Diaries of Doom

London stoner/grunge quartet Okay You Win have barely been active for a year, but are surely starting to make their dent in the British heavy rock scene. In the last few weeks they've immortalised their first chapter of existence with Live From The Pit , a seven-track recording captured live from The Pit Studios in Kent by Paul 'Pablo' Annis in early November 2023. The Live From The Pit album takes you on a sonic ride that kicks off with Ten Year Trip 's climbing psych-rock riff, signaling the start of what immediately seems an epic, grungy adventure. This opener sets the tone, bringing chugs and guitar dissonance that pack a serious punch, all while channeling vocals reminiscent of the legendary Chris Cornell. These echoes of the Soundgarden frontman ooze a vintage sense of cool, and the instrumental/lead guitar break? We're only just getting started. It nicely encapsulates what's to come, with Ryan and Rodrigo's guitar and bass chemistry making itself ...

  Stoke-based quintet Era's End will round off a busy year with the release of Over Throne , due on 29th December. With the attitude of pop punk, the intensity of metalcore, and catchy hooks that bands of a much bigger size would be jealous of, will this give them the lift they deserve? Starting off with a thrashy riff and a full-throttle, driving rhythm, the instrumental work is great. A soaring, charismatic lead vocal from Amy directs the flow, and they waste no time setting the scene. The track is less than three minutes long, so they keep it short, sweet and snappy, with focused songwriting that doesn't try to cram too much in. The chorus packs a punch with its metalcore feel and layered screams, complementing Amy's soulful cleans. Beth's gloriously gritty bass tone in the mix gives the track a nice crunch. It has to be said that the production here is also really impressive. There's a noticeable sonic difference c ompared to their previous work . Over Throne...

Black Cloud Harbour, the solo project from Adam C. Taylor (also of acclaimed Hertfordshire post-sludge fourpiece Everest Queen), launched earlier this year with the release of Corrosion back in October 2023. Mixing punk, hardcore, and black metal in its core sound, Storm built upon the first single a month later, with strong, uplifting melodic undercurrents. As Taylor explains, 'this project will morph and evolve as I go on'. Black Cloud Harbour's genre-twisting places it at the forefront of the modern metal soundscape, and it seems by all accounts that there are still a few surprises awaiting us. Tomorrow will see the release of The Eternal Abyss , the third Black Cloud Harbour single in as many months. It kicks off with a driving hardcore beat and a simple but effective sludgy riff to get the adrenaline flowing early on. He uses a solid, gravelly scream over the top, though as the song progresses into more melodic waters, a tuneful guitar bridge really elevates The Et...

I remember seeing Grunk for the first time. If you haven't yet, you will, too. It was Worcester Music Festival last year, they'd turned the floor of Circle of Swords tattoo studio into a pit of pure chaos, silliness and brutality. Truly a force of nature. A year on, I caught them again at the same festival, though a different venue. It was equally reckless and lawless, but with the addition of bass player Mike, their fuller sound really made a difference on the ears. In the same way, if you compare 2020's Unnecessary Hate Boner to the recently-released Tales From The Stupidity Vortex , Grunk sound bigger and better, with Ramón also adding some guttural gurgles to complement Ollie's tortured shouting this time round. They sound much closer to the finished product these days. Grunk - Hooligan's Haircut (live at Worcester Music Festival 2022) Tales From The Stupidity Vortex kicks off with the brutal and lyrically self-explanatory Radiator Spunk , led by some great...

I was there the night Slump was born - some people (me) would even say that the band was my idea… May 2018, Munich: vocalist/guitarist Matt Noble and I had just been to Sleep (the band, not the act) and were continuing to drink in the bedroom of his tiny student flat, near the top of a Brutalist tower block. Matt drunkenly confided in me that he was struggling with not being in a regular band - my answer? “Mate, *chugs beer* start your own band” Matt did just that. Now a mainstay on the underground Stoner/Doom/Sludge circuit, it’s been a long time coming to hear new music from the band - 2020’s singles Nothing More and Degenerate seem a very long time ago now, even though the tracks still hold water and bang heads to this day. New music has been due for a long time, but you’ll have to wait a little longer for my opinion on these two new tracks, because Slump aren’t the only band with a track on this split EP… Worcester-based Sludge-mongers At War With The Sun kick things off in s...

  Slump and At War With The Sun have announced the upcoming release of SP/LIT , a DIY split EP with ten minutes of music from each band, due on 8th December 2023. With all three tracks partly recorded at the Boooom Room, a recording studio in Central Birmingham built by Kabu and Olly - drummer and bassist of Slump - during Covid lockdowns, the split precedes a run of co-headlining shows around the Midlands. Tracklisting: 1. At War With The Sun - The Garden 2. Slump - Dust 3. Slump - Kneel At War With The Sun Hailing from bleak parts of Worcestershire, "Funeral Sludge" trio AT WAR WITH THE SUN combine the catchiness of 80s Trad Doom and the sombre atmosphere of 90s Death-Doom into an uncompromising sound. Expect a procession of battering-ram heavy, hook laden palm-muted riffs interspersed with sad instrumental passages and full-on Funeral Doom sections ranging from 40 - 60 BPM. Add in a subtle dose of Neurosis -style psychedelia and the end result is a sound which is ...

On this day 50 years ago, Black Sabbath released Sabbath Bloody Sabbath on Vertigo I didn't grow up in a household of heavy music, so my first memory of hearing metal is being in my friend's kitchen at around seven years old, at the time when The Osbournes was on the telly. I didn't know what Black Sabbath or metal was back then, but I picked up on a couple of earworms that turned out to be Sabbath songs later down the line. Fast forward to the age of 13 and I was chatting to an older mate of mine about music. When I told him that I was listening to a lot of Green Day and Kings of Leon, he turned his nose up and told me I should try a bit of Black Sabbath and get into metal. I went to a youth club in my village back then and a few months after that conversation I noticed a CD lying by the player at the end of a night with 'Black Sabbath Greatest Hits' written on the front. I stole it, put it on my mp3 player (showing my generation here) and brought it back the n...