Ragestorm: The Thin Line Between Hope And Ruin (Independent)
Ragestorm hail from Italy and they play true death metal with a massive modern groove metal hook thrown in. This is their first full length and it's a bit good, full of technical riffage, harsh guttural vocals and the modern American screaming favoured by Randy Blythe. The vocals are shared by Marke and bassist vocalist Kolla neither of whom have a clean vocal between them but when the music is this fast, loud and brutal, the guitars of Tele (lead) and Rufio (rhythm) are razor sharp running through thrash influenced death metal of The Meatgrinder Theory and Idiocracy as well as breakdown fuelled American Groove of tracks like Debt Ritual and Acid Tears which has some killer drumming from Bonny and massive breakdown. This is an accomplished album from the Italians who have a similar sound to British Death metallers Bloodshot Dawn with their technical death style but with the added bonus of some chunky American style metal they have a wide ranging sound that will stand them in good stead. A good debut and for any fans of the genre. 7/10
Broken Fate: Rising To The Dream (Independent)
Broken Fate hail from Switzerland and they play some seriously quality heavy metal with lots of great guitar riffs, drum passages and some strong vocals. The band go for the traditional Metallica set up with drums from Alessandro De Cicco, bass from Dario Stutz with lots of sterling lead guitar work and some guttural roars from Roman Leeser and the riff frenzy's of Tobias John Bänteli on rhythm guitar and lead vocals which are somewhere between Matt Drake and Tom Araya. With some amazing tracks like The Way In Your Eyes which has huge chugging riffage before exploding into Eternal Memories which turns into a Fade To Black-like middle section and then erupts into a super speed solo. The band mix modern American metal in the vocal department, but merge it with classic thrash which and some massive clean leads and lots of pit starting snarling thrash. Things slow down on the acoustically dashed Fate before ending with the instrumental. This is a killer E.P from the Swiss crew one which cannot be ignored, lets hope their debut (slated for a 2014 release) is as good as it might be something a bit special. 9/10
Barque Of Dante: Lasting Forever (Mort Productions)