LIVE: The Dangerous Summer @ O2 Academy Islington

What’s the best way to end a UK tour? Most wouldn’t say “Sunday night in a venue tucked above an empty shopping centre,” but not The Dangerous Summer. O2 Academy Islington slowly fills with a crowd who meet the definition you’d expect at an all ages show; middle aged →

Chrissy Costanza – ‘VII’

The artwork says it all. Chrissy Costanza’s debut EP is stamped with the title ‘VII’. Her photograph is blurred in such a way, she appears to have angel wings, an image that asks if you died, how would you see yourself? If you looked back on your →

GALLERY: Arch Enemy, In Flames @ Eventim Apollo

Touché Amoré – Spiral In A Straight Line

What happens when grief finishes? That’s the question Jeremy Bolm of LA post-hardcore heroes Touché Amoré wants to address. After his mother passed from cancer in 2014, his band’s album 2016 album ‘Stage Four’ was a natural reaction, as was 2020’s ‘Lament’. But Bolm made a choice to move →

The Offspring – ‘Supercharged’

Dexter Holland and Noodles know who they are, what kind of music they make, and who likes it. That’s not surprising; the Offspring has been a staple in the US punk scene for over thirty years, so if they haven’t worked it out by now, they probably weren’t going →

LIVE: Call Me Amour @ the Underworld

Here at the Underworld, things are decidedly… cool. Call Me Amour have dropped in for their one and only UK headline date of the year, which naturally sold out before you could snap your fingers, and we’re a little intrigued about what an evening with the guys could hold →

Trash Boat – ‘Heaven Can Wait’

Life is complicated, and Trash Boat have embraced the chaos. It’s been three years since we least heard from St Albans’ finest on record, and they’re continuing on the voyage of artistic self-discover that began with 2021’s ‘Don’t You Feel Amazing?’. The collectively-produced ‘Heaven Can Wait’ is one of →

Chubby and the Gang – ‘And Then There Was…’

“Wake up, wake up, the gang is storming through”, was the battle cry when Chubby and the Gang broke through the glass ceiling in a Covid scarred world in the summer of 2021. The London hardcore scene regulars grabbed the mainstream by the throat as their sophomore record ‘The →

LIVE: Boston Manor / Trophy Eyes @ O2 Forum Kentish Town

It’s a night of achievement, even though the O2 Forum Kentish Town feels rather too relaxed for a Friday night as the crowd meanders in. It’s Boston Manor’s biggest headline show to date, the last night of their Sundiver tour, and they’re in the mood to party. The second Trophy →

Mouth Culture – ‘Whatever The Weather’ EP

It’s become increasingly clear to everyone why Mouth Culture have been absolutely everywhere in the past year. From supporting The Blackout and While She Sleeps, up to sets at Download and 2000 Trees, they’re channelling a zeitgeist of pulling through the mire of nonsense we’re all stuck in and →

Sugar Horse – ‘The Grand Scheme of Things’

It’s a cliché but creatives are often asked ‘Where do you get your ideas?’. Think about it, it’s a ridiculous question, but in the case of Sugar Horse it seems perfectly valid. They think outside outside the box. They have so many ideas that even writing about →

FEVER 333 – ‘DARKER WHITE’

FEVER 333 are determined to resist. Resist what? Pretty much everything that counts as a restriction. ‘DARKER WHITE’, their fourth full length outing, still perches outside genre definition, with the balance between hardcore, metalcore and hip-hop shifting between each song to prevent us even mentioning a “hybrid sound”. Somehow, →

Heriot – ‘Devoured by the Mouth of Hell’

If you’re metal fan and you haven’t heard any of the deafening buzz about Heriot over the last few years, you’ve either not left your house, not been on the internet or just been wildly inattentive. Since the release of their first music back in 2020 they’ve dominated the →

Rain City Drive – ‘THINGS ARE DIFFERENT NOW’

Back in 2020 there was a rebrand. That’s how Rain City Drive came into being. They were worried someone might take offense at their old name. Also, they were one of Johnny Craig’s old projects so maybe they were right to draw a line under that era. →

GALLERY: Zeal & Ardor, Zetra @ O2 Shepherds Bush Empire

LIVE: Zeal and Ardor @ O2 Shepherds Bush Empire

Smoke and ambient soundscapes drift through the damp Empire as folk in the crowd place bets on whether Swiss metal trailblazers Zeal and Ardor will open with a new song or a classic. The only thing more crammed than the stalls is the band’s schedule, and they’re only in →

Nightwish – ‘Yesterwynde’

Nightwish aim incredibly high on their new album. ’Yesterwynde’, the (mostly) Finnish symphonic metallers’ tenth outing, “describes a feeling that cannot be found in any human language” according to keyboard player Tuomas Holopainen, but, perhaps fortunately, we aren’t getting any bogus consciousness expansion or some kind of mystic enlightenment. →

Charlotte Wessels – ‘The Obsession’

Charlotte Wessels is on a journey. After the breakup of her band, cult Dutch powerhouses Delain (who are still performing under the same name with an almost entirely new lineup), the multi instrumental artist shaved her head and took to Patreon, releasing a double solo album one song at →

LIVE: Burn it Down Festival 2024, Torquay

On the face of it, Burn it Down should never have worked. Little old Torquay just doesn’t host award-winning festivals – or at least, it never used to. Six iterations in, however, and the Best Micro Festival in the country (officially) is only going from strength to strength. Burn →

Foxing – ‘Foxing’

With the conclusion of their debut album’s ten year anniversary tour last year, it could be easy for a band like Foxing to rest on their laurels, feet up. But that’s not Foxing. With every release, they push their own boundaries, evolving in one way or another; →