Crypt Sermon – Bleak Metal

By now, it’s clear that many spring and summer events are cancelled or postponed due to the coronavirus/COVID-19 pandemic that is affecting our planet. One such event is Roadburn Festival which takes place every April in Tilburg, The Netherlands.

The festival is best known for bringing excellent music to a dedicated audience and this year they really pushed themselves and their curators to convoke an interesting line-up. Artists would collaborate, albums would be debuted and newly commissioned works would be premiered. It is a shame that the 2020 edition is now postponed, in as much of its entirety as possible, until 2021 but there is still much that can be done to support the artists who will be losing income over these coming months from missing shows and being unable to ship merchandise to some parts of the world. The health of the world hangs in the balance and this is the only sensible and reasonable action that can be taken.

Roadburn Festival Poster by Douwe Dijkstra Illustration

It’s the end of the year and the end of a decade that was driven by change. A lot changed for me, personally, over the last ten years and I can only hope that it led to my becoming a better person. But that is subjective, as is choosing a list of records that I super enjoyed over the last ten months. There was a lot of music released in 2019 and a lot of music I just didn’t hear. There was a lot of music I did hear and never wanted to listen to again. There was music I couldn’t get enough of and listened to constantly. I listened to a handful of non-metal records that I really loved – these records can be seen on a list that will soon be published on Scene Point Blank. I also wrote a list for Metal Hammer but due to deadlines this was required to be finalised at the beginning of October and so my “final” list of albums I really liked has changed a little since then.

For those two lists I had to rank my choices and here I will rank only my top three – these are the records that really made a huge impact on me this year. The remaining records are all excellent, too, of course. If there’s a review of the album then you can find it by clicking on the band name and if you navigate to the record label then you’ll find the bandcamp page for the album (where available) in order to show your own support to these artists.

If you read anything that I wrote this year, then thank you. I hope to continue in 2020.

Mizmor – Cairn (Gilead Media)

Alcest – Spiritual Instinct (Nuclear Blast Records)

Schammasch – Hearts Of No Light (Prosthetic Records)

Bleak Metal

None more bleak.

Tag: Crypt Sermon

Looking Towards The End // 2019