Indholdsfortegnelse for November 2024 i Metal Hammer UK

POPPY’S BEEN ON the scene for a decade – and yet we still don’t know much about her. She started out as a pastel-clad YouTuber, making strange videos and simply proclaiming, “I’m Poppy.” Since then, she’s cycled through aesthetics and sounds, smashing genre boundaries and refusing to conform to, well… anything, as well as becoming modern metal’s go-to guest vocalist. This issue, our Dannii Leivers goes inside her exciting, confounding and ever-changing world. But if you’re looking for something more ‘traditional’ from your metal, then worry not – we’ve got you covered with our huge celebration of Iron Maiden’s epic Powerslave album, complete with frozen banana daiquiris and mummy mayhem. As we went to press, we received the sad news that our friend, metal publicist Michelle Kerr, had passed away. Behind…

2025 WILL BE a massive year for Iron Maiden. It marks the metal icons’ 50th anniversary - a full half-century since bassist Steve Harris formed the band on Christmas Day 1975. And how will they be celebrating this monumental milestone? By embarking on a huge tour that includes their biggest-ever UK headline show. Maiden have announced the first leg of the Run For Your Lives World Tour, which kicks off in Budapest, Hungary on May 27, 2025 and runs through to August 2. The 28-date tour includes arena, stadium and festival shows across mainland Europe, as well as the UK and Ireland. And they promise to be something special. “We’re going to be giving our fans a once-in-a-lifetime live experience,” says singer Bruce Dickinson. “This is a tour that’s gonna put…

“BACK IN THE day, I would get home from school, hop on MTV, and LINKIN PARK’s In The End would be on repeat. As soon as I heard it, I was like, ‘Wow, what is this?’ It was one of the first songs that introduced me to rock music. Chester Bennington definitely inspired me, lyrically, and how they structured their songs – rock songs with a pop structure – inspired me to write in that direction. “I’m an ‘extremes’ person. I either love pop songs with a traditional structure, or I love bands like Dream Theater with longer songs. I discovered SLEEP TOKEN’s Take Me Back To Eden last summer. The flow of music goes from super-pop to super-extreme metal… I thought that was brilliant. “I listened to CIRCA SURVIVE’s…

MOTÖRHEAD WE TAKE NO PRISONERS (THE SINGLES 1995-2006) BMG  £65 FEW BANDS HAVE been compiled and repackaged as much as Motörhead, but this collating of some of the band’s numerous non-hits feels like a necessary endeavour. Lemmy was a legend from the second he spat out Silver Machine with Hawkwind for the first time, but as seminal as those early Motörhead records with Fast Eddie and Philthy Phil were, Motörhead’s second classic line-up bulldozed their way through the most consistently fruitful period in their history. We Take No Prisoners (The Singles 1995-2006) is a 16-track salute to Lemmy, Phil Campbell and Mikkey Dee, with overlooked gems like Sacrifice, Killers and Love For Sale alongside live versions of Over Your Shoulder, Overnight Sensation and R.A.M.O.N.E.S.. Motörhead were always a great singles band,…

ONE EP (2016) The music and the mystique – it all began here THREAD THE NEEDLE Released in September 2016 as the lead single for debut EP One, Thread The Needle is the first song Sleep Token ever put out. It weaves together sensual alt pop and djent riffs, loading it all with layers of enigma. Is it a lamentation of a toxic relationship, a song about a bloke gagging for a shag or something deeper and more mysterious? The imagery suggests a sexual undercurrent. ‘Bury me inside this labyrinthine bed,’ sings masked frontman Vessel. ‘We can feel that time is dilated.’ Fans have theorised that Thread The Needle is about Vessel’s obsession with Sleep, the enigmatic deity that hovers over Sleep Token’s entire existence, which makes it their origin…

THE NIGHT DOES NOT BELONG TO GOD On the surface, The Night Does Not Belong To God lauds of Sleep and His nocturnal domain. Floating in like a prayer, the track likens slumber to paradise. However, despite the initial sense of beauty, it actually hints at Sleep’s darker intentions. As the title suggests, the night is ruled by Sleep, who follows His own rules, unbound by concepts of omnibenevolence. Rather than solace, Sleep deceives Vessel with a false taste of divinity in order to make Vessel a dependent servant. Sleep’s control mirrors the neurological phenomenon of ‘Sundowning’, the sensations dementia sufferers may experience in the evening – a reflection of Vessel’s heightened confusion. THE OFFERING The Offering follows Vessel’s descent into the dark depths of sleep. As Vessel tumbles down…

CHOKEHOLD Reinforcing the imagery threaded through its two predecessors, the opening track on Sleep Token’s third album once again centres around a relationship that seemed perfect but has gone bad (something suggested up by its aggressive, violent title). The twist here is that this could all be Sleep showing Vessel that his relationship will go wrong, rather than narrating something that has already happened. Sleep is offering salvation from a cycle of destruction that He has seen before, but also suggests that what Vessel is (or will) experience is pre-destined, right from Chokehold’s opening line: ‘When we were made, it was no accident.’ It also introduces lyrical motifs that are then picked up again on future songs. On the Sleep Token Discord, the user Valentine goes one step further, stating,…

NEBRA SKY DISK (2009) After founding Pelagic in 2009, Robin immediately used it to promote bands he admired. The label’s first non-Ocean release was the Sky Disk EP from Swiss prog/post-metal outfit Nebra. Its heavy but winding riffs make it ideal for fans of Isis, Mastodon and even The Ocean themselves. MONO THE LAST DAWN / RAYS OF DARKNESS(2014) Pelagic had been focusing on niche European bands, so signing Japanese post-rock heavyweights Mono was a step up. The label released two new albums from the collective simultaneously – The Last Dawn showcased Mono’s symphonic side, while Rays Of Darkness was stripped-down rock. CULT OF LUNA & THE OLD WIND RÅÅNGEST (2016) Though Pelagic never signed Cult Of Luna, they have a release from the post-metal icons in their catalogue. In…

CAGE FIGHT O2 ACADEMY ISLINGTON, LONDON Max Cavalera’s groove metal veterans fire up a frenzy IT’S BEEN FIVE years since Soulfly last battered a UK venue, which is two years more than tonight’s support act, CAGE FIGHT, have even existed. Despite their relative inexperience, the Londoners give the Academy a consummate thrashing. Their crossover tracks routinely decelerate from white-knuckle riffing to headbangable groovy bits, and the impact is instant and obvious, with a moshpit opening up in minutes. This four-piece’s greatest weapon, though, is frontwoman Rachel Aspe. She can growl, scream and screech with the best of them, while her dance moves and imperious gaze give her a bona fide rock star aura. The old adage says that nostalgia is a drug. If that’s the case, then SOULFLY push London…

GORILLA, MANCHESTER Ireland’s licentious sorcerer casts their spell over Manchester A DARK CLOUD hangs low over Manchester’s Gorilla tonight. While passers-by shrug off the ominous chill, here, the coven is congregating. Back in May, BAMBIE THUG cast a spell over Eurovision, their twisted hex of sultry, antagonistic ‘ouija-pop’ seducing the world on the global stage. And, considering the hordes of punters clad in black leather, torn fishnets and intricate swirls of corpsepaint, the necromancer has successfully lured in a swarm of pierced, made-up and dedicated followers. While Bambie may not have seized the crown on the Eurovision stage, their gothic crusade for power is far from over. Placed in the centre of the stage is a plush, velvet throne, and overhead, gnarled, scratchy lettering spells out the objective of the…

MUZIEKGIETERIJ, MAASTRICHT, NETHERLANDS The Ocean head up two nights of exploratory adventures SHOWCASING THE ECLECTIC talent of its namesake record label, Pelagic Fest has evolved into a two-day extravaganza in the Netherlands for its first edition since 2018. On the Saturday, Doom tandem A SWARM OF THE SUN expand to a six-piece for just their second show ever. The pensive collective fill the ‘Big Room’ with increasingly oppressive noise, until guitar troubles steal their last 10 minutes away. The ‘Small Room’’s GLASSING are practically lightspeed by comparison, their post-hardcore batterings made even harsher by black metal riffing and sludge metal breakdowns. Belfast post-rock luminaries AND SO I WATCH YOU FROM AFAR soothe with the sounds of new album Megafauna, which is performed in full. Fan favourites such as Set Guitars To…

DEVIN TOWNSEND Powernerd “No one else sounds like Devin. The perfect record to take you into autumn” ELEANOR GOODMAN EDITOR BLOOD INCANTATION Absolute Elsewhere “Death metal reimagined as vast, Moog-drenched space opera. A landmark album” JONATHAN SELZER REVIEWS EDITOR IRON MAIDEN Iron Maiden “Is it June yet? How about now? Now? Now? Now? What about now? Gahh! Why isn’t it Juuuuuuuuune?!” VANESSA THORPE PRODUCTION EDITOR LINKIN PARK Hybrid Theory “Computer said no for the London show, so a party in my living room it is!” LOUISE BROCK ART EDITOR BOBBIE DAZZLE Fandabidozi “Opeth aren’t the only band who can float your flute” RICH HOBSON STAFF WRITER DEVIN TOWNSEND Powernerd “Devin reins in the wacky shit on his best album in ages” DAVE EVERLEY ASSOCIATE EDITOR…

LONG BEFORE BLOODYWOOD released an album, they were a viral hit. Formed in New Delhi in 2016, their unique blend of nu metal and Indian music helped attract interest to their covers of pop and metal songs. When 2018’s Ari Ari blew up – the track currently has more than 7.2 million views on YouTube – they switched to focus on original songs, the core trio of vocalists Karan Katiyar, Jayant Bhadula and Raoul Kerr now also drawing heavily on Indian folk music. Their 2022 debut, Rakshak, officially turned them into one of India’s most popular metal bands. Riding high on a string of singles that passed the 1 million views mark on YouTube, their international shows – including a full UK tour – were packed to the rafters. Two years…

LIKE ALL THE best ghouls, High Parasite seemed to appear from nowhere. A collaboration between bassist and chief songwriter Tombs and My Dying Bride frontman Aaron Stainthorpe, they arrived fully formed earlier this year and released a debut single, Let It Fail, that was an instant, indisputable goth metal banger. In reality, High Parasite have been steadily gestating in the shadows for three years. Tombs, who works as a guitar tech for several notable metal bands, was working on some new songs and decided to ask his friend Aaron to contribute some vocals. Their partnership immediately clicked, and, one well-received demo tape later, they were signing a record deal and evolving into a serious proposition. “Even at the point of signing a deal, I thought I was just helping a…

“I’M NEVER AFRAID to look into the darkness and see what’s looking back,” Black Satellite vocalist Larissa Vale ponders, lost in thought. “I appreciate the feelings that most people hide from.” Larissa’s musical journey has led her to some bleak places. Look no further than Black Satellite’s 2020 single, Void; amid clashing instrumentation, Larissa sinks into the pits of horror, her distorted snarls proclaiming ‘there’s something wrong with me’. The track explores distress, questioning how far down the rabbit hole one can plummet. They weren’t always so dark, though. Larissa met Black Satellite co-founder and guitarist Kyle Hawken in high school, and their 2017 debut, Endless, lingered on the lighter side of alt metal. Follow-up Aftermath weaponises the full force of industrial experimentation. It’s bitter, gritty and snarling, shades of…

CALCUTTA The three songs on Sleep Token’s second EP are named after historical settlements, each one older than the last – seemingly a metaphor for the decay of a relationship. Calcutta is named after the British-Indian settlement that was established in the late 17th Century, though the region has been inhabited for more than 2,000 years. The song sees Vessel sounding repaired by a new partner (or maybe Sleep). ‘Missing pieces find me,’ he intones at one point, later adding, ‘You are more than warm belief / Melting skywards / More than silence broken / I’m whole again.’ Spoiler alert: it won’t last. NAZARETH Named after the millennia-old settlement in Israel (the birthplace of Jesus’s father Joseph, according to the Bible), Nazareth shifts between metal and more atmospheric sections. The…

Given the sheer amount of lore and theorising surrounding each Sleep Token song, it’s not surprising that even the band’s choice of covers have come under scrutiny. In 2017 they released an unlikely piano ballad cover of hip hop duo Outkast’s 2003 megahit Hey Ya! – a song Outkast rapper André 3000 has said is “about people who stay together in relationships because of tradition… but you end up being unhappy for the rest of your life”. Familiar, much? Two more similarly stripped-down covers followed three years later: Whitney Houston’s 80s pop hit I Wanna Dance With Somebody and Billie Eilish’s 2018 single When The Party’s Over, both recorded for 2020’s From The Room Below session. Both mine the same themes of desperation and loneliness, tying in with Sleep Token’s…

CAPILLA ARDIENTE Where Gods Live And Men Die HIGH ROLLER This Chilean power-doom combo bring more pace, colour, variety and virtuosic flair than is customary in the trad/epic idiom, while still nailing the gloomy atmospheres. CHRIS CHANTLER MOURNERS LAMENT A Grey Farewell PERSONAL RECORDS Exhibiting a grace and sumptuousness uncommon amongst their Chilean brethren, Mourners Lament treat death-doom as a state of penitential exile. This second album feels like parachuting into Purgatory.  JONATHAN SELZER WITCHTRAP Hungry As The Beast HELLS HEADBANGERS This Colombian trio’s infernal cacophony is dirtier than most. Infused with the spiky fury of German thrash and classic Venom, these are foulhearted anthems for the terminally evil. Hail Satan. DOM LAWSON…

HIDEOUS DIVINITY / INTREPID / PESTIFER THE FLEECE, BRISTOL Belgium’s PESTIFER and Estonian mob INTREPID kick off an international bill, with the former’s technical skill and the latter’s vicious bottom-end serving as suitable appetisers. Italians HIDEOUS DIVINITY conjure a formidable wall of sound, with vocalist Enrico Di Lorenzo bringing menace and effortless cool in equal measure. While no NILE show would feel right without Sacrifice Unto Sebek, Sarcophagus and a thunderous Kafir!, one regular criticism is that the setlist can be fairly rigid despite the band being 10 albums in. However, tonight they throw out a few rare crowd-pleasers. Defiling The Gates Of Ishtar’s portentous chants will never fail to illicit unnerving awe, while Lashed To The Slave Stick’s perverse thrust creates the biggest pit of the night. Most impressive…

RENOUNCED / CAULDRON ELECTRIC BRIXTON, LONDON Three eras of metalcore grace tonight’s stage, with newcomers CAULDRON one of the UK’s brightest new hopes. Unfazed by the small number of people not in the mammoth merch queue, they tear through their set with gusto and still get a few early hardcore pitters going. Panic chords and chugging breakdowns reign for RENOUNCED, who’ve returned from an informal hiatus to tour with their heroes. There’s no sign of ring rust, though, their metallic hardcore just as bruising as the fists swinging in the pit. It doesn’t take long for MISERY SIGNALS’ Jesse Zaraska to wind up on the barricade, the crowd fighting for the mic during opener A Victim, A Target before yielding the mic to original frontman Karl Schubach. This is the…

KARL SANDERS IS the mummy master of metal. The driving force and sole constant member of America’s most Egyptologyobsessed death metal band Nile, few musicians in the underground have forged a brand quite like Karl, without the corporate connotations of that word because, well, this is death metal. For more than 30 years now his band have delivered mystical brutality ripped straight from the ancient world, and are credited with helping rejuvenate death metal after its first lull period in the late 90s. Their latest album, The Underworld Awaits Us All, hit the shelves in August, so Hammer caught up with Karl to find out what words of wisdom he has to share. HISTORY WAS THERE BEFORE DEATH METAL “I didn’t get really exposed to metal until I was a…

IMAGINE A WORLD where Tyler Bates, Hans Zimmer and Coheed And Cambria team up to write the metalcore soundtrack to neo-noir action-thriller Max Payne. That’s effectively what Australian polymaths The Gloom In The Corner have done. Since their 2016 debut, Fear Me, they’ve told the twisted love stories of ancient warlords and time travellers in an unfolding narrative they call the ‘Gloom Cinematic Universe’, using fictional characters as a proxy for their own experiences. “It can feel scary talking about raw emotional topics,” says vocalist Mikey Arthur. “Especially when it comes to depression and loneliness. But at the same time, music is an outlet, and the lyrics are an outlet; I have the ability to channel things in my own way.” Take Clutch, a song from their 2022 full-length, Trinity,…

Bruce Dickinson stares out across a sea of 300,000 Brazilian faces, and a sea of 300,000 Brazilian faces stare back at him. What they see is a sweat-coated Englishman, blood running down his face, barely bothering to hide his anger. It’s Friday, January 11, 1985, and Iron Maiden are playing the opening show of the 10-night Rock In Rio megafestival, second on the bill under headliners Queen. This is the biggest gig Maiden will ever play, and it should be a triumph. Except things aren’t going as planned. A local monitor engineer is messing up their sound, and Bruce is getting increasingly irate about it. During Revelations, his fury spills over. Frustrated, he rips off the guitar he’s been playing, only to bash the instrument against his forehead, cutting it…

LIOR WHAT IS IT ABOUT THE BLACK DAHLIA MURDER YOU LOVE? “It’s their energy, they’re ferocious onstage. This comeback story is an amazing thing, man.” HOW MANY TIMES HAVE YOU SEEN THEM? “It’s my second time. The first time was at Graspop a few weeks ago.” HOW DO YOU FEEL ABOUT THEM CONTINUING WITHOUT TREVOR? “I think it’s awesome and amazing.” DO YOU LIKE THE NEW SONGS? “Mammoth’s Hand is pretty cool, Aftermath is sick.” ROBIN WHAT IS IT ABOUT THE BLACK DAHLIA MURDER YOU LOVE? “The riffage. I heard the song Everything Went Black and I tried to learn it on guitar, but I was absolutely shit. Now I can play half the song.”  HOW MANY TIMES HAVE YOU SEEN THEM? “It’s my seventh or eighth time. I even…

JAWS Divorced from the storytelling of the first two EPS, Jaws sees Vessel beg for a seduced partner to open up emotionally. ‘Show me what you’ve lost and why you’re always taking it slow,’ he implores. ‘Show me what wounds you’ve got, show me love.’ Yet there’s something dangerous about the singer’s cagey partner. ‘Are you watching me with the eyes of a predator as you move towards the door?’ he wonders. The single’s artwork, which fills the outline of a shark’s mouth with pictures of flowers, also hints towards the person in question being a duplicitous one. THE WAY THAT YOU WERE Sleep Token’s first original non-metal song (they had already recorded a cover of Outkast’s Hey Ya! by this point). Vessel hopes for his subject to return to…

ATLANTIC While Sundowning drops listeners into the thick of Vessel’s destructive worship, This Place Will Become Your Tomb takes us back to where it all started: underwater. Before becoming a submissive pawn eager to spread Sleep’s message, Vessel finds himself at the water’s edge, prepared to take his own life. The record charts his physical and spiritual descent. Each track is accompanied by nautical depth in metres and fathoms, marking the downward journey of Vessel’s body as it plummets and his mind surrenders to the solace of sleep. Piano-drenched opener Atlantic roots us in the scene, Vessel begging for his life to be taken by the titular ocean’s ‘blue light’. In the limbo between life and death, electronics twisting, Vessel encounters another form of sleep – the deity that will…

AETERNAL CHAMBERS Aeternal Chambers SELF-RELEASED This instrumental project from members of stoner mavericks Obiat explores post-rock’s darkest corners, with dense walls of distortion; some gorgeous, gossamer melodies and a perpetual air of quiet dread. DOM LAWSON EVERY HELL Vertebrate SELF-RELEASED A killer set of driving, metallic, alt rock. Ex-Black Peaks frontman Will Gardner’s spine-tingling clean vocals and molten screams collide thrillingly, brilliantly backed by some raucous bangers. STEPHEN HILL UNCLE DAVE’S BISCUIT BARREL The Curse Of Thirst SELF-RELEASED The UK crossover thrash loons are back with another bonkers EP, this time talking about evil bed socks, goat boys and frogs on sticks. As nutty as a fruitcake, but a lot of fun. ELLIOT LEAVER…

VULKAN ARENA / POKALEN, OSLO Sylvaine oversees a gathering of the underground’s state of the art ESTABLISHED IN 1998, by:Larm has long been a showcase for the wider Scandic music scene, along with a selection of international acts. Its metal, and metal-adjacent, offshoot, by:Larm Black is back after a three-year hiatus to offer up the region’s current state of the art. Fronted by Håvard Solli, ROSA FAENSKAP embody the intersection between queerness and post-black metal. Their high tremolo riffing takes on a nebulous, if still transcendence-seeking glow, and the sense of boundaries being further eroded is channelled by regular off-centre sonic screes that make clear nods to New York art-rockers Sonic Youth. Bergen’s PHANTOM FIRE are a wilfully regressive switch of focus, playing mostly amphetamine-rush black/thrash that sounds like the…

NIGHT DEMON / HEAVY SENTENCE THE UNDERWORLD, LONDON Part early Maiden, part Motörhead and 100% heavy metal, Manchester’s HEAVY SENTENCE open to a near-packed house, and their rough-hewn riffage and sandpaper-raw vocals win it over from the start. NIGHT DEMON spend more time on the road than off, and it shows. They’re underground road warriors, tighter than many big name bands and with real sense of playing like it’s a big stage. Their Diamond Head-on-steroids approach gives them the hooks to match. Originally active from 1971-’92, California’s CIRITH UNGOL never made a commercial impact, but they laid the foundations for both doom and power metal, and since reforming the metal outsiders have finally found their niche. It’s fitting, then, that their farewell tour hits a heaving Underworld with the lead…