This is the FIRST set of TWO Best of 2024 shows. Today I start with my #2 album of the year. Next week, I start with my #1.
My #2 album of 2024 is Blighted Eye. Listen to next week for my #1, and another 3-hour set!
1:54-8:28 BLIGHTED EYE (Seattle), album - Agony's Bespoke Howls From Beyond The Mist — Hot muscular vocals with noodling guitars and complex melodic layers. Top fucking notch fun dudes.
9:08-14:22 OCTOPLOID (Finland), album - Beyond The Aeons Shattered Wings — Psychedelic death bliss blending folk, 70s rock, and magical bubbles to float within.
14:50-18:42 VØIDWOMB (Portugal), album - Spiritual Apotheosis Black Putrescence — Raspy guttural seething over bitter black metal with a sultry groove.
19:15-27:43 THE FLIGHT OF SLEIPNIR (US), album - Nature's Cadence Madness — Beautiful, epic black metal with massive, instrumental compositions and a powerful vocalist.
28:10-33:10 KVAEN (Sweden), album - The Formless Fires The Formless Fires — A best of 2022, flying calloused fingertips in black tremelo flair and anthemic thrash.
33:44-41:26 MOSS UPON THE SKULL (Belgium), album - Quest For The Secret Fire Quest for the Secret Fire (Theurgic Practice) — Improvised speaking-tongues guitars and jazzy unhinged drumming that still has a lovely melodic soul.
42:00-47:03 NECROWRETCH (France), album - Swords Of Dajjal Dii Mauri — Alien rasped vocals in a groovy black metal with heavy metal guitars that build into frenetic and sinister swarms.
47:30-52:33 DEFACEMENT (Netherlands), album - Duality Barrier — Fuming, face melting furnace death metal with writhing vocals and creepy electronic effects.
53:07-1:00:27 HAIL SPIRIT NOIR (Greece), album - Fossil Gardens The Temple of Curved Space — A Best of 2016. Psychedelic avant-garde synth-infused proggy black metal with a fizzy lead singer.
1:01:09-1:06:08 GAEREA (Portugal), album - Coma Suspended — Evocative instrumentals and clean vocals added to their style of rapturous black metal.
1:06:34-1:11:05 CIVEROUS (CA), album - Maze Envy Labyrinth Charm (ft. Derek Rydquist) — A horror soundtrack within proggy and textured death with surprising jazzy drums and beautiful strings.
1:11:34-1:17:22 BIPOLAR ARCHITECTURE (GER), album - Metaphysicize Death of The Architect — My emo pick of the year. Another German masterpiece, this one is a proggy post-metal that explodes into cold black metal riffs.
1:17:56-1:23:57 STORMCROW (Italy), album - Path To Ascension Detached — Another incredible vocalist that gives full-body chills. Emotional black metal with an intense high-paced drummer and beautiful melodic.
1:23:31-1:32:58 SLIMELORD (UK), album - Chytridiomycosis Relinquished Gut-Brain Axis — Unexpected moody meditative thoughtful universe with some swings into a moshy grind.
1:33:26-1:38:49 CEREMONY OF SILENCE (Slovakia), album - Hálios Light Runs Through Light — A Best of 2019. Tempestuous psychedelic death metal and sadistic technical prowess.
1:39:14-1:44:55 EXUVIAL (CO, OK), album - The Hive Mind Chronicles Part I: Parasitica Hive Mind I: Convergent Evolution — A melodic technical death masterpiece.
1:45:24-1:52:53 ÆTHĔRĬA CONSCĬENTĬA (France), album - The Blossoming Haesperadh — Cool horns and meditative sections in a black psychedelic within vast compositions.
1:53:33-1:58:19 ABHORIA (CA/Denver), album - Depths Ghosts in the Smoke — Ginger-viking led Abhoria with one of the hottest vocals. Evolving textural black metal that grows within each song. Majestic, precise and unique.
1:58:45-2:04:21 VALE OF PNATH (Denver), album - Between The Worlds Of Life And Death Beneath Ashen Skies — So glad these dudes are from Denver. The raspy vocalist and masterfully technical, melodic death is delightfully groovy.
2:04:45-2:12:13 ULCERATE (New Zealand), album - Cutting The Throat Of God The Dawn Is Hollow — Brooding death with strains of black and post-metal that shimmers and explodes.
2:12:34-2:19:21 PARFAXITAS (International), album - Weaver Of The Black Moon Weaver Of The Black Moon — Intricate layers of dissonant guitars and vulgar vocals in a haunting, harsh black atmospheric metal.
2:19:51-2:27:38 DÖDSRIT (Sweden), album - Nocturnal Will Nocturnal Fire — Playing both sides of folk-oriented harmonizing melodic and brutal epic.
2:28:08-2:34:12 KNOLL (TN), album - As Spoken Revile of Light — Horns and a lethargic pace amidst the chaos and storm makes this avant-garde horror death grind creepier.
2:34:33-2:41:35 SUN OF NOTHING (Greece), album - Maze Ghost — A screeching moody monster riding atop a psychedelic death rock masterpiece.
2:42-03-2:48:06 JOB FOR A COWBOY (AZ), album - Moon Healer The Forever Rot — Proggy structures and noodling guitars create delicious space with rap-inspired tumbling vocal styles like Archspire.
2:48:29-2:54:18 SYK (Italy), album - eartHFlesh I Am The Beast — Powerful delivery of vocals with savage riffs and rhythmic annihilation. Ominous, beautiful black and death.
2:55:01-END DREAMLESS VEIL (VA), album - Every Limb of the Flood Glossolalia — Artifical Brain and Inter Arma members in an intricately layered black and death metal with spooky shrieks and blistering death rhythm.