As iconic groove metal leaders DEVILDRIVER enter their third decade with 9 full-length albums, countless international tours and worldwide renown, they prove more resilient than ever. As the world was upended in 2020, DEVILDRIVER didn’t pause, releasing the highly-acclaimed first installment of their two-part Dealing With Demons saga, Dealing With Demons I. Media mainstays like Revolver, Metal Hammer, Kerrang and Consequence lauded the album, which debuted at #4 on the US Current Hard Music Albums Chart. Blabbermouth stated, “If the second half of this mammoth endeavor matches the first, this will be remembered as a pivotal moment in the DEVILDRIVER story.” As society emerges more hardened and determined than before, so does DEVILDRIVER’s 10th full-length, Dealing With Demons Vol. II. Produced and engineered by Steve Evetts with additional engineering from guitarist Mike Spreitzer, Dealing With Demons Vol. II is inarguably heavier and relentlessly harsher than its predecessor. Dealing With Demons Vol. II represents not only the most vicious of the two records, but also the darkest recesses of iconic frontman Dez Fafara’s psyche and the final purging of his demons that have long haunted the band’s music, bringing together the elements that make DEVILDRIVER the best at their craft. If there is any question as to whether DEVILDRIVER is slowing down, the new album proves that 20 years into their career, even with their demons in tow – they move forward at the forefront of metal.
Upon A Burning Body
On a mission to prove that everything, even metal, is bigger in Texas, San Antonio-based quintet batter crowds with their driving brand of mosh-ready deathcore. Delivering plenty of massive riffs, punishing breakdowns, and hardcore-style gang choruses, the group has a sound that’s surprisingly infectious in what is typically a highly malevolent, take-no-prisoners genre. The band signed on with Sumerian Records, and in 2010 released its debut album, , on the influential metal label. Upon a Burning Body followed up with their sophomore effort, , in 2012. The hard-charging, Will Putney-produced dropped in 2014, followed in 2016 by , which featured the blistering single “Til the Break of Dawn.”
Now with Seek & Strike, the band strives forward delivering their most honest and crushing metal experience yet, . No gimmicks, no hard sell, just straight up Texas style, American, metal.
Ov Sulfur
You’d think Ricky Hoover made a deal with the devil. Just over a year since inception, Vegas blackened deathcore collective Ov Sulfur has burned bright as a Norwegian church.
Debut LP ‘The Burden Ov Faith’ is the morning after that blasphemic blaze, the sun shining through ash floating like snow. It’s opulent in its cinematic beauty, yet with an underlying darkness that won’t wash away. It’s an epic call-to-arms, not to raise one’s torch as much as question why they would. Less burn down a church and more take down religion as a whole. It’s about to get goddamn apocalyptic.
The burning church is as much about illuminating Hoover’s longstanding qualms with religion as obliterating it. Yet obliterate the album does, starting with slamming firestorm “Stained In Rot,” teasing Hoover’s impressive singing, contrasting his gnarly gutturals. “Befouler” follows with technical riffing and an unexpectedly catchy chorus, before crumbling into a brutal breakdown ft. Alex Terrible. That Hoover keeps up with that masked madman, Left to Suffer’s Taylor Barber and Bodysnatcher’s Kyle Medina is impressive though not surprising. That he holds his own alongside the operatic Howard Jones (Light The Torch, ex-Killswitch Engage) is. The epic title track closes it with beautiful melodies care of Lindsay Schoolcraft, formerly of Cradle of Filth.
Ov Sulfur’s debut spans the stygian realms of deathcore, black metal and metalcore, creating something as majestic as burgeoningly hook-laden and brutal.
