Music Reviews

Metal and heavy music album reviews for those that wish to rock

Music Reviews

Metal and heavy music album reviews for those that wish to rock

HM Album Reviews

Lincoln Brewster

Oxygen

Lincoln Brewster has always been super-poppy. He puts the C in CCM. For his fans, this album is exactly what they want (and most likely expect) from him: high...

HM Album Reviews

Me, Extinct.

Doomsday Disco

Full disclosure: This EP is named for a phrase I used in this publication to review Me, Extinct.’s last release. In the unfortunately disco-less Doomsday Disco, Gorge Goyco concocts...

HM Album Reviews

UGLYTWIN

Oh, The Cost

UGLYTWIN’s new full-length album, Oh, The Cost, packs a punch that’s worthy of being noticed. From start to finish, the band’s debut release is full of ugly riffs, eerie...

HM Album Reviews

Christ's Sake

We All Fall Down

California punk has a very distinctive sound — whether it be the skate punk, pop punk, or hardcore punk, you can tell it is a California band. Christ’s Sake...

HM Album Reviews

Forevermore

Telos

Telos is Indianapolis metalcore outfit Forevermore’s debut release on Solid State Records, but its ten tracks prove the band already knows a thing or two about putting together a...

HM Album Reviews

Wovenwar

Wovenwar

If you ever want a blueprint on how to survive a band member’s Federal crime and conviction, Wovenwar is now on the short list. It’s a good thing they...

HM Album Reviews

Mouth of the South

Struggle Well

When I put on Struggle Well, the new album from Mouth of the South, I thought it was going to be more of the same. Based on the one...

HM Album Reviews

Darkness Divided

Written in Blood

Victory Records’ Darkness Divided debut release, Written in Blood, puts the band much closer to the metal side of metalcore thanks to guitarists Christopher Mora and Sebastian Elizondo. Together,...

HM Album Reviews

I The Breather

Life Reaper

For five years, I The Breather has been reimagining and redefining metalcore. Taking cues from veterans like The Devil Wears Prada and For Today, the band fronts an aggressive,...

HM Album Reviews

Hayden Spenceley

Mirrors

Haydon Spenceley’s new album, Mirrors, proves to be an impressive alternative record. It takes a modern, ambient twist on rock with interesting chord progressions and its upbeat moments, but...

HM Album Reviews

Manafest

The Moment

The Moment, the seventh studio album from four-time Dove Award nominee Manafest, is filled with infectious rap-rock anthems infused with layers of trendy-pop beats. Thematically, Manafest focuses on life’s...

HM Album Reviews

War of Ages

Supreme Chaos

The veteran metal outfit War of Ages returns, bearing their veteran status like professionals. Supreme Chaos, the band’s seventh full-length album, brought equal parts excitement and trepidation after their...

HM Album Reviews

Guardian

Almost Home

If the Almost Home title is a foreshadowing that Guardian is planning on dying as a band, it’ll be our loss. The scary thing about an old band getting...

HM Album Reviews

For All Those Sleeping

Incomplete Me

In a parallel universe, For All Those Sleeping’s third full-length release, Incomplete Me, could have been labeled screamo. Really, really good screamo. Underoath-level screamo. Today’s market, though, would have...

HM Album Reviews

Hillsong Worship

No Other Name

In recent years, Hillsong Church (originating in Australia) has begun to solidify the differences between their different branches of music. Back in the beginning stages, when music was only...

HM Album Reviews

Light Up the Darkness

Waiting

Light Up the Darkness is a four-piece hard rock outfit that knows how to execute their sound professionally. It’s an underrated experience on several levels from an underrated band....

HM Album Reviews

Brutal Cross

At War

Brutal Cross is the extreme metal one-man band of Polish ex-pat Tomasz Sulowski, currently residing in Ireland. At War marks Brutal Cross’s third outing, following 2011’s Trilogy and 2012’s...

HM Album Reviews

Redeem the Exile

Send Me the Seekers

Redeem the Exile have been hard at work touring the regional circuit and this Olympia, WA band’s sound reflects the current Northwest trend in metal and hardcore. The seven...

HM Album Reviews

The Ember Days

Live

The Ember Days’ Live EP is comprised of five moving worship tracks. There’s something fun about live tracks, getting to hear the crowd clapping and cheering — it just...

HM Album Reviews

Hollow Heart

The Separation

The Separation, the debut album from Hollow Heart, serves up some heavy-hitting sounds, delivering a consistent brutal assault on the listener. It’s a healthy dosage of tight drums, cutting...

HM Album Reviews

Crowder

Neon Steeple

Crowder — back again for the first time — sets himself apart from the cookie-cutter worship leaders with a fresh, relevant and innovative debut release, Neon Steeple. In a...

HM Album Reviews

Beartooth

Disgusting

One of the most anticipated records in hard music circles, Beartooth makes their full-length debut with Disgusting. The former vocalist of Attack! Attack! gave us a four-song EP, Sick,...

HM Album Reviews

RYNBLKMRTN

HDSPC

Dream-pop finds solace in an album like HDSPC, an otherwise subgenre of electronic music often burdened with melodramatic cries or forced melodies of moaning, self loathing and anticlimactic gibberish....

HM Album Reviews

Anberlin

Lowborn

I still remember some nights in my adolescent years when I would lay outside on the roof just so I could blast Anberlin’s album, Never Take Friendship Personal, as...

HM Album Reviews

Wolves at the Gate

VxV

The Ohio-based Wolves at the Gate has put together a worthy blend of melodic songs (like “Rest”) with heart-pounding jammers (like “Wild Heart”) for a stellar release in their...

HM Album Reviews

Chainsaw the Musical

The Beauty of Absolution Above All Things is Bittersweet

Chainsaw the Musical’s debut EP, The Beauty of Absolution Above All Things is Bittersweet, shined from the start, rough and unapologetically raw. What could be criticism, here embodies the...

HM Album Reviews

Sound the Ruin

Bloodsong

Chaotic hardcore, probably most popularized by the Dillinger Escape Plan with The Chariot as a generation of influence, is a tough love. You know it grooves, but you can’t...

HM Album Reviews

Being as an Ocean

How We Both Wondrously Perish

It seems rare to find a post-hardcore band carrying a unique sound. Being as an Ocean. although classified as melodic hardcore, has an infectious and refreshing sound. Being as...

HM Album Reviews

Me, Extinct.

Spent

Around the turn of the last century, Jorge Goyco and his wife, Leigh, proffered sunny ambient techno together as Antidote. Whether anything else about him has gotten darker in...

HM Album Reviews

Southbound Fearing

Undefeated

Further Seems Forever and Bleach held the Christian alternative rock throne in the early 2000s, Classic Crime and Anberlin held it in the later part of the decade. While...

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