Upcoming Metal Releases

Upcoming Metal Releases: 7/25/2021 - 7/31/2021


Here are the new (and recent) metal releases for the week of July 25th, 2021 to July 31st, 2021. Releases reflect proposed North American scheduling, if available. Expect to see most of these albums on shelves or distros on Fridays.

See something we missed or have any thoughts? Let us know in the comments. Plus, as always, feel free to post your own shopping lists. Happy digging.

Send us your promos (streaming links preferred) to: [email protected]. Do not send us promo material via social media.


Upcoming Releases

Dee SniderLeave a Scar | Napalm Records | Heavy Metal | United States (New York)

Even if this album can be a little generically meta-metal at points, Snider’s vocals are in amazing shape and put to interesting use (like on “Time to Choose,” where Corpsegrinder stands in on backing vocals as a brutal contrast).

–Ted Nubel

King WomanCelestial Blues | Relapse Records | Doom + Post-Metal + Shoegaze | United States

Shoegaze-y, heartfelt doom that casts personal struggle and suffering in a Biblical-ish light. Powerful vocals and fragile quiets battle with speaker-shaking riffs for the album’s soul, existing almost harmoniously in an intricate embrace.

–Ted Nubel

UnderdarkOur Bodies Burned Bright on Re-Entry | Surviving Sounds | Black Metal | United Kingdom

Underdark run the gamut of black metal to skramz with enough reverence to make each tangent gripping. But what resonates most is their vocals. It’s as if they’re coming out of a previously lacerated throat. They’re still humanistic in that they’re unloading a lifetime of turbulence, which is why they’re so goddam arresting.

–Colin Dempsey

LantlôsWildhund | Prophecy Productions | Post-Metal + Rock + Shoegaze | Germany

Dreamy, yet punchy, post-rock/shoegaze; twisting riffs and cyclical grooves float in an ethereal space not quite rooted in reality.

–Ted Nubel

WitchStill Alive? | Cult Metal Classics | Heavy Metal | Sweden

Witch hit all the right notes of a traditional 80s heavy metal act. This compilation packs together all the demos they recorded in the 1980s that were sadly never released in standard formats. The songs are time capsules, with their fuzzy production buffing the gothic undertones and Maiden-esque dual vocal harmonies. Plus, the music video for “Still Alive?” is the coolest thing you’ll watch all week.

–Colin Dempsey

WallVol 2 | APF Records | Doom Metal + Stoner Rock | United Kingdom

If you want riffs, here you go. If you don’t like vocals, here you go. If you’re starving for desert rock without frills, that forgoes egregious flair in favor of conciseness, eat this up. This shit goes right to your subconscious drive for the riffiest riffs.

–Colin Dempsey

HexorcistEvil Reaping Death | Memento Mori | Death Metal | United States (Miami, FL)

Some weeks, good death metal is hard to come by, but this week we’re blessed with some real standouts. Notably among them is Hexorcist, who might seem like a black/speed kind of outfit from the album name (at least, that’s where my mind went), but in actuality executes an old-school approach to death metal that never once considers letting its victims escape from its impaling riffs and evil-as-all-hell atmosphere.

–Ted Nubel

BlackSwordAlive Again | No Remorse Records | Power Metal | Russia

Adventurously melodic power metal with discernable riffs and more than capable vocals. With a ten year gap since the band’s last album, the wait has clearly paid off.

–Ted Nubel

GalvanizerPrying Sight of Imperception | Me Saco un Ojo | Death Metal | Finland

Death metal generally involves putting together riffs that sound like they’re made to saw through craniums, but Prying Sight of Imperception is particularly sharp in this regard. Especially brutish and vile riffs join with ghoulish harmonies for an organ-rearranging good time.

Praise the PlagueThe Obsidian Gate | Lifeforce Records | Post-Black Metal | Germany

Praise the Plague lean more into the black metal side of the post-black metal field, though the crisp production and dynamic range harken to both industrial and post-rock. It’s as vicious as getting sliced open with a hammer; being sharp and pummeling at the same time.

–Colin Dempsey

TombstonerVictims of Vile Torture | Redefining Darkness Records | Death Metal | United States (New York)

Sometimes death metal touches down into the realm of the living, where you can hear that it was recorded on this mortal plane, and it becomes excessively nasty. Tombstoner have the double bass drums and chugging breakdowns of thrash’s peaks with a little grime leftover from clawing their way out of their coffins.

–Colin Dempsey

CainhurstDark Have Been My Dreams of Late | Independent | Black + Death Metal | Independent

Doomy, dreary, and pitch-black: while this black/death metal project takes its name from Bloodborne (and focused its demo on the game’s chilling lore), its debut LP isn’t as tightly connected, opting instead for a broader look at the darker side of fantasy.

–Ted Nubel

BroderDet højes smed | Independent | Drone/Doom Metal/Noise | Denmark

Mixing noise in with metal might, for the cynical, seem like a way to pad out an album’s runtime, but properly done it shrouds the work in a terrifying veil. This hefty chunk of grisly doom/black/death/drone includes noise interludes that raise the atmosphere from “uncomfortable” to “sickening,” creating pockets of pressure and escalating tension.

–Ted Nubel

NetherbirdArete | Eisenwald | Melodic Black Metal | Sweden

A fine-tuned approach to melodic black metal that integrates vicious death metal bits and atmospheric cascades as it sees fit to achieve an expansive, calculated sound.

–Ted Nubel

OndfødtNorden | Immortal Frost Productions | Black Metal | Finland

Black metal below zero: icy, acerbic, and clearly aimed at matching the misanthropic extremes of second-wave black metal, Norden is a riffy expedition into the wilderness.

–Ted Nubel

SennightNew Takes the Old | Independent | Progressive Rock + Metal | United States (Atlanta, GA)

The vocals might take a few verses to ‘click,’ but once you have a feel for this record, it really shines. Mostly progressive rock, but with some chuggy-chuggy modern metal bits in there, New Takes the Old melds melodic metal to bombastic pacing and a little bit of theatricality. These songs just hit, with enough rock fundamentals to lock in a groove but with enough weirdness to stand out.

–Ted Nubel

SabbraRaven Frost | Independent | Black Metal + Ambient | Russia

Don’t let the three-minute acoustic, dungeon-synth-y intro fool you: pissed-off black metal awaits within. Raven Frost excels at playing dead-simple riffs for exactly the right amount of time before switching to a new one, operating at a sadistic mid-tempo pace.

–Ted Nubel