#the-regeneration-itinerary — Public Fediverse posts

Record(s) o’ the Month – May 2025

There are months when the Record(s) o’ the Month feels like a sacred duty. It is the noble,…
#NewsBeep #News #Music #...andOceans #2025 #AMG'sUnsignedBandRodeo #Amorphis #AU #Australia #DarkTranquillity #Eluveitie #Emperor #Entertainment #independent #Jade #Kalaveraztekah #May25 #MysteriesofaFloweryDream #NikanAxkan #Record(s)o'theMonth #RecordsoftheMonth #Self-Releases #TheRegenerationItinerary
https://www.newsbeep.com/au/56824/

Record(s) o’ the Month – May 2025

There are months when the Record(s) o’ the Month feels like a sacred duty. It is the noble,…
#NewsBeep #News #Music #...andOceans #2025 #AMG'sUnsignedBandRodeo #Amorphis #CA #Canada #DarkTranquillity #Eluveitie #Emperor #Entertainment #independent #Jade #Kalaveraztekah #May25 #MysteriesofaFloweryDream #NikanAxkan #Record(s)o'theMonth #RecordsoftheMonth #Self-Releases #TheRegenerationItinerary
https://www.newsbeep.com/ca/57059/

Record(s) o’ the Month – May 2025

By Angry Metal Guy

There are months when the Record(s) o’ the Month feels like a sacred duty. It is the noble, worthwhile culmination of rigorous listening and passionate discourse.1 And then there’s May. May, a month in which Dr. A.N. Grier tried to vote for a band called… SEXCAVE or some shit four or five different times using different pseudonyms (but the same IP address), and where Dolphin Whisperer almost made me rage quit by making a single comment about “sky-tearing tonalities,” which, like… what kind of pretentious fucking bullshit is that? Do you people even listen to music, or do you just sit around all day making up stupid poetic ways of saying absolutely nothing?2 But if we’re fair, he wasn’t entirely wrong. Sometimes a record arrives that doesn’t just demand attention, it seizes it like an Aztec death deity grabbing the sun.3 So for the first time in a while, the best album in May came from an unsigned band. And not just any unsigned band. It came from a band proficient in bull riding!

The beauty of the Unsigned Band Rodeö lies in its chaos. No expectations. No promo sheets. No preconceived narratives. Just music dropped into our laps like cursed artifacts.4 On Nikan Axkan, which was self-released on May 2nd, 2025 [Bandcamp], Kalaveraztekah weaponizes its vision of death metal through the lens of pre-Hispanic culture and indigenous cosmology. There’s no sense that these Hidrocálidos are some kind of novelty act. They aren’t a Mexican Eluveitie, just playing Dark Tranquillity riffs while putting a Ritual Death Flute over it for 40 seconds in every song.5 Rather, Nikan Axkan is a muscular, seething, and deeply rooted record that radiates conviction from every grinding riff. The percussion rumbles like a procession of drums echoing through stone temples, fusing to a brutal core of death metal that just fucks. There’s a Blood Incantation-like spaciness that offers a counterbalance to all this brutality and adds unexpected depth. After spending the better part of a week in what my physician has called a “ritualistic fugue state,” I managed to pull myself out of the netherworld to write that when Kalaveraztekah’s two pillars—the atmospheric otherworldly and the brutal death metal—meet, “they crash into each other like storm fronts, creating something beautiful and terrible to behold. Nikan Axkan is simultaneously brutal and thoughtful, grindy and melodic, atmospheric and immediate,” and it’s the Record o’ the Month.

Runner(s) Up:

…and Oceans // The Regeneration Itinerary [May 23rd, 2025 | Season of Mist | Bandcamp] — …and Oceans is having an Amorphisesque second act and I am here for it. They’ve always walked the line between symphonic grandiosity and black metal chaos, and with The Regeneration Itinerary, they’ve engineered their third very good platter in 5 years. The record combines sharp, Emperor-style riffing with theatrical synths, industrial flourishes, and ruthlessly precise pacing. “Demonstrating a degree of evolution in their craft” and with “exceptional [performances] across the board,” …and Oceans have once again hit that sweet balance—and ever-more unique sound in this current black metal soundscape—that makes their revitalization so welcome. But it’s not just that it’s a good continuation, I feel like they are continuing to refine and revitalize the launch with each new album they release. It’s always fun to watch bands defy Angry Metal Guy’s Law of Diminishing Recordings™, and while The Regeneration Itinerary isn’t their best record yet, 30 years after their debut, …and Oceans is still releasing vital music that’s impossible to overlook.

Jade // Mysteries of a Flowery Dream [May 9th, 2025 | Pulverised Records | Bandcamp] — Mysteries of a Flowery Dream is an atmospheric death metal record that unfolds like a guided hallucination. It’s melodic. It’s moody. It’s weirdly elegant. And it doesn’t care about my riffs-per-minute quota. It takes things slow and keeps them dreamy. Jade trades bludgeoning immediacy for textured dream-logic, and while it takes a few listens to understand what’s happening, once it clicks, it’s hard for listeners to shake. And yet, it balances out the problem that atmospheric records rarely feel heavy, because they’re too busy padding the sharp edges with “atmosphere.” But Mysteries of a Flowery Dream accomplishes its heaviness by feeling oppressive, dense, claustrophobic, and crushing—leaving the listener feeling like they’re in an experimental submarine on their way to see the Titanic.6 And while it’s not the easiest record to penetrate, Owlswald wants you to know that “those who actively immerse themselves in Jade’s expansive world will be handsomely rewarded. The excellent songwriting, replete with its cohesion, balance, and dynamism, is impressive, steadily shifting my initial apathetic impressions to genuine appreciation. So don your finest headphones, sit back, and let Jade immerse you in their dreamlike world.”

#AndOceans #2025 #AMGSUnsignedBandRodeo #Amorphis #DarkTranquillity #Eluveitie #Emperor #Independent #Jade #Kalaveraztekah #May25 #MysteriesOfAFloweryDream #NikanAxkan #RecordSOTheMonth #RecordsOfTheMonth #SelfReleases #TheRegenerationItinerary

…and Oceans – The Regeneration Itinerary

By Owlswald

My history with Finland’s …and Oceans runs as deep as the Mariana Trench. As a burgeoning metalhead, the eclectic symphonic black metal of 1998’s The Dynamic Gallery of Thoughts immediately sank its hooks into me. Its successor, The Symmetry of I – The Circle of O, solidified their place with its atmospherically intense and innovative brutality. The two albums remain all-time favorites of mine to this day. Conversely, the group’s industrial era of A.M.G.O.D. (2001) and Cypher (2002)—preceding the group’s hiatus—split my interest until 2020’s Cosmic World Mother and the subsequent As in Gardens, So in Tombs marked …and Oceans’ triumphant return to form. So, upon learning that …and Oceans’ seventh full-length, The Regeneration Itinerary, aimed to fuse the Finnish collective’s thirty-year history with their most experimental material since their resurgence, I eagerly dove in, hoping …and Oceans’ stylistic evolution would culminate with an album rivaling their early years.

The Regeneration Itinerary finds …and Oceans venturing into bolder and more daring territory while remaining anchored in the Emperor-esque incisiveness of Cosmic and As in Gardens. Echoing the sweeping grandeur of their earlier works, …and Oceans quickly re-establishes their familiar blend of flamboyance and experimentalism. Launching with a celestial shimmer, opener “Inertiae” detonates into a furious Dimmu Borgir-like energy before unexpectedly morphing into an industrial atmospheric bridge with electronic dance elements. This same confidence fuels potential Song o’ the Year contender “Prophetical Mercury Implement”—recalling Symmetry of I through swirling guitars, powerful drums, and dramatic synths—as well as the machine-like “Chromium Lungs, Bronze Optics.” For forty-six minutes, …and Oceans’ signature combination of symphonic grandiosity, industrial texturing, and black metal aggression ebbs and flows like a rising and retreating tide, firmly leaning into their outlandish spirit.

Demonstrating a degree of evolution in their craft, the performances on The Regeneration Itinerary are exceptional across the board. As Antti Simonen’s orchestrations navigate the majestic backdrop where Dynamic Gallery’s operatic symphonies (“Terminal Filter,” “The Form and the Formless”), Symmetry of I’s serene synths (“Towards the Absence of Light”) and the stark, mechanical pulse of A.M.G.O.D. and Cypher-era automations (“I am Coin, I am Two”) unite, they trade command with Tio Kontio and Teemu Saari’s blistering tremolos and razor-sharp guitars to produce …and Oceans’ grand melodicism. Lillmåns’ vocals are a highlight, shapeshifting from blood-curdling screams to manic shrieks to subterranean growls in tracks like “Prophetical Mercury Implement,” “The Form and the Formless,” and “Förnyelse i tre akter,” wholly embracing the raw and unhinged persona of former vocalist Kena Strömsholm. Beneath these shifting tides, Kauko Kuusisalo’s technical and colorful drumming pulls like an intense undertow, showcasing its evolution by moving beyond characteristic rapid-fire blasts and violent double bass in favor of artful rhythms and precise patterns. Furthermore, …and Oceans’ best production to date cleanly articulates The Regeneration Itinerary’s crushing brutality and subtle nuances, particularly for Simonen’s synths and Kontio and Saari’s guitars.

While the performances on The Regeneration Itinerary are stellar, certain songs across the album’s ten tracks don’t quite measure up to the record’s stronger compositions.1 Despite the strength of the core songwriting, the quirky industrial track “The Ways of Sulphur” seems forced and out of place, while “I am Coin, I am Two” feels underdeveloped and rushed, its abrupt end hindering its otherwise strong first half. Likewise, “The Form and the Formless” and “The Fire in Which We Burn” seem too brief. Thankfully, the strong performances carry the album forward but in a more hardened form, The Regeneration Itinerary would have crushed the Score Safety Counter into mere rubble.

Rating The Regeneration Itinerary demands that I separate my head from my heart. Nevertheless, my overall reaction is one of excitement. In many ways, this album embodies the …and Oceans of old and is what I’ve longed for since their 2017 reformation. With The Regeneration Itinerary, …and Oceans comes full circle, integrating their past into material that should ignite a sense of homecoming for longtime fans. Known for their constant evolution, The Regeneration Itinerary feels like the arrival of a new tide for …and Oceans. One that I’ll be impatiently waiting for again.

Rating: Very Good!
DR: 8 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps mp3
Label: Season of Mist
Websites: andoceans.bandcamp.com | facebook.com/andoceans
Releases Worldwide: May 23, 2025

#AndOceans #2025 #35 #BlackMetal #DimmuBorgir #Emperor #FinnishMetal #May25 #MelodicBlackMetal #Review #Reviews #SeasonOfMist #SymphonicBlackMetal #TheRegenerationItinerary