #5 record Leiþa—has come to my attention because of the work that Carcharodon has done in covering his projects. So, when I went to edit Die Urkatastrophe, well aware of the impending 5.0, I was edified to read a well-argued analysis that highlighted for me exactly what it was that appealed to me so much about Kanonenfieber’s critically acclaimed10 platter. Die Urkatastrophe is a powerful album that walks the line between black and death metal, with surprisingly polished and smooth production and artfully crafted songs. Like so many of the best albums, it is both thematically coherent and full of standout moments. Arresting moments like the gunshot at the end of “Der Maulwurf,” the best-placed samples since Velvet Darkness They Fear, and a superb flow make Die Urkatastrophe a triumph that we’ll return to for years.

#1: Hamferð // Men Guðs hond er sterk [March 22nd, 2024 | Metal Blade Records | Bandcamp] — The best album of 2024 was an undeniably easy choice this year. Released the day after my life started falling to pieces, Hamferð’s third masterpiece is a tale of tragedy (with a smidgen of hope), driven by strong songwriting and stronger performances. There are plenty of things that one can point to that help to differentiate Men Guðs hond er sterk from the field this year: the band’s sound is expertly crafted, and with pristine production, and the band—who apparently records without a click track?!—carries the emotional weight of their music perfectly despite the largely opaque language in which it’s presented.11 Furthermore, enough cannot be said about the powerhouse of a vocalist that Hamferð is fortunate enough to have. Jón Aldará’s vocals carry the day with a brassy baritone that evokes the mourning that all doom peddlers are chasing but so few nail. Men Guðs hond er sterk is tight, it’s heavy—though not as heavy as its predecessor, which I missed—but more importantly it’s complete and brilliant and my Record o’ the Year for 2024.

Honorable Mentions:

In Vain // Solemn [April 19th, 2024 | Indie Recordings | Bandcamp] — Having been released when I was in the moment of absolute denial and despair as my life fell apart, you’ll forgive me for not having heard this album until the last couple months of 2024. And I suspect that if I had been able to spend more time with it, it would have worked its way onto the list proper (though, man, it’s hard to know what would go). Once again, In Vain does such an outstanding job of balancing all the different sounds and influences, and I will never get sick of any clean vocals from the brothers Nedland (RIP Solefald). These guys are great and Solemn keeps them batting 1.000.

Ulcerate // Cutting the Throat of God [June 14th | Debemur Morti Productions | Bandcamp] — Another album that should’ve been higher on my list (but where would I have put Verikalpa then, guys!?). Ulcerate has been awesome and it’s almost unremarkable that they continue to be awesome in new and different ways. The thing that I keep coming back to Cutting the Throat of God for is the fact that these are probably the band’s most addictive and hypnotic riffs. Their sound has always had a fluidity that made them unique, but there are times when I feel like a snake being charmed as I’m listening to Ulcerate pump out fascinating, liquid riffs that seem to morph in scope and feel without ever breaking stride. Another record that is getting the shaft on this list.

Sonata Arctica // Clear Cold Beyond [March 8th, 2024 | Atomic Fire Records] — I started out skeptical about Clear Cold Beyond, and then I ended up loving it. The problem is that this was another record caught up in the Great Dumping o’ 2024 and got lost in the mix. This album has the benefit of having some really fun “we’re sorry we wrote Talviyö and then released two fucking acoustic cover records in a row” moments, but it’s not just an apology tour.12 The strength of Clear Cold Beyond is watching Kakko do the things he’s best at: write about creepy dudes with seriously bad boundaries (“Dark Empath”); write awkward lyrics about social topics that are kind of funny but also maybe not (“California”); and most importantly is his transformation into Dad Rocker (“The Best Things”). This record didn’t ever threaten to be Top 10, but it also deserves a nod for bringing me a ton of joy, even if I can’t listen to “The Best Things” without getting choked up.

Anciients // Beyond the Reach of the Sun [August 30th, 2024 | Season of Mist | Bandcamp] — I have been a little back and forth with Anciients, but Beyond the Reach of the Sun was an absolute banger that got snubbed for a Record o’ the Month spot, despite receiving an excellently written, laudatory review from Saunders. And perpetual self-editing complaints aside, Anciients is one of those bands whose ability to craft Riffs is unmatched. Every single song on this album has one of those Riffs—not just riffs, gotta capitalize that R so everyone knows that we’re talking about iconic stuff here—and I am, frankly, jealous of the feel and groove that these guys seem to have as second nature. This album clicked for me when I put it in the cans on a flight and just sat and listened to it and man, we are spoiled with an absolute embarrassment of riches in metal. These guys are an honorable mention? It’s unfair.

Caligula’s Horse // Charcoal Grace [January 26th, 2024 | InsideOut Records | Bandcamp] — After it was summarily 3.0’d by the guy who brought you the Angra list everyone thought was absolute crap, I feel like everyone just forgot about Charcoal Grace. But I’m going to be honest with you, this record deserved a lot better than it got at the hands of the traitorous reviewer who poo-poohed it and then, allegedly, went on to kick his dog and demand his wife make him a sandwich. This is a more subtle Caligula’s Horse, I admit. How they seem to be swapping places with Haken becomes more manifest with every release. But this record is a true headphones album that deserves a hi-def version of the release, serious cans, and a dark room. It’s loaded with great riffs and fantastic songs and has a particularly poignant and powerful closing. Also, the level of detail here is unreal. Appreciate what you have while they are still putting out amazing albums.

Noxis // Violence Inherent in the System [June 28th, 2024 | Rotted Life Records | Bandcamp] — One of the surprises of the year is an album named after one of the funniest jabs at the anarchosyndicalists in our lives. Noxis’ brand of frantic, technical death metal—complete with my favorite snare of the year—has swept through the Angry Metal Guy staff for a reason. The reason? It’s fucking great. At 45 minutes, Violence Inherent in the System is a record with the energy and addictiveness of Gorod, even if the songwriting chops aren’t quite on that level yet. But you don’t have to be Gorod-good to be good and Noxis is good. I’m looking forward to their sophomore release Scimitars Thrown in Farcical Aquatic Ceremonies, due Q4 2025/Q1 2026.

Madder Mortem // Old Eyes, New Heart [January 26th, 2024 | Dark Essence Records | Bandcamp] — In my Record o’ the Month blurb for Old Eyes, New Heart, I wrote “What Old Eyes, New Heart does is show Madder Mortem as alive and creative as ever, showcasing a more vulnerable, introspective side of themselves. Tracks like ‘Here and Now’ and ‘Cold Hard Rain’ weep with power and raw emotion, giving fans all the feelz they yearn for, and there’s simmering anger girding the material as well. As GardensTale noted, regarding the very personal, intense feeling of the new music: ‘Old Eyes, New Heart will stand as one of the most intimate and therapeutic albums we’re bound to get this year.’ And who isn’t going to need a little bit of therapy in 2024?” Yeah, I found myself listening to this album a lot this year because it expresses what I couldn’t. Again, prescient.

Blood Incantation // Absolute Elsewhere [October 4th, 2024 | Century Media Records | Bandcamp] — Yeah, it’s fine I guess. A little overhyped in the comment section, though. Remember that time when it got released and everyone who hadn’t heard it yet was like “RECORD OF THE YEAR!!!!!!1!” five minutes later? Pepperidge Farms remembers.

Top 10(ish) Songs o’ the Year:

#ish: Karol G // “Si Antes Te Hubiera Conocido” — Fuck you.

#10: Sonata Arctica // “The Best Things” — Fans of the band and this album are going to laugh, but this song kills me. Dad rock. I love it.

#9: Wintersun // “Storm” — When I saw everyone sporting “Silver Leaves” as the highlight of Time II, I had to do a double-take. As I covered at length in my review, the one song that I felt lived up to Jaari’s potential as a player and composer was “Storm,” and this track is a fucking doozy. This track perfectly executes both the blend of blackened death metal and power metal that makes Wintersun’s inability to produce something truly epic frustrating. If I had only heard “Ominous Clouds” and “Storm,” Time II would’ve gotten a 4.5. This is the only memorable thing he wrote on the entire album.

#8: Oceans of Slumber // “Wish” — It’s weird the tracks that call to you on an album. I love this whole record for a bunch of different reasons, but on “Wish” there are little melodic things that Cammie does here that make my heart ache. The lyrics, too. I feel ’em. Deeply underrated record.

#7: Fellowship // “Victim” — “I swear, I won’t always feel like a victim! I won’t always fight on my own! So, forgive me these transgressions as I live a life of lessons and I grow to overshadow darker thrones! This king is king alone!”

#6: Opeth // “§4” — No more perfect encapsulation of why Opeth is impressive than how hard they nailed this song. Love the porn beat with the Ian Anderson flute solo (Deathro Tull, lol) that gives way to stadium rock that gives way to grindy death metal. Just inject that fucking shit straight into my fucking veins. Unff.

#5: Grendel’s Sÿster // “Cosmogony” — This song is metal as fuck. I love the fun little extra beat they drop in to make it feel like a slightly lopsided wheel rolling along. But there’s nothing about this that doesn’t live up to what I wrote above: good, honest heavy metal. Catchy, riffy, and fun to listen to. Top it off with a bass-heavy section and a gallop carried on the guitar and you’ve got yourself a recipe for an epic, addictive track. More of this, plz.

#4: Fleshgod Apocalypse // “Morphine Waltz” — This song fucking rules. From the opening strains with the horn section in the orchestra to the 3/4 time signature (y’know, ’cause it’s actually a waltz), to the raw, punky performance from Bordacchini. Extra points for the fucking balls to the wall bridge with the huge choirs before the guitar solo. Like, how do you fucking people not think this is one of the best albums of the year? JFC.

#3: Caligula’s Horse // “Mute” — One of Caligula’s Horse’s strongest traits is their ability to write epic conclusions to their albums. “Mute” is up there with “Graves” in terms of the sheer weightiness of the whole thing—though this time it’s more delicate. Beautiful.

#2: Anciients // “Despoiled” — Riff of the year at 3:57. Gives me involuntary metal face. Love the vocal melodies, too. Great stuff.

#1: Madder Mortem // “Things I’ll Never Do” — This song fucking kills me. Has anyone checked on their lyricist recently?

#2024 #Anciients #AngryMetalGuy #AngryMetalGuySRecordSOTheYear #AngryMetalGuySTop10Ish_ #BeyondTheAeons #BlessingOfDespair #BloodIncantation #BloomDecay #CaligulaSHorse #DawnTreader #DevenialVerdict #DieUrkatastrophe #Fellowship #FleshgodApocalypse #GrendelSSÿster #Hamferð #InVain #Iotunn #Kanonenfieber #KarolG #KatabasisIntoTheAbaton #Kinship #Listurnalia2024 #MadderMortem #MenGuðsHondErSterk #Noxis #OceansOfSlumber #Octoploid #Opera #Opeth #SonataArctica #TheLastWillAndTestament #TheSkiesAboveEternity #TimeII #Tuomio #Ulcerate #Verikalpa #WhereGodsFearToSpeak #Wintersun

Angry Metal Guy’s Top Ten(ish) of 2024

By Angry Metal Guy

Starting 2025 with a bang was always important, and I elected the “being 26 days late with your Record o’ the Year post” as the best possible way to give everyone that patented Angry Metal Guy feeling of waiting and waiting only to be smacked in the face with 5000 words that you disagree with entirely. Welcome to the Wonderful World of Executive Dysfunction! Let’s make a list!1

Fifteen years of Angry Metal Guy and year 15 will be remembered as a genuinely good year for metal. There were several excellent releases I was genuinely excited about and as the year went on, things got even better. For the first time in a while, I felt like I had a glut of options and felt guilty about what was and wasn’t making the list. In terms of total performance, year 15 at AMG stayed roughly on par with 2023. We wrote 691 posts (mostly reviews), which, in terms of raw numbers, dropped to lower than 2023 and was once again the lowest since 2015. We made up for it in girth, however, with the average post sporting a whopping 955 words! This might be a case of the self-fulfilling prophecy biting me in the ass for consistently yelling at everyone for being overwriters at which point they see themselves as overwriters and begin to overwrite. Or, maybe it’s because we had fewer reviews to balance out the longer posts. Regardless, we finished with a “big-boned” 660,024 total words in 2024. We averaged 38,617 views a day, leading us to our second-highest annual readership numbers ever at 14,129,320 total page views; a tick down from last year, but that’s not surprising when we’re writing fewer posts.

The readership of AMG is as global as ever, but the USA, UK, and Canada retained their spots as 1, 2, and 3 on our Top 10(ish) Biggest Readerships. Germans continued to flock here in droves, maintaining their position at number 4 on our list with Australia coming in at healthy 5. I’m a bit surprised at Australia for not taking umbrage at getting beat by the Germans last year, but when you live in constant fear of your absolutely frightening environs, I guess that’s the least of your worries.2 Spots 6-9 are the same as last year with Netherlands, Sweden, France, and Spain. But coming in at number 10 was Finland! Our strategy of lauding Finnish bands is finally paying off. “How” you ask? Well, if I can get to celebrity status in Finland, I intend to go there so I can be awkwardly ignored in social situations by an entirely new population of Scandinavians. I was happy to see Poland sneak up to the coveted “ish” spot on the list, but that means Brazil dropped out of the Top 10(ish) and that sucks.3 We were once again visited a single time by a mysterious robed reader from the Vatican City and I want to extend a warm Angry Metal Guy welcome to the lone citizen of Micronesia who found their way to our sacred halls.

The biggest, coolest thing that happened in 2024 (following one of the shittiest things to happen in 2024) was, of course, helping Kenstrosity deal with the catastrophe that was his life following Hurricane Helene. It was so cool and gratifying to see just how generous and amazing the fans of AMG were and we’ll never forget your generosity. We also added n00bs—welcoming Alekhines Gun, Tyme, and Killjoy as new blood for the Bloodgod (with more coming, we promise)—and saw the return of the illustrious Mark Z. We lost—at least for the time being—Ferox at the end of the year and that sucks for all of us. But losing him to a burgeoning career as a showrunner and movie director seems like the kind of thing that isn’t such a bitter pill to swallow. Personally, alas, 2024 was pretty much the worst year of my life. The reason I equivocate is because every time I think something like that I can only think of Homer Simpson saying: “So far! The worst year of your life so far!” But 2024 was marred by a breakup I did not want and struggles with both my physical health and the obvious consequences thereof. I re-read my Top 10(ish) of 2023 and was amused in that “oh, sweet summer child” kind of way when I read:

On a personal note, this year [2023] was supposed to be one of the best of my life. It has been an unmitigated pile of shit, with only a few bright spots. As usual, I’ll try to make 2024 a better year, where I am Angry Metal Guy in practice, not just in spirit. A new year always brings unreasonable and unrealistic goals that get broken in shame by April, doesn’t it? Well, that’s mine.

Alas, that ended up being quite a bit more prescient than I could’ve anticipated given that it was the 31st of March when the Behind the Music voiceover guy had to step in: “Then tragedy struck…”

So, 2024 turned out to be significantly worse for me than 2023. That said, I did, in fact, work a lot more on AMG than I have in previous years and it’s helped me to create a map of how that’s possible for the future. Furthermore, I’m finally starting to understand the things at the root of my BS—beyond unfortunate and frustrating life circumstances or the fact that I’m a big worthless loser4—and I hope that results in some real progress. Because, when all is said and done, Angry Metal Guy has stood the test of time for a reason and I’m proud of it and want to be involved in it. I like the music, I like most of the people, I like hazing n00bs, and I like arguing incessantly about opinions. Even if I feel a little out of lockstep with metal trends in recent years, I still think that my voice is important here and I want to have it here. And it’s thanks to everyone here, particularly Steel Druhm, Dr. Grier, and the other helpers, as well as the writers and of course, the readers, who have kept this all afloat while I am trying to solve the mystery that is my brain.

To moderate expectations for 2025! Here’s the Top 10(ish) of 2024.

#ish 2: Dawn Treader // Bloom & Decay [August 24th | Liminal Dread Productions | Bandcamp] — I’m relatively certain that if you had polled the writers and readers of AngryMetalGuy.com and asked them to predict this list, Dawn Treader’s Bloom & Decay would not have come even remotely close to placing on my Top 10(ish). And it makes sense. Dawn Treader traffics in a genre of black metal that I rail on at every chance. At this point, my personality is basically constructed of jokes about how calling something atmospheric just means they use a lot of reverb. And yeah, Bloom & Decay uses inordinate amounts of reverb, I can’t deny it. But better, Ross Connell subverts the ‘one-man black metal project’ tropes by being good, actually. The record is emotionally poignant, musically rich, and laden with pathos—causing that aching bloom in my chest while listening to what feels at times like sad songs playing in major keys. If there’s one reason I haven’t been back to this album as much as other things, it’s because it’s hard to listen to at times. The messages contained here and the way they are delivered can be challenging at times; long discursive samples that are hard to have repeated back at you time and again in a time of a lot of despair. Still, that’s hardly a knock against Dawn Treader’s work, there are a lot of people who would suggest that it’s exactly that which makes Bloom & Decay art. And there’s no question in my mind that Bloom & Decay is a work of art.

#ish 1: Verikalpa // Tuomio [April 19th, 2024 | Scarlet Records | Bandcamp] — But then again, who needs serious emotionally poignant works of art when you can listen to Finnish guys writing amazing blackened melodeath that heavily features faux accordion and lyrics, presumably, about drinking? I feel a bit guilty that these guys have yet to make a number on the list—having previously been relegated to an -ish—but they are getting better and better and Tuomio has been a joy to listen to in a year where almost nothing else brought me joy. In a way, Verikalpa’s sound is a form of nostalgiacore for me—with its 2004 production, its 2004 riffs, and my 2004 urge to drink beer and headbang. But, as Steel Druhm would argue out of pure self-interest, some things are timeless and change is bad, so this isn’t a critique. And while the metal-listening public lost its taste for folk metal after the glut that was released in the late 2000s, I find Verikalpa avoids the pitfalls of the sound, delivering only the highest quality riffs and blasts. Loaded with groove and chunky riffs, Verikalpa knows how to write solid, speedy, fun, and brutal metal that will make you want to drink a beer and lift some weights. And again, what more can we truly ask of any metal band? If you aren’t listening to and loving Verikalpa by now, you’re missing out. Of all the Finnish releases with dated sounds this year, Tuomio is the best.

#10: Grendel’s Sÿster // Katabasis into the Abaton [August 30th, 2024 | Sur Del Cruz Music | Bandcamp] — If there was a major “I did not see that coming” moment in 2024, it was that Grendel’s Sÿster never left my playlist once I heard it for the first time. An addictive record, I summed it up best when I wrote that “this German four-piece drops metal that reeks of patchouli and ‘Atomkraft? Nein, Danke!‘ to surprising effect. The core of Grendel’s Sÿster’s sound is the combination of fuzzy guitars, bubbly p-bass, and boxy drums into something that will undoubtedly call to mind the ’70s hard rock of your choice: Wishbone Ash, Jethro Tull, Thin Lizzy or nostalgia merchants like Gygax.” And that sound—not a sound that I spend my free time chasing down—could be directly shot into my veins and I couldn’t be happier. There’s something pure and honest and beautiful about this music. It is both poppy and niche, both pretentious and utterly not; it breaks down binaries and exists in the interstices. And goddammit, it’s what one roadie for Porcupine Tree once said of Blaze’s first three records, “it’s good, honest heavy metal.” And that’s it. The cream rises to the top; good songwriting always wins. And Katabasis into the Abaton is loaded with great songs, fun ideas, and idiosyncratic vocals. It’s surprising in all the right ways.

#9: Oceans of Slumber // Where Gods Fear to Speak [September 13th, 2024 | Season of Mist | Bandcamp] — Some experiences are unforgettable, and getting to see Oceans of Slumber in the summer of 2024 and really hear Cammie Beverly live was one such experience. There are few people in the world who truly have a Voice with a capital V and Cammie is one of them. The band’s performance was entrancing and her presence was commanding. It was literal goosebumps. I had been enjoying Where Gods Fear to Speak for a few weeks at that point, but seeing Oceans of Slumber live transformed my entire understanding of the unique strengths contained herein. Between her voice, genuinely progressive—and at times challenging—songwriting, and the fantastic performances, Where Gods Fear to Speak sounds like the culmination of the band’s career. Having learned from the past and meshed it all, listeners are left with something transcendent, beautiful, and the perfect balance of heavy and delicate. If there’s one knock on this record, it’s that people may struggle with a flowing relationship to song structure and hooks. But for the sophisticated listener, each song on Where Gods Fear to Speak is a beautiful step on an unforgettable journey.

#8: Iotunn // Kinship [October 25th, 2024 | Metal Blade Records | Bandcamp] — Hard truth time: I was never super enamored in Access All Worlds. While the blog and the commentariat were busy heaping praise upon the best band to come out of Denmark since Mercyful Fate, I held my tongue and gave them the spotlight they deserved because I was in a definite minority. But the record never inspired me. So, I approached Kinship with skepticism. I love Jón’s voice—this is no secret—but at 68 minutes long with 10-minute songs and one record in the bag I hadn’t felt… you know how it goes. I was happily surprised when Kinship hooked me hard. Jón’s voice brings everything together, but the blackened undercurrent spicing up the melodeath riffing (pretty sure Amon Amarth called their lawyers about a couple of the riffs in “The Anguished Ethereal”) matched with an epic scope that could be carried only by someone with the brass timbre and Grondesque vocal power of Aldará. I have been back to this again and again since I broke down and dropped it on the proverbial turntable. It is deep enough to keep me coming back, it’s hooky enough to kick that dopamine into high gear, and it’s beautiful and well-crafted with that aching Scandy melancholy that I crave. Bravo, Iotunn, this is a real first step towards me forgiving your spelling of ‘jotun’ and the Stockholm Bloodbath.

#7: Fellowship // The Skies above Eternity [November 22nd, 2024 | Scarlet Records | Bandcamp] — I am hardly the first person to note that it’s difficult to follow a beloved record. I think it’s even harder to follow a beloved debut. And I doubt there’s an album that’s been released in recent years that is as beloved as Fellowship’s debut, The Saberlight Chronicles. Putting the hopes and fate of the Europower scene in the hands of these tiny pastoral persons and sending them off to Mordor was never a good idea. But surprise, surprise, they survived!5 And they’re back with an album that has inspired the kind of dedication that only the rare band ever gets close to, landing super high on people’s lists despite being a late November release. And you can hear why. The Skies above Eternity is yet another 45ish minutes of fantastic, guitar-driven melodic power metal that simultaneously rules and takes itself seriously enough to have good, interesting, relatable, and at times inspiring lyrics while also embracing the fun and natural, inherent silliness of power metal. That’s a hard balance to strike and Fellowship nails it with aplomb. They say you don’t want to be the guy who follows The Guy, you want to be the guy who follows the guy who follows The Guy. I suspect The Skies above Eternity will always be slightly underrated because it isn’t The Saberlight Chronicles. But fuck me if it isn’t excellent.

#6: Devenial Verdict // Blessing of Despair [October 4th | Transcending Obscurity Records | Bandcamp] — I knew that these kids from Finland were alright when I jokingly called them “Morbid Angelcore” on Instagram and they took it with grace.6 Honestly, of all the stuff that the “No Fun, Only Reverb and Feels!” flank of AMG has dredged up and dumped hyperbolic praise on, Devenial Verdict is one of the bands to which I feel the most grateful to have been exposed. Often sold as either “dissodeath” or “atmospheric death metal,” because they’re both wildly popular subgenres of death metal, both feel like misnomers. Rather, Blessing of Despair is an album loaded with memorable moments and melodies, and while it does, indeed, employ a lot of “atmosphere,”7 I was not prepared for the elite-level Azagthoth-on-LSD riffs that litter Blessing of Despair. I wouldn’t say that Blessing of Despair is OSDM, but the riffing evokes the masters in ways both direct and subtle and it gives the record an impeccable vibe. Devenial Verdict has wrought a brilliant death metal album where riffs abound, the atmosphere is set on the “Cathedral” setting, and every song is better than the last. Maybe the best word to use to describe their x factor is gravitas. But whatever it is, Devenial Verdict’s got it in spades.

#5: Octoploid // Beyond the Aeons [July 5th, 2024 | Reigning Phoenix Music | Bandcamp] — The amount of love that Beyond the Aeons isn’t receiving is one of the scandals of 2024, in my opinion. This started with our own positive—but tepid, if I’m honest—review of Beyond the Aeons and has continued through Listurnalia. As a passive, but legitimate, autocrat of Angry Metal Guy, I have half a mind to shut this place down over this deep disrespect for Amorphiscore. Honestly, it pains me not to make Beyond the Aeons the #1 album,8 because I have listened to these 33 minutes of extreme metal—occasionally tremmy and black, but mostly just solid melodeath—more than almost anything else this year. Tracks like “Coast of the Drowned Sailors” feed my need for new Amorphis and my secret wish that they were heavier. And that’s one thing I’ll give Octoploid, unlike Barren Earth, Beyond the Aeons doesn’t dwell too long on anything. It kicks off and speeds along, hitting you with catchy leads in the key of Moomin and doubled with synth—as one does. Don’t sleep on Octoploid. Beyond the Aeons is energetic, fun, catchy, and worth at least a couple of spins a week six months after it was released.

#4: Opeth // The Last Will and Testament [November 22nd, 2024 | Moderbolaget] — What Opeth has accomplished on The Last Will and Testament is remarkable. Unlike so many bands, Opeth’s reimaginations of its sound still speak to me. The Last Will and Testament is a smart, coherent, and melodramatic record that does Mikael Åkerfeldt and crew credit. The reason that this record elevates itself above the ceiling that most Newpeth lived under, however, is that they are finally able to turn the music up to 11 again compositionally. After more than a decade without the emotional and compositional peak (and release) of a guttural growl released from the diaphragm over a particularly chunky riff or heavy drums, The Last Will and Testament continues the band’s development but gives them a release valve—”§4″ being the highlight for me, where they transition from Opethro Tull—a jazz flute solo—to Deathro Tull with some operatic, but dour, death metal. And it simply feels good to hear them doing both of these things simultaneously. Having gone through and relistened to the discography at length, it is striking how Opeth circa 2024 sounds very little like the band I fell in love with in the late-’90s/early aughts. To be able to both be markedly different and feel like the same band is a deeply underrated trait. This could have been higher if I’d had longer with it.

#3: Fleshgod Apocalypse // Opera [August 23rd, 2024 | Nuclear Blast Records | Bandcamp] — I knew almost immediately that Opera was going to be a controversial record. I was not prepared for the hyperbolic pushback that Opera garnered from fans of Italy’s death metal answer to [Luca (Turilli / Lione)’s] Rhapsody [of Fire] for being, as I wrote myself, “undeniably poppy.” Sometimes I think that we fans of the extreme metal scene have lost sight of what pop music really is. The fact that people have been heaping scorn on Fleshgod Apocalypse for writing operatic death metal because Veronica Bordacchini doesn’t only sing using proper operatic technique and the band simplified some of its compositional tendencies is, to put it lightly, patently absurd. Opera is fun! It’s energetic and well-crafted, and it has a better excuse for writing more palatable and less grandiose music that uses more traditional pop and rock compositional structures than Nightwish ever had,9 and it literally has dramatic choirs arpeggiating in Latin behind grinding blast beats and death metal growls as I’m writing this blurb! Fucking get over yourselves. Go enjoy the shit out of Opera. No one sounds like Fleshgod Apocalypse and when they hit, they fucking hit. And Opera hits! It is thematically interesting, deeply personal, and cohesive in the way that the best albums are while featuring a diverse and excellent performance from Bordacchini. Easily one of the best records of 2024.

#2: Kanonenfieber // Die Urkatastrophe [September 20th, 2024 | Century Media | Bandcamp] — One of the things that makes the work at Angry Metal Guy interesting after 15 years is editing other writers’ work. It’s a pleasure to get to talk to, work with, and help guide the brilliant writers that we have working here. And because I want to hear what I’m reading about at the same time, I listen to a lot of music I would not necessarily have chosen to listen to myself. Noise’s work—such as 2023’s #5 record Leiþa—has come to my attention because of the work that Carcharodon has done in covering his projects. So, when I went to edit Die Urkatastrophe, well aware of the impending 5.0, I was edified to read a well-argued analysis that highlighted for me exactly what it was that appealed to me so much about Kanonenfieber’s critically acclaimed10 platter. Die Urkatastrophe is a powerful album that walks the line between black and death metal, with surprisingly polished and smooth production and artfully crafted songs. Like so many of the best albums, it is both thematically coherent and full of standout moments. Arresting moments like the gunshot at the end of “Der Maulwurf,” the best-placed samples since Velvet Darkness They Fear, and a superb flow make Die Urkatastrophe a triumph that we’ll return to for years.

#1: Hamferð // Men Guðs hond er sterk [March 22nd, 2024 | Metal Blade Records | Bandcamp] — The best album of 2024 was an undeniably easy choice this year. Released the day after my life started falling to pieces, Hamferð’s third masterpiece is a tale of tragedy (with a smidgen of hope), driven by strong songwriting and stronger performances. There are plenty of things that one can point to that help to differentiate Men Guðs hond er sterk from the field this year: the band’s sound is expertly crafted, and with pristine production, and the band—who apparently records without a click track?!—carries the emotional weight of their music perfectly despite the largely opaque language in which it’s presented.11 Furthermore, enough cannot be said about the powerhouse of a vocalist that Hamferð is fortunate enough to have. Jón Aldará’s vocals carry the day with a brassy baritone that evokes the mourning that all doom peddlers are chasing but so few nail. Men Guðs hond er sterk is tight, it’s heavy—though not as heavy as its predecessor, which I missed—but more importantly it’s complete and brilliant and my Record o’ the Year for 2024.

Honorable Mentions:

In Vain // Solemn [April 19th, 2024 | Indie Recordings | Bandcamp] — Having been released when I was in the moment of absolute denial and despair as my life fell apart, you’ll forgive me for not having heard this album until the last couple months of 2024. And I suspect that if I had been able to spend more time with it, it would have worked its way onto the list proper (though, man, it’s hard to know what would go). Once again, In Vain does such an outstanding job of balancing all the different sounds and influences, and I will never get sick of any clean vocals from the brothers Nedland (RIP Solefald). These guys are great and Solemn keeps them batting 1.000.

Ulcerate // Cutting the Throat of God [June 14th | Debemur Morti Productions | Bandcamp] — Another album that should’ve been higher on my list (but where would I have put Verikalpa then, guys!?). Ulcerate has been awesome and it’s almost unremarkable that they continue to be awesome in new and different ways. The thing that I keep coming back to Cutting the Throat of God for is the fact that these are probably the band’s most addictive and hypnotic riffs. Their sound has always had a fluidity that made them unique, but there are times when I feel like a snake being charmed as I’m listening to Ulcerate pump out fascinating, liquid riffs that seem to morph in scope and feel without ever breaking stride. Another record that is getting the shaft on this list.

Sonata Arctica // Clear Cold Beyond [March 8th, 2024 | Atomic Fire Records] — I started out skeptical about Clear Cold Beyond, and then I ended up loving it. The problem is that this was another record caught up in the Great Dumping o’ 2024 and got lost in the mix. This album has the benefit of having some really fun “we’re sorry we wrote Talviyö and then released two fucking acoustic cover records in a row” moments, but it’s not just an apology tour.12 The strength of Clear Cold Beyond is watching Kakko do the things he’s best at: write about creepy dudes with seriously bad boundaries (“Dark Empath”); write awkward lyrics about social topics that are kind of funny but also maybe not (“California”); and most importantly is his transformation into Dad Rocker (“The Best Things”). This record didn’t ever threaten to be Top 10, but it also deserves a nod for bringing me a ton of joy, even if I can’t listen to “The Best Things” without getting choked up.

Anciients // Beyond the Reach of the Sun [August 30th, 2024 | Season of Mist | Bandcamp] — I have been a little back and forth with Anciients, but Beyond the Reach of the Sun was an absolute banger that got snubbed for a Record o’ the Month spot, despite receiving an excellently written, laudatory review from Saunders. And perpetual self-editing complaints aside, Anciients is one of those bands whose ability to craft Riffs is unmatched. Every single song on this album has one of those Riffs—not just riffs, gotta capitalize that R so everyone knows that we’re talking about iconic stuff here—and I am, frankly, jealous of the feel and groove that these guys seem to have as second nature. This album clicked for me when I put it in the cans on a flight and just sat and listened to it and man, we are spoiled with an absolute embarrassment of riches in metal. These guys are an honorable mention? It’s unfair.

Caligula’s Horse // Charcoal Grace [January 26th, 2024 | InsideOut Records | Bandcamp] — After it was summarily 3.0’d by the guy who brought you the Angra list everyone thought was absolute crap, I feel like everyone just forgot about Charcoal Grace. But I’m going to be honest with you, this record deserved a lot better than it got at the hands of the traitorous reviewer who poo-poohed it and then, allegedly, went on to kick his dog and demand his wife make him a sandwich. This is a more subtle Caligula’s Horse, I admit. How they seem to be swapping places with Haken becomes more manifest with every release. But this record is a true headphones album that deserves a hi-def version of the release, serious cans, and a dark room. It’s loaded with great riffs and fantastic songs and has a particularly poignant and powerful closing. Also, the level of detail here is unreal. Appreciate what you have while they are still putting out amazing albums.

Noxis // Violence Inherent in the System [June 28th, 2024 | Rotted Life Records | Bandcamp] — One of the surprises of the year is an album named after one of the funniest jabs at the anarchosyndicalists in our lives. Noxis’ brand of frantic, technical death metal—complete with my favorite snare of the year—has swept through the Angry Metal Guy staff for a reason. The reason? It’s fucking great. At 45 minutes, Violence Inherent in the System is a record with the energy and addictiveness of Gorod, even if the songwriting chops aren’t quite on that level yet. But you don’t have to be Gorod-good to be good and Noxis is good. I’m looking forward to their sophomore release Scimitars Thrown in Farcical Aquatic Ceremonies, due Q4 2025/Q1 2026.

Madder Mortem // Old Eyes, New Heart [January 26th, 2024 | Dark Essence Records | Bandcamp] — In my Record o’ the Month blurb for Old Eyes, New Heart, I wrote “What Old Eyes, New Heart does is show Madder Mortem as alive and creative as ever, showcasing a more vulnerable, introspective side of themselves. Tracks like ‘Here and Now’ and ‘Cold Hard Rain’ weep with power and raw emotion, giving fans all the feelz they yearn for, and there’s simmering anger girding the material as well. As GardensTale noted, regarding the very personal, intense feeling of the new music: ‘Old Eyes, New Heart will stand as one of the most intimate and therapeutic albums we’re bound to get this year.’ And who isn’t going to need a little bit of therapy in 2024?” Yeah, I found myself listening to this album a lot this year because it expresses what I couldn’t. Again, prescient.

Blood Incantation // Absolute Elsewhere [October 4th, 2024 | Century Media Records | Bandcamp] — Yeah, it’s fine I guess. A little overhyped in the comment section, though. Remember that time when it got released and everyone who hadn’t heard it yet was like “RECORD OF THE YEAR!!!!!!1!” five minutes later? Pepperidge Farms remembers.

Top 10(ish) Songs o’ the Year:

#ish: Karol G // “Si Antes Te Hubiera Conocido” — Fuck you.

#10: Sonata Arctica // “The Best Things” — Fans of the band and this album are going to laugh, but this song kills me. Dad rock. I love it.

#9: Wintersun // “Storm” — When I saw everyone sporting “Silver Leaves” as the highlight of Time II, I had to do a double-take. As I covered at length in my review, the one song that I felt lived up to Jaari’s potential as a player and composer was “Storm,” and this track is a fucking doozy. This track perfectly executes both the blend of blackened death metal and power metal that makes Wintersun’s inability to produce something truly epic frustrating. If I had only heard “Ominous Clouds” and “Storm,” Time II would’ve gotten a 4.5. This is the only memorable thing he wrote on the entire album.

#8: Oceans of Slumber // “Wish” — It’s weird the tracks that call to you on an album. I love this whole record for a bunch of different reasons, but on “Wish” there are little melodic things that Cammie does here that make my heart ache. The lyrics, too. I feel ’em. Deeply underrated record.

#7: Fellowship // “Victim” — “I swear, I won’t always feel like a victim! I won’t always fight on my own! So, forgive me these transgressions as I live a life of lessons and I grow to overshadow darker thrones! This king is king alone!”

#6: Opeth // “§4” — No more perfect encapsulation of why Opeth is impressive than how hard they nailed this song. Love the porn beat with the Ian Anderson flute solo (Deathro Tull, lol) that gives way to stadium rock that gives way to grindy death metal. Just inject that fucking shit straight into my fucking veins. Unff.

#5: Grendel’s Sÿster // “Cosmogony” — This song is metal as fuck. I love the fun little extra beat they drop in to make it feel like a slightly lopsided wheel rolling along. But there’s nothing about this that doesn’t live up to what I wrote above: good, honest heavy metal. Catchy, riffy, and fun to listen to. Top it off with a bass-heavy section and a gallop carried on the guitar and you’ve got yourself a recipe for an epic, addictive track. More of this, plz.

#4: Fleshgod Apocalypse // “Morphine Waltz” — This song fucking rules. From the opening strains with the horn section in the orchestra to the 3/4 time signature (y’know, ’cause it’s actually a waltz), to the raw, punky performance from Bordacchini. Extra points for the fucking balls to the wall bridge with the huge choirs before the guitar solo. Like, how do you fucking people not think this is one of the best albums of the year? JFC.

#3: Caligula’s Horse // “Mute” — One of Caligula’s Horse’s strongest traits is their ability to write epic conclusions to their albums. “Mute” is up there with “Graves” in terms of the sheer weightiness of the whole thing—though this time it’s more delicate. Beautiful.

#2: Anciients // “Despoiled” — Riff of the year at 3:57. Gives me involuntary metal face. Love the vocal melodies, too. Great stuff.

#1: Madder Mortem // “Things I’ll Never Do” — This song fucking kills me. Has anyone checked on their lyricist recently?

#2024 #Anciients #AngryMetalGuy #AngryMetalGuySRecordSOTheYear #AngryMetalGuySTop10Ish_ #BeyondTheAeons #BlessingOfDespair #BloodIncantation #BloomDecay #CaligulaSHorse #DawnTreader #DevenialVerdict #DieUrkatastrophe #Fellowship #FleshgodApocalypse #GrendelSSÿster #Hamferð #InVain #Iotunn #Kanonenfieber #KarolG #KatabasisIntoTheAbaton #Kinship #Listurnalia2024 #MadderMortem #MenGuðsHondErSterk #Noxis #OceansOfSlumber #Octoploid #Opera #Opeth #SonataArctica #TheLastWillAndTestament #TheSkiesAboveEternity #TimeII #Tuomio #Ulcerate #Verikalpa #WhereGodsFearToSpeak #Wintersun

Angry Metal Guy’s Top Ten(ish) of 2024

By Angry Metal Guy

Starting 2025 with a bang was always important, and I elected the “being 26 days late with your Record o’ the Year post” as the best possible way to give everyone that patented Angry Metal Guy feeling of waiting and waiting only to be smacked in the face with 5000 words that you disagree with entirely. Welcome to the Wonderful World of Executive Dysfunction! Let’s make a list!1

Fifteen years of Angry Metal Guy and year 15 will be remembered as a genuinely good year for metal. There were several excellent releases I was genuinely excited about and as the year went on, things got even better. For the first time in a while, I felt like I had a glut of options and felt guilty about what was and wasn’t making the list. In terms of total performance, year 15 at AMG stayed roughly on par with 2023. We wrote 691 posts (mostly reviews), which, in terms of raw numbers, dropped to lower than 2023 and was once again the lowest since 2015. We made up for it in girth, however, with the average post sporting a whopping 955 words! This might be a case of the self-fulfilling prophecy biting me in the ass for consistently yelling at everyone for being overwriters at which point they see themselves as overwriters and begin to overwrite. Or, maybe it’s because we had fewer reviews to balance out the longer posts. Regardless, we finished with a “big-boned” 660,024 total words in 2024. We averaged 38,617 views a day, leading us to our second-highest annual readership numbers ever at 14,129,320 total page views; a tick down from last year, but that’s not surprising when we’re writing fewer posts.

The readership of AMG is as global as ever, but the USA, UK, and Canada retained their spots as 1, 2, and 3 on our Top 10(ish) Biggest Readerships. Germans continued to flock here in droves, maintaining their position at number 4 on our list with Australia coming in at healthy 5. I’m a bit surprised at Australia for not taking umbrage at getting beat by the Germans last year, but when you live in constant fear of your absolutely frightening environs, I guess that’s the least of your worries.2 Spots 6-9 are the same as last year with Netherlands, Sweden, France, and Spain. But coming in at number 10 was Finland! Our strategy of lauding Finnish bands is finally paying off. “How” you ask? Well, if I can get to celebrity status in Finland, I intend to go there so I can be awkwardly ignored in social situations by an entirely new population of Scandinavians. I was happy to see Poland sneak up to the coveted “ish” spot on the list, but that means Brazil dropped out of the Top 10(ish) and that sucks.3 We were once again visited a single time by a mysterious robed reader from the Vatican City and I want to extend a warm Angry Metal Guy welcome to the lone citizen of Micronesia who found their way to our sacred halls.

The biggest, coolest thing that happened in 2024 (following one of the shittiest things to happen in 2024) was, of course, helping Kenstrosity deal with the catastrophe that was his life following Hurricane Helene. It was so cool and gratifying to see just how generous and amazing the fans of AMG were and we’ll never forget your generosity. We also added n00bs—welcoming Alekhines Gun, Tyme, and Killjoy as new blood for the Bloodgod (with more coming, we promise)—and saw the return of the illustrious Mark Z. We lost—at least for the time being—Ferox at the end of the year and that sucks for all of us. But losing him to a burgeoning career as a showrunner and movie director seems like the kind of thing that isn’t such a bitter pill to swallow. Personally, alas, 2024 was pretty much the worst year of my life. The reason I equivocate is because every time I think something like that I can only think of Homer Simpson saying: “So far! The worst year of your life so far!” But 2024 was marred by a breakup I did not want and struggles with both my physical health and the obvious consequences thereof. I re-read my Top 10(ish) of 2023 and was amused in that “oh, sweet summer child” kind of way when I read:

On a personal note, this year [2023] was supposed to be one of the best of my life. It has been an unmitigated pile of shit, with only a few bright spots. As usual, I’ll try to make 2024 a better year, where I am Angry Metal Guy in practice, not just in spirit. A new year always brings unreasonable and unrealistic goals that get broken in shame by April, doesn’t it? Well, that’s mine.

Alas, that ended up being quite a bit more prescient than I could’ve anticipated given that it was the 31st of March when the Behind the Music voiceover guy had to step in: “Then tragedy struck…”

So, 2024 turned out to be significantly worse for me than 2023. That said, I did, in fact, work a lot more on AMG than I have in previous years and it’s helped me to create a map of how that’s possible for the future. Furthermore, I’m finally starting to understand the things at the root of my BS—beyond unfortunate and frustrating life circumstances or the fact that I’m a big worthless loser4—and I hope that results in some real progress. Because, when all is said and done, Angry Metal Guy has stood the test of time for a reason and I’m proud of it and want to be involved in it. I like the music, I like most of the people, I like hazing n00bs, and I like arguing incessantly about opinions. Even if I feel a little out of lockstep with metal trends in recent years, I still think that my voice is important here and I want to have it here. And it’s thanks to everyone here, particularly Steel Druhm, Dr. Grier, and the other helpers, as well as the writers and of course, the readers, who have kept this all afloat while I am trying to solve the mystery that is my brain.

To moderate expectations for 2025! Here’s the Top 10(ish) of 2024.

#ish 2: Dawn Treader // Bloom & Decay [August 24th | Liminal Dread Productions | Bandcamp] — I’m relatively certain that if you had polled the writers and readers of AngryMetalGuy.com and asked them to predict this list, Dawn Treader’s Bloom & Decay would not have come even remotely close to placing on my Top 10(ish). And it makes sense. Dawn Treader traffics in a genre of black metal that I rail on at every chance. At this point, my personality is basically constructed of jokes about how calling something atmospheric just means they use a lot of reverb. And yeah, Bloom & Decay uses inordinate amounts of reverb, I can’t deny it. But better, Ross Connell subverts the ‘one-man black metal project’ tropes by being good, actually. The record is emotionally poignant, musically rich, and laden with pathos—causing that aching bloom in my chest while listening to what feels at times like sad songs playing in major keys. If there’s one reason I haven’t been back to this album as much as other things, it’s because it’s hard to listen to at times. The messages contained here and the way they are delivered can be challenging at times; long discursive samples that are hard to have repeated back at you time and again in a time of a lot of despair. Still, that’s hardly a knock against Dawn Treader’s work, there are a lot of people who would suggest that it’s exactly that which makes Bloom & Decay art. And there’s no question in my mind that Bloom & Decay is a work of art.

#ish 1: Verikalpa // Tuomio [April 19th, 2024 | Scarlet Records | Bandcamp] — But then again, who needs serious emotionally poignant works of art when you can listen to Finnish guys writing amazing blackened melodeath that heavily features faux accordion and lyrics, presumably, about drinking? I feel a bit guilty that these guys have yet to make a number on the list—having previously been relegated to an -ish—but they are getting better and better and Tuomio has been a joy to listen to in a year where almost nothing else brought me joy. In a way, Verikalpa’s sound is a form of nostalgiacore for me—with its 2004 production, its 2004 riffs, and my 2004 urge to drink beer and headbang. But, as Steel Druhm would argue out of pure self-interest, some things are timeless and change is bad, so this isn’t a critique. And while the metal-listening public lost its taste for folk metal after the glut that was released in the late 2000s, I find Verikalpa avoids the pitfalls of the sound, delivering only the highest quality riffs and blasts. Loaded with groove and chunky riffs, Verikalpa knows how to write solid, speedy, fun, and brutal metal that will make you want to drink a beer and lift some weights. And again, what more can we truly ask of any metal band? If you aren’t listening to and loving Verikalpa by now, you’re missing out. Of all the Finnish releases with dated sounds this year, Tuomio is the best.

#10: Grendel’s Sÿster // Katabasis into the Abaton [August 30th, 2024 | Sur Del Cruz Music | Bandcamp] — If there was a major “I did not see that coming” moment in 2024, it was that Grendel’s Sÿster never left my playlist once I heard it for the first time. An addictive record, I summed it up best when I wrote that “this German four-piece drops metal that reeks of patchouli and ‘Atomkraft? Nein, Danke!‘ to surprising effect. The core of Grendel’s Sÿster’s sound is the combination of fuzzy guitars, bubbly p-bass, and boxy drums into something that will undoubtedly call to mind the ’70s hard rock of your choice: Wishbone Ash, Jethro Tull, Thin Lizzy or nostalgia merchants like Gygax.” And that sound—not a sound that I spend my free time chasing down—could be directly shot into my veins and I couldn’t be happier. There’s something pure and honest and beautiful about this music. It is both poppy and niche, both pretentious and utterly not; it breaks down binaries and exists in the interstices. And goddammit, it’s what one roadie for Porcupine Tree once said of Blaze’s first three records, “it’s good, honest heavy metal.” And that’s it. The cream rises to the top; good songwriting always wins. And Katabasis into the Abaton is loaded with great songs, fun ideas, and idiosyncratic vocals. It’s surprising in all the right ways.

#9: Oceans of Slumber // Where Gods Fear to Speak [September 13th, 2024 | Season of Mist | Bandcamp] — Some experiences are unforgettable, and getting to see Oceans of Slumber in the summer of 2024 and really hear Cammie Beverly live was one such experience. There are few people in the world who truly have a Voice with a capital V and Cammie is one of them. The band’s performance was entrancing and her presence was commanding. It was literal goosebumps. I had been enjoying Where Gods Fear to Speak for a few weeks at that point, but seeing Oceans of Slumber live transformed my entire understanding of the unique strengths contained herein. Between her voice, genuinely progressive—and at times challenging—songwriting, and the fantastic performances, Where Gods Fear to Speak sounds like the culmination of the band’s career. Having learned from the past and meshed it all, listeners are left with something transcendent, beautiful, and the perfect balance of heavy and delicate. If there’s one knock on this record, it’s that people may struggle with a flowing relationship to song structure and hooks. But for the sophisticated listener, each song on Where Gods Fear to Speak is a beautiful step on an unforgettable journey.

#8: Iotunn // Kinship [October 25th, 2024 | Metal Blade Records | Bandcamp] — Hard truth time: I was never super enamored in Access All Worlds. While the blog and the commentariat were busy heaping praise upon the best band to come out of Denmark since Mercyful Fate, I held my tongue and gave them the spotlight they deserved because I was in a definite minority. But the record never inspired me. So, I approached Kinship with skepticism. I love Jón’s voice—this is no secret—but at 68 minutes long with 10-minute songs and one record in the bag I hadn’t felt… you know how it goes. I was happily surprised when Kinship hooked me hard. Jón’s voice brings everything together, but the blackened undercurrent spicing up the melodeath riffing (pretty sure Amon Amarth called their lawyers about a couple of the riffs in “The Anguished Ethereal”) matched with an epic scope that could be carried only by someone with the brass timbre and Grondesque vocal power of Aldará. I have been back to this again and again since I broke down and dropped it on the proverbial turntable. It is deep enough to keep me coming back, it’s hooky enough to kick that dopamine into high gear, and it’s beautiful and well-crafted with that aching Scandy melancholy that I crave. Bravo, Iotunn, this is a real first step towards me forgiving your spelling of ‘jotun’ and the Stockholm Bloodbath.

#7: Fellowship // The Skies above Eternity [November 22nd, 2024 | Scarlet Records | Bandcamp] — I am hardly the first person to note that it’s difficult to follow a beloved record. I think it’s even harder to follow a beloved debut. And I doubt there’s an album that’s been released in recent years that is as beloved as Fellowship’s debut, The Saberlight Chronicles. Putting the hopes and fate of the Europower scene in the hands of these tiny pastoral persons and sending them off to Mordor was never a good idea. But surprise, surprise, they survived!5 And they’re back with an album that has inspired the kind of dedication that only the rare band ever gets close to, landing super high on people’s lists despite being a late November release. And you can hear why. The Skies above Eternity is yet another 45ish minutes of fantastic, guitar-driven melodic power metal that simultaneously rules and takes itself seriously enough to have good, interesting, relatable, and at times inspiring lyrics while also embracing the fun and natural, inherent silliness of power metal. That’s a hard balance to strike and Fellowship nails it with aplomb. They say you don’t want to be the guy who follows The Guy, you want to be the guy who follows the guy who follows The Guy. I suspect The Skies above Eternity will always be slightly underrated because it isn’t The Saberlight Chronicles. But fuck me if it isn’t excellent.

#6: Devenial Verdict // Blessing of Despair [October 4th | Transcending Obscurity Records | Bandcamp] — I knew that these kids from Finland were alright when I jokingly called them “Morbid Angelcore” on Instagram and they took it with grace.6 Honestly, of all the stuff that the “No Fun, Only Reverb and Feels!” flank of AMG has dredged up and dumped hyperbolic praise on, Devenial Verdict is one of the bands to which I feel the most grateful to have been exposed. Often sold as either “dissodeath” or “atmospheric death metal,” because they’re both wildly popular subgenres of death metal, both feel like misnomers. Rather, Blessing of Despair is an album loaded with memorable moments and melodies, and while it does, indeed, employ a lot of “atmosphere,”7 I was not prepared for the elite-level Azagthoth-on-LSD riffs that litter Blessing of Despair. I wouldn’t say that Blessing of Despair is OSDM, but the riffing evokes the masters in ways both direct and subtle and it gives the record an impeccable vibe. Devenial Verdict has wrought a brilliant death metal album where riffs abound, the atmosphere is set on the “Cathedral” setting, and every song is better than the last. Maybe the best word to use to describe their x factor is gravitas. But whatever it is, Devenial Verdict’s got it in spades.

#5: Octoploid // Beyond the Aeons [July 5th, 2024 | Reigning Phoenix Music | Bandcamp] — The amount of love that Beyond the Aeons isn’t receiving is one of the scandals of 2024, in my opinion. This started with our own positive—but tepid, if I’m honest—review of Beyond the Aeons and has continued through Listurnalia. As a passive, but legitimate, autocrat of Angry Metal Guy, I have half a mind to shut this place down over this deep disrespect for Amorphiscore. Honestly, it pains me not to make Beyond the Aeons the #1 album,8 because I have listened to these 33 minutes of extreme metal—occasionally tremmy and black, but mostly just solid melodeath—more than almost anything else this year. Tracks like “Coast of the Drowned Sailors” feed my need for new Amorphis and my secret wish that they were heavier. And that’s one thing I’ll give Octoploid, unlike Barren Earth, Beyond the Aeons doesn’t dwell too long on anything. It kicks off and speeds along, hitting you with catchy leads in the key of Moomin and doubled with synth—as one does. Don’t sleep on Octoploid. Beyond the Aeons is energetic, fun, catchy, and worth at least a couple of spins a week six months after it was released.

#4: Opeth // The Last Will and Testament [November 22nd, 2024 | Moderbolaget] — What Opeth has accomplished on The Last Will and Testament is remarkable. Unlike so many bands, Opeth’s reimaginations of its sound still speak to me. The Last Will and Testament is a smart, coherent, and melodramatic record that does Mikael Åkerfeldt and crew credit. The reason that this record elevates itself above the ceiling that most Newpeth lived under, however, is that they are finally able to turn the music up to 11 again compositionally. After more than a decade without the emotional and compositional peak (and release) of a guttural growl released from the diaphragm over a particularly chunky riff or heavy drums, The Last Will and Testament continues the band’s development but gives them a release valve—”§4″ being the highlight for me, where they transition from Opethro Tull—a jazz flute solo—to Deathro Tull with some operatic, but dour, death metal. And it simply feels good to hear them doing both of these things simultaneously. Having gone through and relistened to the discography at length, it is striking how Opeth circa 2024 sounds very little like the band I fell in love with in the late-’90s/early aughts. To be able to both be markedly different and feel like the same band is a deeply underrated trait. This could have been higher if I’d had longer with it.

#3: Fleshgod Apocalypse // Opera [August 23rd, 2024 | Nuclear Blast Records | Bandcamp] — I knew almost immediately that Opera was going to be a controversial record. I was not prepared for the hyperbolic pushback that Opera garnered from fans of Italy’s death metal answer to [Luca (Turilli / Lione)’s] Rhapsody [of Fire] for being, as I wrote myself, “undeniably poppy.” Sometimes I think that we fans of the extreme metal scene have lost sight of what pop music really is. The fact that people have been heaping scorn on Fleshgod Apocalypse for writing operatic death metal because Veronica Bordacchini doesn’t only sing using proper operatic technique and the band simplified some of its compositional tendencies is, to put it lightly, patently absurd. Opera is fun! It’s energetic and well-crafted, and it has a better excuse for writing more palatable and less grandiose music that uses more traditional pop and rock compositional structures than Nightwish ever had,9 and it literally has dramatic choirs arpeggiating in Latin behind grinding blast beats and death metal growls as I’m writing this blurb! Fucking get over yourselves. Go enjoy the shit out of Opera. No one sounds like Fleshgod Apocalypse and when they hit, they fucking hit. And Opera hits! It is thematically interesting, deeply personal, and cohesive in the way that the best albums are while featuring a diverse and excellent performance from Bordacchini. Easily one of the best records of 2024.

#2: Kanonenfieber // Die Urkatastrophe [September 20th, 2024 | Century Media | Bandcamp] — One of the things that makes the work at Angry Metal Guy interesting after 15 years is editing other writers’ work. It’s a pleasure to get to talk to, work with, and help guide the brilliant writers that we have working here. And because I want to hear what I’m reading about at the same time, I listen to a lot of music I would not necessarily have chosen to listen to myself. Noise’s work—such as 2023’s #5 record Leiþa—has come to my attention because of the work that Carcharodon has done in covering his projects. So, when I went to edit Die Urkatastrophe, well aware of the impending 5.0, I was edified to read a well-argued analysis that highlighted for me exactly what it was that appealed to me so much about Kanonenfieber’s critically acclaimed10 platter. Die Urkatastrophe is a powerful album that walks the line between black and death metal, with surprisingly polished and smooth production and artfully crafted songs. Like so many of the best albums, it is both thematically coherent and full of standout moments. Arresting moments like the gunshot at the end of “Der Maulwurf,” the best-placed samples since Velvet Darkness They Fear, and a superb flow make Die Urkatastrophe a triumph that we’ll return to for years.

#1: Hamferð // Men Guðs hond er sterk [March 22nd, 2024 | Metal Blade Records | Bandcamp] — The best album of 2024 was an undeniably easy choice this year. Released the day after my life started falling to pieces, Hamferð’s third masterpiece is a tale of tragedy (with a smidgen of hope), driven by strong songwriting and stronger performances. There are plenty of things that one can point to that help to differentiate Men Guðs hond er sterk from the field this year: the band’s sound is expertly crafted, and with pristine production, and the band—who apparently records without a click track?!—carries the emotional weight of their music perfectly despite the largely opaque language in which it’s presented.11 Furthermore, enough cannot be said about the powerhouse of a vocalist that Hamferð is fortunate enough to have. Jón Aldará’s vocals carry the day with a brassy baritone that evokes the mourning that all doom peddlers are chasing but so few nail. Men Guðs hond er sterk is tight, it’s heavy—though not as heavy as its predecessor, which I missed—but more importantly it’s complete and brilliant and my Record o’ the Year for 2024.

Honorable Mentions:

In Vain // Solemn [April 19th, 2024 | Indie Recordings | Bandcamp] — Having been released when I was in the moment of absolute denial and despair as my life fell apart, you’ll forgive me for not having heard this album until the last couple months of 2024. And I suspect that if I had been able to spend more time with it, it would have worked its way onto the list proper (though, man, it’s hard to know what would go). Once again, In Vain does such an outstanding job of balancing all the different sounds and influences, and I will never get sick of any clean vocals from the brothers Nedland (RIP Solefald). These guys are great and Solemn keeps them batting 1.000.

Ulcerate // Cutting the Throat of God [June 14th | Debemur Morti Productions | Bandcamp] — Another album that should’ve been higher on my list (but where would I have put Verikalpa then, guys!?). Ulcerate has been awesome and it’s almost unremarkable that they continue to be awesome in new and different ways. The thing that I keep coming back to Cutting the Throat of God for is the fact that these are probably the band’s most addictive and hypnotic riffs. Their sound has always had a fluidity that made them unique, but there are times when I feel like a snake being charmed as I’m listening to Ulcerate pump out fascinating, liquid riffs that seem to morph in scope and feel without ever breaking stride. Another record that is getting the shaft on this list.

Sonata Arctica // Clear Cold Beyond [March 8th, 2024 | Atomic Fire Records] — I started out skeptical about Clear Cold Beyond, and then I ended up loving it. The problem is that this was another record caught up in the Great Dumping o’ 2024 and got lost in the mix. This album has the benefit of having some really fun “we’re sorry we wrote Talviyö and then released two fucking acoustic cover records in a row” moments, but it’s not just an apology tour.12 The strength of Clear Cold Beyond is watching Kakko do the things he’s best at: write about creepy dudes with seriously bad boundaries (“Dark Empath”); write awkward lyrics about social topics that are kind of funny but also maybe not (“California”); and most importantly is his transformation into Dad Rocker (“The Best Things”). This record didn’t ever threaten to be Top 10, but it also deserves a nod for bringing me a ton of joy, even if I can’t listen to “The Best Things” without getting choked up.

Anciients // Beyond the Reach of the Sun [August 30th, 2024 | Season of Mist | Bandcamp] — I have been a little back and forth with Anciients, but Beyond the Reach of the Sun was an absolute banger that got snubbed for a Record o’ the Month spot, despite receiving an excellently written, laudatory review from Saunders. And perpetual self-editing complaints aside, Anciients is one of those bands whose ability to craft Riffs is unmatched. Every single song on this album has one of those Riffs—not just riffs, gotta capitalize that R so everyone knows that we’re talking about iconic stuff here—and I am, frankly, jealous of the feel and groove that these guys seem to have as second nature. This album clicked for me when I put it in the cans on a flight and just sat and listened to it and man, we are spoiled with an absolute embarrassment of riches in metal. These guys are an honorable mention? It’s unfair.

Caligula’s Horse // Charcoal Grace [January 26th, 2024 | InsideOut Records | Bandcamp] — After it was summarily 3.0’d by the guy who brought you the Angra list everyone thought was absolute crap, I feel like everyone just forgot about Charcoal Grace. But I’m going to be honest with you, this record deserved a lot better than it got at the hands of the traitorous reviewer who poo-poohed it and then, allegedly, went on to kick his dog and demand his wife make him a sandwich. This is a more subtle Caligula’s Horse, I admit. How they seem to be swapping places with Haken becomes more manifest with every release. But this record is a true headphones album that deserves a hi-def version of the release, serious cans, and a dark room. It’s loaded with great riffs and fantastic songs and has a particularly poignant and powerful closing. Also, the level of detail here is unreal. Appreciate what you have while they are still putting out amazing albums.

Noxis // Violence Inherent in the System [June 28th, 2024 | Rotted Life Records | Bandcamp] — One of the surprises of the year is an album named after one of the funniest jabs at the anarchosyndicalists in our lives. Noxis’ brand of frantic, technical death metal—complete with my favorite snare of the year—has swept through the Angry Metal Guy staff for a reason. The reason? It’s fucking great. At 45 minutes, Violence Inherent in the System is a record with the energy and addictiveness of Gorod, even if the songwriting chops aren’t quite on that level yet. But you don’t have to be Gorod-good to be good and Noxis is good. I’m looking forward to their sophomore release Scimitars Lobbed in Farcical Aquatic Ceremonies, due Q4 2025/Q1 2026.

Madder Mortem // Old Eyes, New Heart [January 26th, 2024 | Dark Essence Records | Bandcamp] — In my Record o’ the Month blurb for Old Eyes, New Heart, I wrote “What Old Eyes, New Heart does is show Madder Mortem as alive and creative as ever, showcasing a more vulnerable, introspective side of themselves. Tracks like ‘Here and Now’ and ‘Cold Hard Rain’ weep with power and raw emotion, giving fans all the feelz they yearn for, and there’s simmering anger girding the material as well. As GardensTale noted, regarding the very personal, intense feeling of the new music: ‘Old Eyes, New Heart will stand as one of the most intimate and therapeutic albums we’re bound to get this year.’ And who isn’t going to need a little bit of therapy in 2024?” Yeah, I found myself listening to this album a lot this year because it expresses what I couldn’t. Again, prescient.

Blood Incantation // Absolute Elsewhere [October 4th, 2024 | Century Media Records | Bandcamp] — Yeah, it’s fine I guess. A little overhyped in the comment section, though. Remember that time when it got released and everyone who hadn’t heard it yet was like “RECORD OF THE YEAR!!!!!!1!” five minutes later? Pepperidge Farms remembers. In all seriousness, this record is great and I enjoyed it which is why it’s here. But while it threatened to hit the list as an #ish, it never really felt like RotY material to me. Still, give these guys their due. They are unique and cool and you love to see the enthusiasm about weirdo progdeath.

Top 10(ish) Songs o’ the Year:

#ish: Karol G // “Si Antes Te Hubiera Conocido” — Fuck you.

#10: Sonata Arctica // “The Best Things” — Fans of the band and this album are going to laugh, but this song kills me. Dad rock. I love it.

#9: Wintersun // “Storm” — When I saw everyone sporting “Silver Leaves” as the highlight of Time II, I had to do a double-take. As I covered at length in my review, the one song that I felt lived up to Jaari’s potential as a player and composer was “Storm,” and this track is a fucking doozy. This track perfectly executes both the blend of blackened death metal and power metal that makes Wintersun’s inability to produce something truly epic frustrating. If I had only heard “Ominous Clouds” and “Storm,” Time II would’ve gotten a 4.5. This is the only memorable thing he wrote on the entire album.

#8: Oceans of Slumber // “Wish” — It’s weird the tracks that call to you on an album. I love this whole record for a bunch of different reasons, but on “Wish” there are little melodic things that Cammie does here that make my heart ache. The lyrics, too. I feel ’em. Deeply underrated record.

#7: Fellowship // “Victim” — “I swear, I won’t always feel like a victim! I won’t always fight on my own! So, forgive me these transgressions as I live a life of lessons and I grow to overshadow darker thrones! This king is king alone!”

#6: Opeth // “§4” — No more perfect encapsulation of why Opeth is impressive than how hard they nailed this song. Love the porn beat with the Ian Anderson flute solo (Deathro Tull, lol) that gives way to stadium rock that gives way to grindy death metal. Just inject that fucking shit straight into my fucking veins. Unff.

#5: Grendel’s Sÿster // “Cosmogony” — This song is metal as fuck. I love the fun little extra beat they drop in to make it feel like a slightly lopsided wheel rolling along. But there’s nothing about this that doesn’t live up to what I wrote above: good, honest heavy metal. Catchy, riffy, and fun to listen to. Top it off with a bass-heavy section and a gallop carried on the guitar and you’ve got yourself a recipe for an epic, addictive track. More of this, plz.

#4: Fleshgod Apocalypse // “Morphine Waltz” — This song fucking rules. From the opening strains with the horn section in the orchestra to the 3/4 time signature (y’know, ’cause it’s actually a waltz), to the raw, punky performance from Bordacchini. Extra points for the fucking balls to the wall bridge with the huge choirs before the guitar solo. Like, how do you fucking people not think this is one of the best albums of the year? JFC.

#3: Caligula’s Horse // “Mute” — One of Caligula’s Horse’s strongest traits is their ability to write epic conclusions to their albums. “Mute” is up there with “Graves” in terms of the sheer weightiness of the whole thing—though this time it’s more delicate. Beautiful.

#2: Anciients // “Despoiled” — Riff of the year at 3:57. Gives me involuntary metal face. Love the vocal melodies, too. Great stuff.

#1: Madder Mortem // “Things I’ll Never Do” — This song fucking kills me. Has anyone checked on their lyricist recently?

Show 12 footnotes

1. This joke is fucking hilarious but only a few of you are going to get it. ↩
2. I kid because I’m scared shitless of your country and will never visit it. – AMG ↩
3. Wondering where you are? 11. Poland; 12. Brazil; 13. Norway; 14. Belgium; 15. Italy; 16. Greece; 17. Denmark; 18. Czechia; 19. Austria; 20. Russia; 21: Mexico; 22. Portugal; 23. Switzerland; 24. Romania; 25. Hungary. ↩
4. Not that I’m *not* a big worthless loser, just that there’s more to it. ↩
5. They suffered unduly and cast a lot of longing stares at each other, but they survived! ↩
6. Because fucking Morbid Angel is the best, obviously. ↩
7. Read: reverb. ↩
8. Tell you what, guys, how ’bout Jón Aldará joins Octoploid and y’all start writing 15-minute songs? Then you can both be #1! ↩
9. And don’t get me started Steven Wilson. “Ooh, I should be famous, why haven’t I had a number one record when Nick Beggs has had one?!” 🙄 ↩
10. This is true because I am busy acclaiming it. ↩
11. Obviously, largely opaque for most of us. People from the Faroe Islands do, indeed, speak the language in which this album is sung. My AI translator does not. ↩
12. And if it is, it is obviously their best-executed one to date. ↩

#2024 #Anciients #AngryMetalGuy #AngryMetalGuySRecordSOTheYear #AngryMetalGuySTop10Ish_ #BeyondTheAeons #BlessingOfDespair #BloodIncantation #BloomDecay #CaligulaSHorse #DawnTreader #DevenialVerdict #DieUrkatastrophe #Fellowship #FleshgodApocalypse #GrendelSSÿster #Hamferð #InVain #Iotunn #Kanonenfieber #KarolG #KatabasisIntoTheAbaton #Kinship #Listurnalia2024 #MadderMortem #MenGuðsHondErSterk #Noxis #OceansOfSlumber #Octoploid #Opera #Opeth #SonataArctica #TheLastWillAndTestament #TheSkiesAboveEternity #TimeII #Tuomio #Ulcerate #Verikalpa #WhereGodsFearToSpeak #Wintersun

I am delighted to have been elected as a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society.

It’s great to see the interdisciplinary approach of the Society and the sheer quality and quantity of its activities.

https://royalhistsoc.org/society-elects-306-new-fellows-associate-fellows-members-and-postgraduate-members/

#fellow #fellowship #history #royalhistorysociety #legalhistory #lawandhistory

The Big Conversation – Christadelphians in the United Kingdom

In the United Kingdom people may find several villages and towns where there reside Christadelphians,  a body of Christians who try to base their beliefs and practices wholly on the Bible, which they regard as God’s word. They try therefore to rid themselves of the various ideas and rituals which have attached themselves to Christendom over the last 2,000 years and to return to the beliefs and practices of the first century apostles.

Being a group of people who want to follow the Nazarene Jew Jeshua, who did not want to do his own will, but always did the Will of his heavenly Father, they as the man born in Bethlehem, are living in this world but not wanting to be of this world following human traditions and human dogmas. That does not make them so popular, because people may look strange at those people who do not want to celebrate Halloween and other pagan festivities.

Because the Christadelphians are a community without the trappings of elaborate buildings, priests or icons, their institutions and fellowship-rooms not be seen straight away. The outer sights are not important for the Christadelphians who prefer to give honour to God and show a deep respect for God’s word and love to have a strong sense of family and fellowship.

On the above map you can see some of the more than 300 ecclesiae in Great Britain and Ireland. They were taken under the loop by brother Jon Downes who on the 10th of October asked

What is happening?

For him the present size & growth or non-growth of UK ecclesiae show there isn’t a, ‘No Change’ option

It’s not that we aren’t trying!

he said to about 350 Christadelphians present at Dudley college.

In this world of figures, comparisons and evaluations it is all about numbers in graphics which have to show an up-going trend and reach high peaks. this for sure can not be said about our very small community. Lots of people may think when it is not big it has no value and can not be good. But people should look at the intrinsic value and to see what a group or church is believing, following up, and how they keep to what they preach. It is true that minorities do not exert influence, and that they should have to contend on the culture or the systems around it.

Christadelphians do not fall in the temptation to pretend to be a majority, even if one is not. They do know they are just a little grain of sand in our religious world. But that does not mean that many more little grains can be put together with water and with clay form a nice vase. Though sometimes it can look like we are coming to sit more in an urn. Especially in Belgium we are in distress and can do with some support form abroad. Though looking at other countries can show us also how important it is to make more work of the announcing or making known of our society.

All over the world people may not forget that the church of Jesus Christ is never a majority, in any fallen culture, even if we happen to outnumber every[one] else around us. They should come to see that the real church of God is the church of Christ were people are willing to follow Jesus his words, his teachings, but also his manners and his aspirations. It is a place where people are willing to share the agapè love of Christ, who was even willing to give his life for others, even for those who turned against him. Would we do that?

Where Christian churches have held fast to the truth that the Holy Scriptures have been given by God as an authoritative and infallible rule of faith and practice, they have never wandered very seriously out of the right way. But when, on the other hand, reason has been exalted above revelation, and made the the exponent of revelation, all kinds of errors and mischiefs have been the result, and got many sorts of denominations which have lots of rituals people may like very much but which are not according to God’s Law. And that part is the most important in our building community. We should all try to live according God’s Law and love His Words more than the words of man.

Unfortunately, lots of Christians do not closely follow the Bible today and prefer to join churches in which they can keep up their human traditions. They have changed things to how they want them to be.
Since the times of Jesus, there have been small groups of people who believed what the Bible said. Many of these people were cruelly treated in times past as a result of their beliefs. Such believers united in the North of America when in 1864 broke out the Civil War. Dr. Thomas thought up the word “Christadelphian“, a name combining the name “Christ” with the Greek word “adelphi” meaning “brother”. So the name “Christadelphian” means “brothers and sisters in Christ“.

Christadelphians are grateful to John Thomas for his efforts in searching out the message of the Bible. John Thomas was not a prophet or someone special. He read the Bible, just as we try to do. Christadelphians follow Jesus Christ, not John Thomas. Not following just one man or just one human organisation gives that we may have different ideas about certain things, but that doe snot mean we would not have union with each other, though we must agree that there are certain Christadelphian groups who shamefully do not want to have contact with other Christadelphians.  According to the Belgian Free Christadelphians this is also part of the reasons why it is so difficult to show the world a bigger group of religious people under one name: Christadelphians.

Being joined together by our common faith in the Bible, and the way we live, we all should try to meet each other and have contact with each other as loving siblings. All being brothers and sisters in Christ. Though each “ecclesia” has to look after its own affairs, and choose members who determine arrangements and organise activities on behalf of their members they should feel that unity with Christ with other Christadelphians world wide and show the outside world that Jesus Christ is their head of each ecclesia.

Living in this world we do agree that “It’s not about the numbers” … …but the “numbers tell a story”. And those numbers in west Europe may be alarming. Therefore there was the call to come thereto in the UK to discuss that matter of dwindling ciphers.

Like any other western capitalist country in the UK Bible ownership and Bible knowledge has slumped, some english people also do find it a form of indoctrination when parents in their home pray and talk about God in front of their children of that child.

Jon Downes presented the anxious members a snapshot of our society in the UK.

and showed those present how a typical ecclesia looks like.

When we look at the adult baptisms in our community from related people (3,5) and from non related
(1.0) plus counting the (0.5) refellowshipping members, comparing them with the average of 10 people falling asleep and 2 people leaving the fellowship, we might say that such numbers bring the graphic line downwards.

What might happen to the Christadelphian community in the United Kingdom when they do not something to change the coarse.

happened.

Therefore lets look at the United Kingdom as an example.

what might this give to that community, where we find, like everywhere in the world members becoming older and dying, whilst the world is getting less interested in God and commandment.

In case we can bring the Gospel of the Good News to many more ears, we should be able by a co-effort of preaching to increase the interest in God again and get again some people interested in joining a community of lovers of Christ and lovers of God.

We must see that

The lost are our hope

and that there is good reason to try to reach the lost. We as brothers and sisters in Christ should love the people in the world so much that we will be offering some of our spare time for preaching work.

We are the hope of the lost

Luckily it is not all ad  or sad news.

Good News!

tells brother Downes is that we can look at

• 120 baptisms a year (4 average sized ecclesias)
• In the last 40 years, 39 new ecclesias. (Although 96 have closed & some were renamed).
• In the last 15 years,1/4 of all baptisms from non Christadelphian backgrounds were by just 16 ecclesias. (Although 1/3 didn’t baptise any)
• While many ecclesias are shrinking many are growing.
• Numbers in Africa are growing!
• Bible Learning Centres & Learning English are having a big impact

Instead of going for Plan A is it not better that we go for Plan B?

• Current UK Christadelphian population of 8-8500 is based on 223 2015 ALS Diary returns on households & 178 2015 CCH survey returns. 10 Ecclesias had neither return and were estimated on previous diary returns.
• 1985 to 2015 data based on records kept from the back of the Christadelphian, clearly subject to some error, gaps and misreporting. The last 12 months of Magazine entries were analysed separately and yielded results consistent with the records obtained.
• Net loss of 120 per annum and the 10, 5, 1 ratio derived from average of last 10 years data. Approx 240 out and 120 in. These do not include brothers and sisters movement in and out of the UK.
• Forecast from 2015 based on a linear continuation which could easily be a) more dramatic because of rapid closure of small ecclesias, ageing population, reduced home pool to draw from, fewer people to witness, higher rates of leaving the community b) less dramatic as in a smaller community there are fewer people falling asleep each year.

One of the deceases of this time is that too many people want to enjoy their own little cocoon and not getting out of their comfort zone to share life with the spiritually needy. Those who call themselves Christian may not forget that this means to be a follower of Jesus Christ and demands also doing what he required from his followers. Jesus asked us to go out in the world to proclaim the Kingdom of God. We are to make every effort to bring hope and healing in Jesus name to those in need.

We are to see that the tangible goodness of God flows into every nook and cranny of our communities – especially in those places where darkness seems to prevail. {Walking With Intentionality}

+

Preceding articles:

Religious Practices around the world

Manifests for believers #3 Catholic versus Protestant

Ecclesia to exist, grow and communities to have people communicating with each other

The Ecclesia in the churchsystem

Reasons to come together

The Big Conversation

The Big Conversation follow up

Reasons why you may not miss the opportunity to go to a Small Church

Engaging the culture without losing the gospel

Evangelisation, local preaching opposite overseas evangelism

Feeling-good, search for happiness and the church

Members of the ecclesia uniting and seeking God’s help in tribulation

Why we do not have our worship-services in a church building

Belgian Christadelphians 2013 & 2014 in review

Personal thoughts, communication, establishing ecclesia and guest writings

++

Additional reading:

1. People are turning their back on Christianity
2. Looking on what is going on and not being of it
3. London an exaggerated microcosm of the UK at large
4. Parents forbidden to pray in front of their children or to take them to church
5. State and attitude of certain people to blame for radicalisation
6. More Muslim children than Christian children growing up in our cities
7. Will Islam conquer Europe
8. Christianity to be enshrined
9. Halloween custom of the nations
10. Wrong ideas about religious terrorism
11. A call easy to understand
12. Discipleship way of life on the narrow way to everlasting life
13. Many forgot how Christ should be our anchor and our focus
14. The meek one riding on an ass
15. Do not be afraid to learn or to speak
16. Reasons to come together
17. Congregate, to gather, to meet
18. Fellowship
19. Disciple of Christ counting lives and friends dear to them
20. The first on the list of the concerns of the saint
21. Holiness and expression of worship coming from inside
22. To find ways of Godly understanding
23. Perishable non theologians daring to go out to preach
24. Who are the honest ones?
25. Certain people trying to stem freedom of speech
26. Priority to form a loving brotherhood
27. Newsweek asks: How ignorant are you?
28. Religious Freedom in a Multicultural World
29. Some christians do have problems with the Christian connection with Jews
30. American atheists most religiously literate Americans
31. Determine the drive
32. Try driving forward instead of backwards
33. Campbell, Thomas and Bijbelvorsers
34. Looking at older articles series over Russell on the previous Bible-scholar Association
35. Wanting to know more about basic teachings of Christadelphianism
36. Christadelphians or Messianic Christians or Messianic Jews
37. Christadelphian people
38. Who are Christadelphians
39. What are Brothers in Christ
40. Two new encyclopaedic articles
41. Christadelphians today
42. Keeping an ecclesia in modern times
43. Small churches of the few Christadelphians
44. Christianity to be enshrined
45. Christianity is a love affair
46. Intentions of an Ecclesia
47. Character transformed by the influence of our fellowships
48. Love for each other attracting others
49. What makes a consecrated Christian
50. A call easy to understand
51. If you have integrity
52. Work with joy and pray with love
53. To know Christ is filling life with meaning
54. The truth is very plain to see and God can be clearly seen

+++

Other articles of interest:

1. Walking in Total Dependence Upon God
2. What is God’s Will For Your Life?
3. On the Affirmation of Scripture
4. A Snapshot of the Church in America
5. a little church
6. Four Pressing Needs in Rural Communities, and How the Church Should Respond
7. If It’s All About Relationship…
8. Leading a church is not a hands free exercise
9. Walking With Intentionality
10. Living Our Faith in a New Way
11. What’s in It for Me?
12. Deacon Selection In the Small Church
13. Lord’s Day 10: God is in Control
14. Just Try a Few Things
15. “When Faith Goes, All Good Things Go”
16. Growing Deep
17. All the Wrong Reasons
18. Little Church
19. Leading Change
20. Small Groups & Grow A Small Church by Multiplying Its Small Groups
21. Living well
22. Blessed by His Hand
23. Encouragement for the Small
24. How Did You Get Here?
25. How to Impersonate a Big Church
26. What Do You Do Well?
27. Recognize the Facts
28. What are your top two struggles?
29. The Best Thing You Can Do
30. On the road to sainthood and not silent about it
31. Incognito Zone: Where the Church Is Booming
32. House Church Reaches Out to Atheists, Agnostics in California
33. The one religion that’s not part of my spiritual quest
34. Six Ways Not to Forsake the Assembly
35. Tent Making
36. Journey On The Narrow Path

+++

Related articles

• One in three people born in the UK this year will suffer from some form of dementia in their lifetime, the Alzheimer’s Research UK charity has warned. (grumpyelder.com)
• Israel Goldstein Youth Village looking for dates in Europe (christadelphianworld.blogspot.com)
• Looking for writers for two Lifestyle Magazines (christadelphianworld.blogspot.com)
• Change of name (christadelphianworld.blogspot.com)

Rate this:

#AdultBaptism #Agape #BeingInUnion #Belgium #BiblicalTruth #BrothersAndSistersInChrist #BrothersInChrist #CapitalistWorld #Christadelphian #ChristadelphianCommunity #Christadelphians #Christendom #ChristianChurches #ChristianTruth #Christians #ChurchOfJesusChrist #ComfortZone #DwindlingChurch #Ecclesia #Fellowship #FollowerOfChrist #FollowingJesusChrist #FollowingMan #GreatBritain #HopeOfEcclesia #Influence #InterestInGod #Ireland #JohnThomas #JonDownes #LeavingTheFellowship #LivingInThisWorld #LoversOfChrist #LoversOfGod #Minority #NorthOfAmerica #NumbersAmount_ #PaganFestivities #Preaching #PreachingWork #Proclaim #Proclaiming #ReachingTheLost #Refellowshipping #RuleOfPractice #SistersInChrist #SmallCommunity #TeachingsOfChrist #Temptation #Union #UnitedKingdom #Unity #UnityInChrist #UnityInDiversity #WayOfLiving #WordOfMan

The Big Conversation – Christadelphians in the United Kingdom

In the United Kingdom people may find several villages and towns where there reside Christadelphians,  a body of Christians who try to base their beliefs and practices wholly on the Bible, which they regard as God’s word. They try therefore to rid themselves of the various ideas and rituals which have attached themselves to Christendom over the last 2,000 years and to return to the beliefs and practices of the first century apostles.

Being a group of people who want to follow the Nazarene Jew Jeshua, who did not want to do his own will, but always did the Will of his heavenly Father, they as the man born in Bethlehem, are living in this world but not wanting to be of this world following human traditions and human dogmas. That does not make them so popular, because people may look strange at those people who do not want to celebrate Halloween and other pagan festivities.

Because the Christadelphians are a community without the trappings of elaborate buildings, priests or icons, their institutions and fellowship-rooms not be seen straight away. The outer sights are not important for the Christadelphians who prefer to give honour to God and show a deep respect for God’s word and love to have a strong sense of family and fellowship.

On the above map you can see some of the more than 300 ecclesiae in Great Britain and Ireland. They were taken under the loop by brother Jon Downes who on the 10th of October asked

What is happening?

For him the present size & growth or non-growth of UK ecclesiae show there isn’t a, ‘No Change’ option

It’s not that we aren’t trying!

he said to about 350 Christadelphians present at Dudley college.

In this world of figures, comparisons and evaluations it is all about numbers in graphics which have to show an up-going trend and reach high peaks. this for sure can not be said about our very small community. Lots of people may think when it is not big it has no value and can not be good. But people should look at the intrinsic value and to see what a group or church is believing, following up, and how they keep to what they preach. It is true that minorities do not exert influence, and that they should have to contend on the culture or the systems around it.

Christadelphians do not fall in the temptation to pretend to be a majority, even if one is not. They do know they are just a little grain of sand in our religious world. But that does not mean that many more little grains can be put together with water and with clay form a nice vase. Though sometimes it can look like we are coming to sit more in an urn. Especially in Belgium we are in distress and can do with some support form abroad. Though looking at other countries can show us also how important it is to make more work of the announcing or making known of our society.

All over the world people may not forget that the church of Jesus Christ is never a majority, in any fallen culture, even if we happen to outnumber every[one] else around us. They should come to see that the real church of God is the church of Christ were people are willing to follow Jesus his words, his teachings, but also his manners and his aspirations. It is a place where people are willing to share the agapè love of Christ, who was even willing to give his life for others, even for those who turned against him. Would we do that?

Where Christian churches have held fast to the truth that the Holy Scriptures have been given by God as an authoritative and infallible rule of faith and practice, they have never wandered very seriously out of the right way. But when, on the other hand, reason has been exalted above revelation, and made the the exponent of revelation, all kinds of errors and mischiefs have been the result, and got many sorts of denominations which have lots of rituals people may like very much but which are not according to God’s Law. And that part is the most important in our building community. We should all try to live according God’s Law and love His Words more than the words of man.

Unfortunately, lots of Christians do not closely follow the Bible today and prefer to join churches in which they can keep up their human traditions. They have changed things to how they want them to be.
Since the times of Jesus, there have been small groups of people who believed what the Bible said. Many of these people were cruelly treated in times past as a result of their beliefs. Such believers united in the North of America when in 1864 broke out the Civil War. Dr. Thomas thought up the word “Christadelphian“, a name combining the name “Christ” with the Greek word “adelphi” meaning “brother”. So the name “Christadelphian” means “brothers and sisters in Christ“.

Christadelphians are grateful to John Thomas for his efforts in searching out the message of the Bible. John Thomas was not a prophet or someone special. He read the Bible, just as we try to do. Christadelphians follow Jesus Christ, not John Thomas. Not following just one man or just one human organisation gives that we may have different ideas about certain things, but that doe snot mean we would not have union with each other, though we must agree that there are certain Christadelphian groups who shamefully do not want to have contact with other Christadelphians.  According to the Belgian Free Christadelphians this is also part of the reasons why it is so difficult to show the world a bigger group of religious people under one name: Christadelphians.

Being joined together by our common faith in the Bible, and the way we live, we all should try to meet each other and have contact with each other as loving siblings. All being brothers and sisters in Christ. Though each “ecclesia” has to look after its own affairs, and choose members who determine arrangements and organise activities on behalf of their members they should feel that unity with Christ with other Christadelphians world wide and show the outside world that Jesus Christ is their head of each ecclesia.

Living in this world we do agree that “It’s not about the numbers” … …but the “numbers tell a story”. And those numbers in west Europe may be alarming. Therefore there was the call to come thereto in the UK to discuss that matter of dwindling ciphers.

Like any other western capitalist country in the UK Bible ownership and Bible knowledge has slumped, some english people also do find it a form of indoctrination when parents in their home pray and talk about God in front of their children of that child.

Jon Downes presented the anxious members a snapshot of our society in the UK.

and showed those present how a typical ecclesia looks like.

When we look at the adult baptisms in our community from related people (3,5) and from non related
(1.0) plus counting the (0.5) refellowshipping members, comparing them with the average of 10 people falling asleep and 2 people leaving the fellowship, we might say that such numbers bring the graphic line downwards.

What might happen to the Christadelphian community in the United Kingdom when they do not something to change the coarse.

happened.

Therefore lets look at the United Kingdom as an example.

what might this give to that community, where we find, like everywhere in the world members becoming older and dying, whilst the world is getting less interested in God and commandment.

In case we can bring the Gospel of the Good News to many more ears, we should be able by a co-effort of preaching to increase the interest in God again and get again some people interested in joining a community of lovers of Christ and lovers of God.

We must see that

The lost are our hope

and that there is good reason to try to reach the lost. We as brothers and sisters in Christ should love the people in the world so much that we will be offering some of our spare time for preaching work.

We are the hope of the lost

Luckily it is not all ad  or sad news.

Good News!

tells brother Downes is that we can look at

• 120 baptisms a year (4 average sized ecclesias)
• In the last 40 years, 39 new ecclesias. (Although 96 have closed & some were renamed).
• In the last 15 years,1/4 of all baptisms from non Christadelphian backgrounds were by just 16 ecclesias. (Although 1/3 didn’t baptise any)
• While many ecclesias are shrinking many are growing.
• Numbers in Africa are growing!
• Bible Learning Centres & Learning English are having a big impact

Instead of going for Plan A is it not better that we go for Plan B?

• Current UK Christadelphian population of 8-8500 is based on 223 2015 ALS Diary returns on households & 178 2015 CCH survey returns. 10 Ecclesias had neither return and were estimated on previous diary returns.
• 1985 to 2015 data based on records kept from the back of the Christadelphian, clearly subject to some error, gaps and misreporting. The last 12 months of Magazine entries were analysed separately and yielded results consistent with the records obtained.
• Net loss of 120 per annum and the 10, 5, 1 ratio derived from average of last 10 years data. Approx 240 out and 120 in. These do not include brothers and sisters movement in and out of the UK.
• Forecast from 2015 based on a linear continuation which could easily be a) more dramatic because of rapid closure of small ecclesias, ageing population, reduced home pool to draw from, fewer people to witness, higher rates of leaving the community b) less dramatic as in a smaller community there are fewer people falling asleep each year.

One of the deceases of this time is that too many people want to enjoy their own little cocoon and not getting out of their comfort zone to share life with the spiritually needy. Those who call themselves Christian may not forget that this means to be a follower of Jesus Christ and demands also doing what he required from his followers. Jesus asked us to go out in the world to proclaim the Kingdom of God. We are to make every effort to bring hope and healing in Jesus name to those in need.

We are to see that the tangible goodness of God flows into every nook and cranny of our communities – especially in those places where darkness seems to prevail. {Walking With Intentionality}

+

Preceding articles:

Religious Practices around the world

Manifests for believers #3 Catholic versus Protestant

Ecclesia to exist, grow and communities to have people communicating with each other

The Ecclesia in the churchsystem

Reasons to come together

The Big Conversation

The Big Conversation follow up

Reasons why you may not miss the opportunity to go to a Small Church

Engaging the culture without losing the gospel

Evangelisation, local preaching opposite overseas evangelism

Feeling-good, search for happiness and the church

Members of the ecclesia uniting and seeking God’s help in tribulation

Why we do not have our worship-services in a church building

Belgian Christadelphians 2013 & 2014 in review

Personal thoughts, communication, establishing ecclesia and guest writings

++

Additional reading:

1. People are turning their back on Christianity
2. Looking on what is going on and not being of it
3. London an exaggerated microcosm of the UK at large
4. Parents forbidden to pray in front of their children or to take them to church
5. State and attitude of certain people to blame for radicalisation
6. More Muslim children than Christian children growing up in our cities
7. Will Islam conquer Europe
8. Christianity to be enshrined
9. Halloween custom of the nations
10. Wrong ideas about religious terrorism
11. A call easy to understand
12. Discipleship way of life on the narrow way to everlasting life
13. Many forgot how Christ should be our anchor and our focus
14. The meek one riding on an ass
15. Do not be afraid to learn or to speak
16. Reasons to come together
17. Congregate, to gather, to meet
18. Fellowship
19. Disciple of Christ counting lives and friends dear to them
20. The first on the list of the concerns of the saint
21. Holiness and expression of worship coming from inside
22. To find ways of Godly understanding
23. Perishable non theologians daring to go out to preach
24. Who are the honest ones?
25. Certain people trying to stem freedom of speech
26. Priority to form a loving brotherhood
27. Newsweek asks: How ignorant are you?
28. Religious Freedom in a Multicultural World
29. Some christians do have problems with the Christian connection with Jews
30. American atheists most religiously literate Americans
31. Determine the drive
32. Try driving forward instead of backwards
33. Campbell, Thomas and Bijbelvorsers
34. Looking at older articles series over Russell on the previous Bible-scholar Association
35. Wanting to know more about basic teachings of Christadelphianism
36. Christadelphians or Messianic Christians or Messianic Jews
37. Christadelphian people
38. Who are Christadelphians
39. What are Brothers in Christ
40. Two new encyclopaedic articles
41. Christadelphians today
42. Keeping an ecclesia in modern times
43. Small churches of the few Christadelphians
44. Christianity to be enshrined
45. Christianity is a love affair
46. Intentions of an Ecclesia
47. Character transformed by the influence of our fellowships
48. Love for each other attracting others
49. What makes a consecrated Christian
50. A call easy to understand
51. If you have integrity
52. Work with joy and pray with love
53. To know Christ is filling life with meaning
54. The truth is very plain to see and God can be clearly seen

+++

Other articles of interest:

1. Walking in Total Dependence Upon God
2. What is God’s Will For Your Life?
3. On the Affirmation of Scripture
4. A Snapshot of the Church in America
5. a little church
6. Four Pressing Needs in Rural Communities, and How the Church Should Respond
7. If It’s All About Relationship…
8. Leading a church is not a hands free exercise
9. Walking With Intentionality
10. Living Our Faith in a New Way
11. What’s in It for Me?
12. Deacon Selection In the Small Church
13. Lord’s Day 10: God is in Control
14. Just Try a Few Things
15. “When Faith Goes, All Good Things Go”
16. Growing Deep
17. All the Wrong Reasons
18. Little Church
19. Leading Change
20. Small Groups & Grow A Small Church by Multiplying Its Small Groups
21. Living well
22. Blessed by His Hand
23. Encouragement for the Small
24. How Did You Get Here?
25. How to Impersonate a Big Church
26. What Do You Do Well?
27. Recognize the Facts
28. What are your top two struggles?
29. The Best Thing You Can Do
30. On the road to sainthood and not silent about it
31. Incognito Zone: Where the Church Is Booming
32. House Church Reaches Out to Atheists, Agnostics in California
33. The one religion that’s not part of my spiritual quest
34. Six Ways Not to Forsake the Assembly
35. Tent Making
36. Journey On The Narrow Path

+++

Related articles

• One in three people born in the UK this year will suffer from some form of dementia in their lifetime, the Alzheimer’s Research UK charity has warned. (grumpyelder.com)
• Israel Goldstein Youth Village looking for dates in Europe (christadelphianworld.blogspot.com)
• Looking for writers for two Lifestyle Magazines (christadelphianworld.blogspot.com)
• Change of name (christadelphianworld.blogspot.com)

Rate this:

#AdultBaptism #Agape #BeingInUnion #Belgium #BiblicalTruth #BrothersAndSistersInChrist #BrothersInChrist #CapitalistWorld #Christadelphian #ChristadelphianCommunity #Christadelphians #Christendom #ChristianChurches #ChristianTruth #Christians #ChurchOfJesusChrist #ComfortZone #DwindlingChurch #Ecclesia #Fellowship #FollowerOfChrist #FollowingJesusChrist #FollowingMan #GreatBritain #HopeOfEcclesia #Influence #InterestInGod #Ireland #JohnThomas #JonDownes #LeavingTheFellowship #LivingInThisWorld #LoversOfChrist #LoversOfGod #Minority #NorthOfAmerica #NumbersAmount_ #PaganFestivities #Preaching #PreachingWork #Proclaim #Proclaiming #ReachingTheLost #Refellowshipping #RuleOfPractice #SistersInChrist #SmallCommunity #TeachingsOfChrist #Temptation #Union #UnitedKingdom #Unity #UnityInChrist #UnityInDiversity #WayOfLiving #WordOfMan

The Big Conversation – Christadelphians in the United Kingdom

In the United Kingdom people may find several villages and towns where there reside Christadelphians,  a body of Christians who try to base their beliefs and practices wholly on the Bible, which they regard as God’s word. They try therefore to rid themselves of the various ideas and rituals which have attached themselves to Christendom over the last 2,000 years and to return to the beliefs and practices of the first century apostles.

Being a group of people who want to follow the Nazarene Jew Jeshua, who did not want to do his own will, but always did the Will of his heavenly Father, they as the man born in Bethlehem, are living in this world but not wanting to be of this world following human traditions and human dogmas. That does not make them so popular, because people may look strange at those people who do not want to celebrate Halloween and other pagan festivities.

Because the Christadelphians are a community without the trappings of elaborate buildings, priests or icons, their institutions and fellowship-rooms not be seen straight away. The outer sights are not important for the Christadelphians who prefer to give honour to God and show a deep respect for God’s word and love to have a strong sense of family and fellowship.

On the above map you can see some of the more than 300 ecclesiae in Great Britain and Ireland. They were taken under the loop by brother Jon Downes who on the 10th of October asked

What is happening?

For him the present size & growth or non-growth of UK ecclesiae show there isn’t a, ‘No Change’ option

It’s not that we aren’t trying!

he said to about 350 Christadelphians present at Dudley college.

In this world of figures, comparisons and evaluations it is all about numbers in graphics which have to show an up-going trend and reach high peaks. this for sure can not be said about our very small community. Lots of people may think when it is not big it has no value and can not be good. But people should look at the intrinsic value and to see what a group or church is believing, following up, and how they keep to what they preach. It is true that minorities do not exert influence, and that they should have to contend on the culture or the systems around it.

Christadelphians do not fall in the temptation to pretend to be a majority, even if one is not. They do know they are just a little grain of sand in our religious world. But that does not mean that many more little grains can be put together with water and with clay form a nice vase. Though sometimes it can look like we are coming to sit more in an urn. Especially in Belgium we are in distress and can do with some support form abroad. Though looking at other countries can show us also how important it is to make more work of the announcing or making known of our society.

All over the world people may not forget that the church of Jesus Christ is never a majority, in any fallen culture, even if we happen to outnumber every[one] else around us. They should come to see that the real church of God is the church of Christ were people are willing to follow Jesus his words, his teachings, but also his manners and his aspirations. It is a place where people are willing to share the agapè love of Christ, who was even willing to give his life for others, even for those who turned against him. Would we do that?

Where Christian churches have held fast to the truth that the Holy Scriptures have been given by God as an authoritative and infallible rule of faith and practice, they have never wandered very seriously out of the right way. But when, on the other hand, reason has been exalted above revelation, and made the the exponent of revelation, all kinds of errors and mischiefs have been the result, and got many sorts of denominations which have lots of rituals people may like very much but which are not according to God’s Law. And that part is the most important in our building community. We should all try to live according God’s Law and love His Words more than the words of man.

Unfortunately, lots of Christians do not closely follow the Bible today and prefer to join churches in which they can keep up their human traditions. They have changed things to how they want them to be.
Since the times of Jesus, there have been small groups of people who believed what the Bible said. Many of these people were cruelly treated in times past as a result of their beliefs. Such believers united in the North of America when in 1864 broke out the Civil War. Dr. Thomas thought up the word “Christadelphian“, a name combining the name “Christ” with the Greek word “adelphi” meaning “brother”. So the name “Christadelphian” means “brothers and sisters in Christ“.

Christadelphians are grateful to John Thomas for his efforts in searching out the message of the Bible. John Thomas was not a prophet or someone special. He read the Bible, just as we try to do. Christadelphians follow Jesus Christ, not John Thomas. Not following just one man or just one human organisation gives that we may have different ideas about certain things, but that doe snot mean we would not have union with each other, though we must agree that there are certain Christadelphian groups who shamefully do not want to have contact with other Christadelphians.  According to the Belgian Free Christadelphians this is also part of the reasons why it is so difficult to show the world a bigger group of religious people under one name: Christadelphians.

Being joined together by our common faith in the Bible, and the way we live, we all should try to meet each other and have contact with each other as loving siblings. All being brothers and sisters in Christ. Though each “ecclesia” has to look after its own affairs, and choose members who determine arrangements and organise activities on behalf of their members they should feel that unity with Christ with other Christadelphians world wide and show the outside world that Jesus Christ is their head of each ecclesia.

Living in this world we do agree that “It’s not about the numbers” … …but the “numbers tell a story”. And those numbers in west Europe may be alarming. Therefore there was the call to come thereto in the UK to discuss that matter of dwindling ciphers.

Like any other western capitalist country in the UK Bible ownership and Bible knowledge has slumped, some english people also do find it a form of indoctrination when parents in their home pray and talk about God in front of their children of that child.

Jon Downes presented the anxious members a snapshot of our society in the UK.

and showed those present how a typical ecclesia looks like.

When we look at the adult baptisms in our community from related people (3,5) and from non related
(1.0) plus counting the (0.5) refellowshipping members, comparing them with the average of 10 people falling asleep and 2 people leaving the fellowship, we might say that such numbers bring the graphic line downwards.

What might happen to the Christadelphian community in the United Kingdom when they do not something to change the coarse.

happened.

Therefore lets look at the United Kingdom as an example.

what might this give to that community, where we find, like everywhere in the world members becoming older and dying, whilst the world is getting less interested in God and commandment.

In case we can bring the Gospel of the Good News to many more ears, we should be able by a co-effort of preaching to increase the interest in God again and get again some people interested in joining a community of lovers of Christ and lovers of God.

We must see that

The lost are our hope

and that there is good reason to try to reach the lost. We as brothers and sisters in Christ should love the people in the world so much that we will be offering some of our spare time for preaching work.

We are the hope of the lost

Luckily it is not all ad  or sad news.

Good News!

tells brother Downes is that we can look at

• 120 baptisms a year (4 average sized ecclesias)
• In the last 40 years, 39 new ecclesias. (Although 96 have closed & some were renamed).
• In the last 15 years,1/4 of all baptisms from non Christadelphian backgrounds were by just 16 ecclesias. (Although 1/3 didn’t baptise any)
• While many ecclesias are shrinking many are growing.
• Numbers in Africa are growing!
• Bible Learning Centres & Learning English are having a big impact

Instead of going for Plan A is it not better that we go for Plan B?

• Current UK Christadelphian population of 8-8500 is based on 223 2015 ALS Diary returns on households & 178 2015 CCH survey returns. 10 Ecclesias had neither return and were estimated on previous diary returns.
• 1985 to 2015 data based on records kept from the back of the Christadelphian, clearly subject to some error, gaps and misreporting. The last 12 months of Magazine entries were analysed separately and yielded results consistent with the records obtained.
• Net loss of 120 per annum and the 10, 5, 1 ratio derived from average of last 10 years data. Approx 240 out and 120 in. These do not include brothers and sisters movement in and out of the UK.
• Forecast from 2015 based on a linear continuation which could easily be a) more dramatic because of rapid closure of small ecclesias, ageing population, reduced home pool to draw from, fewer people to witness, higher rates of leaving the community b) less dramatic as in a smaller community there are fewer people falling asleep each year.

One of the deceases of this time is that too many people want to enjoy their own little cocoon and not getting out of their comfort zone to share life with the spiritually needy. Those who call themselves Christian may not forget that this means to be a follower of Jesus Christ and demands also doing what he required from his followers. Jesus asked us to go out in the world to proclaim the Kingdom of God. We are to make every effort to bring hope and healing in Jesus name to those in need.

We are to see that the tangible goodness of God flows into every nook and cranny of our communities – especially in those places where darkness seems to prevail. {Walking With Intentionality}

+

Preceding articles:

Religious Practices around the world

Manifests for believers #3 Catholic versus Protestant

Ecclesia to exist, grow and communities to have people communicating with each other

The Ecclesia in the churchsystem

Reasons to come together

The Big Conversation

The Big Conversation follow up

Reasons why you may not miss the opportunity to go to a Small Church

Engaging the culture without losing the gospel

Evangelisation, local preaching opposite overseas evangelism

Feeling-good, search for happiness and the church

Members of the ecclesia uniting and seeking God’s help in tribulation

Why we do not have our worship-services in a church building

Belgian Christadelphians 2013 & 2014 in review

Personal thoughts, communication, establishing ecclesia and guest writings

++

Additional reading:

1. People are turning their back on Christianity
2. Looking on what is going on and not being of it
3. London an exaggerated microcosm of the UK at large
4. Parents forbidden to pray in front of their children or to take them to church
5. State and attitude of certain people to blame for radicalisation
6. More Muslim children than Christian children growing up in our cities
7. Will Islam conquer Europe
8. Christianity to be enshrined
9. Halloween custom of the nations
10. Wrong ideas about religious terrorism
11. A call easy to understand
12. Discipleship way of life on the narrow way to everlasting life
13. Many forgot how Christ should be our anchor and our focus
14. The meek one riding on an ass
15. Do not be afraid to learn or to speak
16. Reasons to come together
17. Congregate, to gather, to meet
18. Fellowship
19. Disciple of Christ counting lives and friends dear to them
20. The first on the list of the concerns of the saint
21. Holiness and expression of worship coming from inside
22. To find ways of Godly understanding
23. Perishable non theologians daring to go out to preach
24. Who are the honest ones?
25. Certain people trying to stem freedom of speech
26. Priority to form a loving brotherhood
27. Newsweek asks: How ignorant are you?
28. Religious Freedom in a Multicultural World
29. Some christians do have problems with the Christian connection with Jews
30. American atheists most religiously literate Americans
31. Determine the drive
32. Try driving forward instead of backwards
33. Campbell, Thomas and Bijbelvorsers
34. Looking at older articles series over Russell on the previous Bible-scholar Association
35. Wanting to know more about basic teachings of Christadelphianism
36. Christadelphians or Messianic Christians or Messianic Jews
37. Christadelphian people
38. Who are Christadelphians
39. What are Brothers in Christ
40. Two new encyclopaedic articles
41. Christadelphians today
42. Keeping an ecclesia in modern times
43. Small churches of the few Christadelphians
44. Christianity to be enshrined
45. Christianity is a love affair
46. Intentions of an Ecclesia
47. Character transformed by the influence of our fellowships
48. Love for each other attracting others
49. What makes a consecrated Christian
50. A call easy to understand
51. If you have integrity
52. Work with joy and pray with love
53. To know Christ is filling life with meaning
54. The truth is very plain to see and God can be clearly seen

+++

Other articles of interest:

1. Walking in Total Dependence Upon God
2. What is God’s Will For Your Life?
3. On the Affirmation of Scripture
4. A Snapshot of the Church in America
5. a little church
6. Four Pressing Needs in Rural Communities, and How the Church Should Respond
7. If It’s All About Relationship…
8. Leading a church is not a hands free exercise
9. Walking With Intentionality
10. Living Our Faith in a New Way
11. What’s in It for Me?
12. Deacon Selection In the Small Church
13. Lord’s Day 10: God is in Control
14. Just Try a Few Things
15. “When Faith Goes, All Good Things Go”
16. Growing Deep
17. All the Wrong Reasons
18. Little Church
19. Leading Change
20. Small Groups & Grow A Small Church by Multiplying Its Small Groups
21. Living well
22. Blessed by His Hand
23. Encouragement for the Small
24. How Did You Get Here?
25. How to Impersonate a Big Church
26. What Do You Do Well?
27. Recognize the Facts
28. What are your top two struggles?
29. The Best Thing You Can Do
30. On the road to sainthood and not silent about it
31. Incognito Zone: Where the Church Is Booming
32. House Church Reaches Out to Atheists, Agnostics in California
33. The one religion that’s not part of my spiritual quest
34. Six Ways Not to Forsake the Assembly
35. Tent Making
36. Journey On The Narrow Path

+++

Related articles

• One in three people born in the UK this year will suffer from some form of dementia in their lifetime, the Alzheimer’s Research UK charity has warned. (grumpyelder.com)
• Israel Goldstein Youth Village looking for dates in Europe (christadelphianworld.blogspot.com)
• Looking for writers for two Lifestyle Magazines (christadelphianworld.blogspot.com)
• Change of name (christadelphianworld.blogspot.com)

Rate this:

#AdultBaptism #Agape #BeingInUnion #Belgium #BiblicalTruth #BrothersAndSistersInChrist #BrothersInChrist #CapitalistWorld #Christadelphian #ChristadelphianCommunity #Christadelphians #Christendom #ChristianChurches #ChristianTruth #Christians #ChurchOfJesusChrist #ComfortZone #DwindlingChurch #Ecclesia #Fellowship #FollowerOfChrist #FollowingJesusChrist #FollowingMan #GreatBritain #HopeOfEcclesia #Influence #InterestInGod #Ireland #JohnThomas #JonDownes #LeavingTheFellowship #LivingInThisWorld #LoversOfChrist #LoversOfGod #Minority #NorthOfAmerica #NumbersAmount_ #PaganFestivities #Preaching #PreachingWork #Proclaim #Proclaiming #ReachingTheLost #Refellowshipping #RuleOfPractice #SistersInChrist #SmallCommunity #TeachingsOfChrist #Temptation #Union #UnitedKingdom #Unity #UnityInChrist #UnityInDiversity #WayOfLiving #WordOfMan