by Sebastian Kluth
After many positive reviews and enthusiastic mentions on numerous lists for album of the year, I decided to give Power Trip a second chance. I had seen the band in concert with Iron Reagan last year but hadn't been particularly impressed. Nightmare Logic...
Snarveien, better known as Detour, is a classic Norwegian horror movie. The story is quickly told. A young couple that illegally smuggles alcohol has to take a detour because of an accident and gets stranded on an abandoned road in the woods. Soon, strange...
Brazilian power metal Armored Dawn sextet surely knows a lot about music business and how to promote its material. The band's first promotional EP was released with numerous rock and metal magazines from all around the world. Pretty much any metal fan...
There is no need to introduce the most awaited metal comeback release of the year, because everything has already been said. So let’s head straight to the music written and performed by Ozzy Obsourne, Tony Iommi, Geezer Butler, and session drummer Brad...
Only a few months after the release of the cover album Schicksalsmelodien, German Neue Deutsche Härte band Eisbrecher is back with its ninth studio album Liebe Macht Monster. The record includes fourteen brand-new tracks with a generous running time of...
Versus is a Japanese movie that is quite challenging to classify. It includes elements of fantasy with portals leading to other worlds. It could be described as a horror movie due to the presence of murderous zombies. This is also an action film featuring...
Partially based upon historical events, Bernard Rose's Samurai Marathon portrays how a Japanese lord sends his men on an exhausting run to get them prepared for a potential attack by Western forces after centuries of isolation. The movie follows different...
Historical drama with depth and grit While everbody seems to be going crazy over Christopher Nolan's new science-fiction epic Tenet, I must admit that I have prefered Chinese historical military drama The Eight Hundred a little bit more. The movie tells...
Two years after the rather underwhelming but financially successful King Kong versus Godzilla, Toho Studios continued its most important franchise with fourth entry Mothra versus Godzilla. This movie is one of the highlights in the franchise and its best...
The Salvation is a Danish western and while this might sound surprising at first sight, The Salvation is easily the best western I have seen in many years and a solid candidate for western of the decade or even of the century. The story revolves around...
Despite obvious grammar mistakes in the lyrics, Metalwings' debut EP Fallen Angel in the Hell was a promising release thanks to grounded, natural and unique vocals and the use of viola sounds and Irish flutes in an epic symphonic metal context. The first...
Before I Fall is best described as a contemporary feminist take on Groundhog Day. It tells the story of high school student Samantha who seems to have a quite normal life. She lives with her friendly parents and her good-spirited little sister. She has...
The Survival Family is a very intelligent movie that mixes dramatic and humorous elements in a balanced way. The film tells the story of a slightly estranged family consisting of a busy father, a lonely wife, an overtly sensitive daughter and an isolated...
Xiaoyu or Rain in English is a promising symphonic power metal quintet from Guangzhou in the People’s Republic of China. Founded back in 2005, the band released a first full length record in 2008 which can be loosely translated as “Forest Pavilion” and...
Lord Symphony is a promising new underground band on the rise. The band hails from Solo, Central Java, in Indonesia and mixes traditional European power metal in the key of Gamma Ray with a more epic and symphonic touch inspired by Rhapsody Of Fire, and...
The Universal Migrator I: The Dream Sequencer Floating in Space When I bought Ayreon's double-album The Universal Migrator Part I: The Dream Sequencer and The Universal Migrator Part II: Flight of the Migrator as a teenager one and a half decades ago,...
Countdown is an entertaining horror movie that is best enjoyed with some friends around Halloween. The film revolves around a cell phone application that predicts when a person is going to die. The story follows a young nurse who realizes she only has...
More Moonglow - The Rock Hard EP comes for free with German Rock Hard magazine and intends to promote new studio album Moonglow. With six tracks and a total running time just above forty-five minutes, this exclusive release offers value for money for...
Midnattsol's The Aftermath is the first record of the German-Norwegian quintet since former Leaves' Eyes singer Liv Kristine joined her sister Carmen Elise Espenæs last year. I expected a clever use of the two distinctive vocalists but the new material...
I have always been a supporter of kawaii metal as it has revolutionized the metal genre. Revolutionary bands have always taken risks, expanded horizons and been controversially discussed. This was the case when doom metal created a whole new genre of...
From a purely objective point of view, ''Yoga Hosers'' could be seen as one of the worst movies ever made. The story is extremely weak. The movie has several big plot holes. The acting performances are somewhere between average and terrible. The characters...
Two years after the outstanding self-titled debut from power metal and melodic rock supergroup Unisonic, the quintet is back in full strength with its sophomore output entitled Light Of Dawn. While many people I know didn’t appreciate the debut, it was...
Hwimory is a power metal band from Incheon, South Korea that’s been around the local scene for the last decade or so, and in 2010 released its first self-titled release. Guitar player Lee Jae-Wook also plays for a heavy metal band from Seoul called Mir,...
The Vision Bleak is one of my favourite bands. They mix dark Lovecraftian lyrics with epic gothic metal, basing their music beautiful melodic vocals and a few occasional blackened shrieks, great guitar play varying between melodic mid-tempo riffs and...
The immortal Japanese heavy metal institution Loudness comes around with its twenty-eighth studio record in thirty-three years. The cover artwork and album title, The Sun Will Rise Again, reference the band’s breakthrough record Thunder In The East from...
