What can you say about Atreyu? You really have to hand it to Orange County’s Metalcore magicians. With all the success generated by 2002’s Suicide Notes and Butterfly Kisses, getting radio airplay, a slot on this year’s Ozzfest, and just the overall hype surrounding this album, you couldn’t be blamed for being a tad concerned about the direction they would go with this one. Well, silly us for worrying, the truth is they’ve gotten even heavier. The sound is bigger, the playing is tighter, the songs are more dynamic, and the lyrics are as bitter as the finest dark chocolate. Each song comes equipped with a heartfelt chorus so potently memorable that it transcends space and time. In summary, this album achieves a masterful balance of rage, melody, and rhythm not likely to be contested anytime soon. Consider the bar raised for 2004.

Melodic Black/Death from Greece brought to you by three extremely attractive women. Musically they hit as hard as any gents you’d care to put them up against, and I wish someone would put the singer up against me. All joking aside, Astarte play an atmospheric yet brutal form of Blackened Death/Thrash, heavy on the symphonic tip. What holds this back for me is the vocals. While Tristessa’s screechy style is plenty abrasive, you can totally tell she’s a gal and that bothers me for some reason. I admit I’m a bit silly, but I don’t speak in a female voice, I don’t think in a female voice, and while I can appreciate talent when I hear it, when it comes to Extreme Metal, effeminacy in the vocal department is harder for me to get behind. Although, I’d have no trouble getting behind any of these beauties. Sorry, I couldn’t resist that one. This does feature guest appearances from Sakis of Rotting Christ (“Oceanus Procellarum”) and Shagrath of Dimmu Borgir (“The Ring”), which may be reason enough for some to pick this up. My insanity aside, Astarte do shred, and if cool girls really did exist, this would be at the top of their playlists.

I don’t know a whole lot about this band other than the fact that there is only one member, Strijd (at least that’s what I think it says in the inlay, the writing isn’t clear). The inlay isn’t very helpful in that regard, but it did tell me that two of the tracks are from the …and Only Ruins Will Remain demo and another track was for a split (I’m assuming a 7-inch) that never was released. Musically, Black Circle is every bit as generic as the band name would imply. This is essentially Burzum with a drum machine. The structures are minimalistic and the whole album is fairly predictable and, to a degree, fairly boring as well. As officer Barbrady from South Park would say, “Move along folks, nothing to see here…”

A crushing display of haunting Funeral Doom! This is the sound of a soul dying. Overcast dirges crawl through the stereo, as the vocalist’s darkened chant gives way to tortured growls. This is all of life’s emptiness and misery set to a score capable of slowing the pulse. There are only three tracks, but this clocks in at over 40 minutes, and it is time well spent at peace with regret. An extremely muddy sound quality and some sub par vocal experimentation on the last track are all that holds A Clarion Call back from perfection. Fans of Skepticism and Shape of Despair take serious fucking note! This will serve just as worthy as background music for the exit.

Total fucking Debbie Gibson Metal. The girls in this band are hot as fuck, but that doesn’t make the actual listening process any easier. Musically, this is a decent Theatre of Tragedy rip off. If I periodically ovulated, I might be able to feel this.

This once great Death/Thrash band now has to use a hot chick singer as a novelty for sales. She’s okay, but she sure as hell ain’t no Rachel Kloosterwaard. This is essentially a single for their new boring song, and it includes some extra shit that no one in the universe will ever care about. Some live shit (hooray), a cover of Manowar’s “Kill with Power,” Megadeth’s “Symphony of Destruction” (way to pick from the primo era, guys), and a Carcass cover which is actually pretty damn good (I guess it’d better be if your guitarist actually was in Carcass). There’s also some video clip which is useless to me because, like Seth Putnam said, technology is gay. When the highest selling point is a cover, you’re probably better off putting the $12 in the tank.

Listening to this album’s first track, “Silence of Sorrow,” I thought for sure I was in for a pleasant surprise. This song, with it’s Gothenburg-flavored Thrashiness and infectiously melodic chorus, is the kind that gets this Metalhead singing in the shower. However, this confused German band spends the rest of the album trying to be Rammstein with an ’80s Soft Rock edge. I can imagine the promo sticker now, “for fans of Billy Joel, Def Leppard and Dark Tranquillity.” Truly pathetic and outright perplexing. To show right off the bat the talent they possess, and then throw it away all for the sake of novelty. I suppose the drummer’s top hat should’ve clued me in. I guess any group of jokers that pick up instruments are at least capable of writing one good song.

[Nuclear Blast translated the band’s name to The Apocalyptic Riders for the US release. -Editor]

When you splice the DNA of the gods with your own, you become godlike. Just ask Rapture or Daylight Dies, who have crafted masterful works under the influence and inspiration of the almighty Katatonia. Add to that fold Green Bay’s Aphotic, who may even bring more originality to the altar than their aforementioned peers. After two flawless EPs (Aphotic and Under Veil of Dark - both included on this disc), this trio featuring ex-members of Dusk have added a live drummer to the fray (not that you can even tell, as their drum machine programming in the past has sounded extraordinarily real) and have served up five more perfect gems of rhythmic despondency. These guys go the extra mile to find the grooves that hurt and the melodies that intoxicate. Enveloped with an aura of dismal serenity, this band can actually manifest depression. Incorporating clean vocals with a downtrodden Death-snarl takes this band to new melancholic heights, and just listen to them invoke the discouraged masters on “Lunar Ride.” It gives me chills. Three flawless EPs a flawless full length doth make.

Angelrust is a band trying to cross melodic Black Metal with Opeth. Not the easiest way to get your feet wet, but I’ll be damned if they don’t have enough musical talent and a good enough singer to make it work most of the time. They must have some money, too, because this 4-song CD is as pro-produced as all get out, plus it features a PC CD-ROM video file! Like I said, the attack is an even balance of mid-paced, melodic Black Metal with standard shrieking, and clean/acoustic interludes with actual singing. The latter portions find these guys wanting to be Opeth so bad it hurts. And the drawbacks there are obvious, the most prevalent being that as good as this guy is, he’s no Mike Akerfeldt. Who is or ever will be? And then there’s little things like the gruff backing vocals on “The Exile” which sound really stupid and out of place. But overall, these guys show enormous promise. Anyone that can work an acoustic guitar this beautifully and still rock the house are worth keeping an ear on. They’re just not quite there yet.