Having formed in 2003, The Breathing Process are a band that has endured myriad changes in terms of personnel and style. From the title to the actual content, Samsara, the band’s third album and first in six years, sounds and reads to be an allegory for their cyclical nature. https://thebreathingprocess.bandcamp.com/ Vocals either hiss like locusts or roar like bears awakened from hibernation. Guitars die, decay, and are reborn, in triplicate no less. Cryogenic keyboards...
HomeAuthorDarren Lewis, Author at First Angel Media
I heard the whirring blades and tank treads in the distance. I caught a glimpse of the colossal, titanium abattoir rolling over the defilers and gluttons and tyrants. I heard their screams as the killing machine gurgled in satisfaction. I saw its four operators grin approvingly. Post Mortal Possession are the band that devoured Cannibal Corpse, butchered Cattle Decapitation, and buried Six Feet Under, all with a handful of material in their war chest....
In Southside Pittsburgh’s The Smiling Moose, a place known as much for co-ed carousing as it is for underground live music, a cramped attic of a venue hosted a storm of black metal that brewed slowly, starting as a fine mist and finishing as a torrential thundershower. Local act Veiled took the stage first, their dripping, mossy, frigid black metal, the band formerly known as Gnosis of the Witch, Windir and Drudkh iffs crawling from...
Vermithrax are what American power metal used to be: gritty, salt-of-the-earth, lead-heavy, fast, melodic, and built for war. Their recently hatched full-length debut album (after a widely circulated EP that was released in 2013), Imperium Draconus, continues Vermithrax’s glory-bound crusade with a dragon-lunged singer in imposing, stout-hearted captain Chris Roy to lead them. Nothing has ever been rote about Vermithrax’s brand of power metal, and Imperium Draconus is no exception. There is no tedious, derivative...
The endurance trial of seismic shifts, dinosaur stampedes, and lightning storms continued in what is still an unassuming venue in Lawrenceville’s Cattivo. Who would be left standing come 1 a.m. was a question that was on the minds of performers, attendees, and observers such as myself. Day 2 saw a more eclectic lineup than Day 1. Pittsburgh’s Urns fired the opening shots of day 2 with a slow, atmospheric set of death-infused black doom. Intelligent,...
Named after a god from Robert E. Howard’s Conan the Barbarian mythos, the Descendants of Crom festival entered its second year of doom-centric celebration late Friday afternoon to what was initially a sparse crowd in Lawrenceville’s Cattivo. Now a 2-day event, the fest–a joint effort between local label Blackseed Records and website Riff Relevant–was loaded with an array of acts that ultimately belong to the Church of Black Sabbath. Yet, the realms of doom...
I had previously dismissed Australian daredevils Parkway Drive in error when last they played Pittsburgh the same night as a decidedly more underground show was taking place on the other side of the city. Perhaps it was their name, which invoked all things “emo” and “nu” and whatnot. However, upon investigating Parkway Drive’s catalogue after their previous show months back, I heard much of what made metalcore a once exciting genre in the high 90’s and...
Despite existing as a clandestine recording project since 2014, Deathwhite’s first ever concert appearance occurred the other night at The Funhouse, Mr. Small’s of Milvale’s club-within-a-club, and what a brooding statement of intent it was. A quintet made up of ominous, hooded, mysterious, nameless figures took the stage, their brand of “dark metal” consisting of a brew of melodic and gothic-tinged genres. Bands such as Katatonia, Anathema. Evergrey, Green Carnation, and Nevermore came to mind...
Featured ArticlesShow ReviewsOh Shit They’re Going To Kill Us! Fight To Survive With Friends As Part Of Skull Fest 10
Last night’s four-act Cattivo gig was my first time attending anything related to Skull Fest, the annual punk-centric weekend-long event made up of micro-concerts spread out over many small venues that is now in its tenth year. This stand leaned more towards the metal side of things, and due to the nature of the festival, the crowd was crusty and mohawked and jovially rowdy, the number of unfamiliar, youthful faces somewhat overwhelming the senses and...
Featured ArticlesShow ReviewsBrimstone Coven Proselytize At Howler’s With Jakethehawk, Horseburner, and Faith In Jane!
The air was heavy and damp when I arrived in Bloomfield. It was if it were about to storm, and as soon as I stepped out of my ride and jogged across Liberty Avenue I heard…thunder…in the form of West Virginia outlaws Horseburner. Their set in Howler’s Coyote Cafe, one of Pittsburgh’s most loved rock bars, had just begun, Thin Lizzy riffs burning and in love with life…and death. This being my third time seeing...