Between The Buried And Me – ‘Automata I’ (Album Review)

After almost two decades in the game, Between The Buried And Me refuse to stop pushing their own boundaries. Since day one, BTBAM have consistently evolved while birthing multiple progressive masterworks. Alaska was one of the first albums that got me into structurally advanced music; Colors was…well…Colors, for fuck’s sake; and 2012’s Parallax II cemented BTBAM’s status as a new generation’s equivalent of Pink Floyd and Dream Theater Read more…

Posted on 27 February 2018

Jakub Zytecki – ‘Ladder Head / Feather Bed’ (Album Review)

There may be countless technically accomplished guitarists in the world, but Jakub Zytecki is one of a kind. The best musicians are not only able to impress using flashy chops and virtuosic gymnastics – they also succeed in making us feel something. With Ladder Head and Feather Bed – two EPs set to be combined into one full-length release – Jakub Zytecki has Read more…

Posted on 20 February 2018

Endless Heights – ‘Vicious Pleasure’ (Album Review)

Over the past several years, Endless Heights have risen through the Australian post-hardcore ranks and earned much respect along the way. Vicious Pleasure – the Sydney quintet’s second long-playing effort – takes a more introspective and self-analytical tack than previous album New Bloom. It opens with Taste It, a short and promising intro full of Read more…

Posted on 14 February 2018

Feed The Rhino – ‘The Silence’ (Album Review)

When an album forces me to go back and listen to bands who came of age in the early 2000s, it’s automatically on my good side. Feed The Rhino’s love of Deftones and modern metal-spiked hardcore is well-established, but the moment The Silence got started, the first note I wrote came out as follows: Read more…

Posted on 11 February 2018

Rabea Massaad – ‘Grinding Gears’ (EP Review)

As one of the Internet’s leading guitar personalities, Rabea Massaad is widely recognized by six-string aficionados worldwide as…well…a bit fucking good. A total, authoritative master of rock and metal playing with a unique, immediately recognisable style of his own, this guy knows his shit. Bea (pronounced like “beer”) is also a key member of long-term personal favourites Dorje and Toska – a pair of bands already making an impact on the online rock, metal, and instrumental prog scenes Read more…

Posted on 08 February 2018

Rolo Tomassi – ‘Time Will Die And Love Will Bury It’ (Album Review)

Rolo Tomassi are batshit crazy in the best possible way. If you fancy trying to pigeonhole them, good luck. You’d probably have to come up with some ridiculous new genre label to make it work – something like “box of mathy death-frogs” or “kitchen sinkcore”.

Alternatively, you could just call Rolo Tomassi “Rolo Tomassi”, and be Read more…

Posted on 06 February 2018

Submotion Orchestra – ‘Kites’ (Album Review)

Although we sometimes take it for granted in the streaming age, music is a luxury good. When Submotion Orchestra play, that fact becomes perfectly clear. Their albums always sound expensive, high-class cultural excursions made for the benefit not of the super-rich, but all of us mere mortals.

A couple of years back, Submotion Orchestra dropped Colour Theory, an album littered with Read more…

Posted on 04 February 2018

Good Tiger – ‘We Will All Be Gone’ (Album Review)

Having crowdfunded $46,000 in support of their first album A Head Full Of Moonlight, Good Tiger made a massive impact on the global rock and metal scene even before that auspicious debut hit digital shelves, speakers, and eardrums.

Fair play.

This time out, the progressively-oriented super-supergroup are back with Read more…

Posted on 01 February 2018

Marmozets – ‘Knowing What You Know Now’ (Album Review)

There’s no such thing as a Marmozets B-side. The Northern quintet’s debut The Weird And Wonderful Marmozets turned out to be my favourite album of 2014, a consistent barrage of killer tracks with all the fat trimmed away. Marmozets are able to marry insane time changes and catchy hooks, weaving the weird and wonderful together into a series of modern classics.

Knowing What You Know Now is significantly less odd than Read more…

Posted on 26 January 2018

Tiny Moving Parts – ‘Swell’ (Album Review)

Although some critics automatically dismiss anything that sounds too earnest and, whisper it, emo, Tiny Moving Parts have contributed to said genre’s continued evolution by mutating catchy tunes into spacetime-warping multidimensional pretzel shapes. Technically accomplished and happy to lead listeners through oddly metered sections aplenty, these guys walk the finest of fine lines between near-virtuosic overwhelm and passionate, singalong-inducing song delivery. 2016’s Celebrate was Read more…

Posted on 23 January 2018