First Reactions - Ulthar's 'Furnace Hibernation', from "Providence." (2020)

In a previous life, I found myself, if not ravished, than as sure as heck seduced by the 2018 album, "Cosmovore", care of Oakland death metal threesome Ulthar. While it was having its wicked way with me behind a skip (it later bought me a kebab), I was impressed by how it blended huge, nasty, meaty hooks with at times deep and rich song structures. Also, the Ian Miller cover art.

As I held its hair up while it projectile vomited up the side of a Vauxhall Astra, and before we tried to find where one of its stiletto heels ended up (on the roof of a bus shelter), I was also left to ponder another question - what would Ulthar's next record sound like?

I got my answer today, care of the band's label, 20 Buck Spin. Ulthar has a new album, "Providence", coming out (if the Plague Lord wills it) on 12th June, 2020. It already scores points with another Ian Miller cover (really, he ought to be just given the brief to re-design the British Isles and be done with it). But what about the song just released from that album, Furnace Hibernation?

Vengeful Spectre - "Vengeful Spectre" (2020)

Harsh times often require harsh music. In a sense, then, Vengeful Spectre, a black metal act from Guandong, China, is both perfectly timed, and placed, to score the sheer screaming horror of it all.

This may sound glib, but you can't deny the symbolism, or the fact that the band has worried fans asking about their status, and, indeed, health. 

For all that, its new album (out now on Pest Productions) is well packaged, with excellent, and evocative, cover art, and a novel sound which combines the more accessible end of the black metal spectrum (think Bulldozer, or late stage Immortal) with traditional Chinese instruments.

Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs - "Viscerals" (2020)

In many ways, this is the Chicken Korma of doom metal albums. That's to say, if you want to know how Indian (really, Bangladeshi) cuisine swept all before it in the UK, you have the really mild dishes to thank. 

Oh, there will always be a place for the anus-flaying glory of the Vindaloo, or the mild napalm tang of a good Jalfreezi. But the mild, wimp-out options, like your Butter Chickens, Pasandas, and, indeed, Kormas, gave the blander, more timid parts of the British palate a fighting chance.

Which brings us, naturally, to the new album by Geordie doom/psych rock quintet, Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs. (Or Pigs7, as they will be referred to from now on in this review, because RSI ain't my bag.) "Viscerals", with its knowingly kitsch, luridly yucky cover art, is doom metal, but for the ironic craft beer crowd.