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The post Anthrax Announce New Album ‘Cursum Perficio’ appeared first on The Razor's Edge.

Blue Medusa, the new band from former Arch Enemy vocalist Alissa White-Gluz, have shared their second single.

After the huge success of the trio’s savage debut single ‘Checkmate’, they’re back with another face-melter.

This one is titled ‘Flying Monkey’, and it’s a wickedly dark cut that finds Alissa and co. at their most vulnerable and vicious.

With a title that nods to the story of The Wizard Of Oz, it makes sense that there’s a cinematic flair to this one. Frantic and delightfully fun, there’s plenty of hidden references and double entendres to dig into here, and they’re all wrapped in the kind of riffs and harmonies that’ll get your heart properly racing.

The instrumentation of ‘Flying Monkey’ was composed by guitarist Dani Sophia, who states:

“Flying Monkey was written in this really liminal space, this waiting area in-between chapters in my life, and the melodies reflect the themes of the nightmares I was having at the time. No matter where I was, I kept hearing an out-of-tune music box playing in the distance…”

Alissa also had this to say about the track’s creation:

“Flying Monkey is exactly the kind of music I want to be making. I am so inspired by Dani and Alyssa. This Blue Medua album is almost like writing my memoirs and I have loved every aspect of creating it.”

The official music video for the track is also set to arrive later today (May 15).

Check it out from 4pm GMT below.

The post Blue Medusa Drop Explosive Single ‘Flying Monkey’ appeared first on Rock Sound.

Kevin Morby just released his masterpiece. Little Wide Open, out today, is the folk-rock singer-songwriter’s greatest collection of songs to date. The album presents an interconnected batch of reflections: on Morby’s Midwestern homeland and the adventures that have carried him far from it, on isolation and connection, on reckless youth and hard-won maturity, on how to navigate this life and what makes it worth living.

The post The Story Behind Every Song On Kevin Morby’s Masterful New Album <em>Little Wide Open</em> appeared first on Stereogum.

Falling Together, the new album from US-based progressive rock group Advent Horizon is out today.

The album marks the follow-up to their critically acclaimed 2023 release A Cell to Call Home. Falling Together is an album about holding your beliefs under a microscope, and determining whether they are truly yours, or whether they were planted there by others when you were young and impressionable.

Falling Together is available to order now here:
https://www.adventhorizonmusic.com/merch-region-selection
The band is now releasing the second single from the album.

To celebrate the album’s release, the band have shared a performance video for the album’s opening track, the 19-minute epic “In A Lone And Dreary World.”

Vocalist/Guitarist/Songwriter Rylee McDonald on the track: “‘I’ve always been a big fan of prog epics (Close to the edge, Hemispheres, 2112, Anesthetize, Crystalized etc), and have long dreamed of crafting an epic of my own. Years ago, Mike and I decided to write an epic track telling the story of someone raised in a sheltered community who builds up the courage to leave the safety of their home and explore the “dangerous and evil” world outside, only to discover that the world is actually a place of beauty and wonder. I wrote/recorded the first draft of this song back in 2018-2019 during the ACTCH writing sessions. It was immediately apparent that this concept was too big to fit neatly within ACTCH, so we set it aside, knowing that it would become the centerpiece of our followup album to ACTCH. Over the coming years, it blossomed into the single biggest piece of music I’ve ever composed. I’m immensely proud of how “In a lone and dreary world” turned out. It’s the longest, heaviest, most dynamic thing we’ve done to date, and I truly cannot wait to see people’s reaction to it.”

“Falling Together” is available on CD and vinyl here
https://www.adventhorizonmusic.com/merch-region-selection
and digital here:
https://adventhorizon.bandcamp.com/

You can hear the singles on streaming services now.
One additional song will be made available each month.

1. In A Lone And Dreary World (19:03)
2. Faiths Window (5:20)
3. Patience (4:53)
4. Past Life Parable (5:03)
5. Gravity I (2:35)
6. Gravity II (4:49)
7. Animals (5:34)

ADVENT HORIZON is:
Rylee McDonald – Vocals, Guitars, Keys
Mike Lofgreen – Drums and Percussion
Cason Wood – Bass, Keys, Trombone
Grant Matheson – Guitar, Keys, Vocals

The post Advent Horizon share share performance video for 19-minute epic “In A Lone And Dreary World” – new album ‘Falling Together’ out today appeared first on The Prog Report.

Get details on new tours featuring Black Veil Brides, Journey, Hayley Williams and more. Continue reading…

Posted on May 15th 2026, 1:50p.m.

Theme From Alex – Thirsty Broken Magic & Part Ghost (Self Released)
Matthew Alexander Powell continues his reissue campaign with the two albums from his previous band Theme From Alex. Thirsty Broken Magic dropped in 2003 and and Part Ghost in 2016, both are similar but different in their own ways.

Thirsty Broken Magic is more of a solo album with Matt performing vocals/guitars/bass joined by Rob Reed (Magenta/Sanctuary/Chimpan A) on keys/programming and Ryan Ashton on drums.

Part Ghost is more of band project with Matt on vocals/guitar, Blare on drums and lead vocals on Comfort The Ride, Edd Sprague on guitars/vocals and Jamie Roberts on bass/vocals, who is now in Puzzle Tree with Powell.

Production wise Thirsty Broken Magic is handheld by Powell and Reed while Part Ghost is Powell and Lee Howells who also adds backing vocals alongside Beth-Anne Matthews and Dylan Thompson (ex-The Reasoning) whom Powell was in Shadow Of The Sun with.

Guests on Thirsty Broken Music are High Griffiths on lead guitar for Silver Lining and Edward Sprague on lead guitar for Refrain (who clearly made an impact as he joined the band for the next album).

So with all that preamble and who’s who out of the way we can actually get down to the music on these albums. Starting with Thirsty Broken Magic and Soul Tired kicks off with some early 2000’s alt rock riffs that were bang up to date then, Powell’s vocals perhaps not as refined as they are now but there’s a passion behind it for mixing grooving riffs with prog acumen.

She comes next and you can hear the Jeff Buckley influence strongly in the voice and acoustic guitar, the acoustics are very important to the whole album, creating the main rhythm of these songs as Light And Shade adds Creed/Staind style emotive balladry and the first of three Mantra’s splits the album up into chapters, the first two short interludes while the third is the outro of the record but features a hidden song (remember those) after some silence

Before I Know brings back the heavy, a slithering bass groove adding grunge to the alt metal as Breathe dreamily invokes some radio pop shifting to a short rockers Fra Diavalo. You can hear that Thirsty Broken Magic is very of it’s time but a lot of the styles visited here continue into Powell’s work after this and beyond.

I mentioned the vocals and they aren’t bad mind you, just still a bit raw which suits the style of the album as the woozy Silver Lining is followed by the soulful Sunburn, again highlighting the acoustic guitar. Carrying this through to Refrain which makes me think of Stone Temple Pilots and is the last ‘proper’ song here.

Thirsty Broken Magic is an album of potential, there’s a lot of things here that will be revisited over Powell’s career and on the follow up of course.

Part Ghost then is a record with a bit more time and experience behind it, the prog influences creeping in a bit more in terms of experimentation with styles, rhythms, and atmospheres. Big riffs swagger in on Broken Man the alt/grunge style still central to the music but as I said much more rounded.

Lyrically too things take a step up as they do vocally, the harmonies in particular work really well to make the album feel ‘big’. Brittlewing is spectral and dynamic, it sounds like a band playing these songs over a collection of musicians, we move into the riffy metallic world of Canute and it’s powerful Alice In Chains vibe.

Galaxy returns to acoustic balladry, ripe with emotion and some 90’s angst meeting a bit of prog rock scrubbing, Mad Season continuing the psychedelic/acoustic themes with repeating melodies, transitioning to Comfort The Ride, the albums longest song and it’s most affecting, hooked on a big bass line it’s got a flavour of Dream Theater’s balladry.

Into the back end of the record and the maturity is obvious with the brooding Play Dead and the propulsive Crashing Around You, the drumming here needs to be highlighted as it does on the on the Soundgarden-like Holy Water, a track which brings the woozy riffs of Cornell and co.

The influences are a lot broader on Part Ghost, more realised than on the debut. Bloodlines for instance is some introspective radio fodder segueing into album closer Torch which again features a big set of chorus riffs countered by stripped back verses.

So Part Ghost feels much more like a band project, the style of Thirsty Broken Magic doesn’t disappear it’s just reappraised with experience and performed by more musicians which adds to the definition of everything.

Revisiting these albums in preparation for his new solo album Matthew Alexander Powell is giving the audience gained through Puzzle Tree a look at how he got here. Theme From Alex is where volume met the singer/songwriter and both are worth exploring to chart the evolution. 9/10

The post SHANNON JAE RIDOUT: Northwestern US Folk Singer/Songwriter Issues Title Track From Two Busted Boots And A Broken Heart LP, Nearing June 12th Release On Anti-Corp Music appeared first on INFRARED MAGAZINE.

After Hellhammer ended, nobody expected Celtic Frost to amount to anything –let alone influence a generation of underground bands

For more than a decade, Maneating Orchid have been creating some of the most chaotic and unpredictable extreme music coming out of India’s underground. With Cold Logic, the band pushes even deeper into dissonance, cosmic dread, fractured structures and suffocating intensity – refining the strange and volatile identity they’ve been building since their earliest releases. We spoke with Vinay and Kaushal about exhaustion, instability, sci-fi horror, density, and why “risk is for pop stars to worry about”.

Hi! After finishing Cold Logic, what did it feel like this album had taken from you compared to previous records – mentally, creatively, or even structurally?
Vinay: We give as much of our time, effort and energy as possible to every release we ever put out, and “Cold Logic” was no different. We slogged our asses off, whether it was writing, recording, mixing/mastering, shooting videos, creating artwork, or currently even pushing the album out to attain the widest reach. All of this takes mental bandwidth, keeping our creative juices flowing and structuring it around our regular work days. It’s a continuous struggle trying to maintain the balance, but it is what it is, and we’re happy with how “Cold Logic” has shaped up.

At what point did you realize the record was becoming less about controlled complexity and more about a system that keeps destabilizing itself?
Vinay: If I understand the question correctly, I don’t think those two things are mutually exclusive. Our music is controlled and complex, but the result feels like it’s a constantly shifting system. It’s more of a cause-and-effect relationship than it is about picking one over the other. So yeah, I guess fuck shit up and then try to maintain balance.

With the shift away from socio-political themes toward cosmic dread and psychological fracture, what opened that door thematically for this album?
Kaushal: Our first EP actually heavily leaned into techno-surreal and sci-fi ideas. The two releases that followed became more socio-political and were rooted in reacting to things happening around us externally, whereas “Cold Logic” turned inward and outward at the same time. With “Cold Logic”, we found ourselves returning to that earlier fascination with cosmic dread, fractured perception, post-humanism, and existential uncertainty, just in a much deeper and more focused way. A lot of the themes came from thinking about existence on a larger scale, cosmic indifference, and the discomfort that comes from realising there may not be any inherent structure or meaning underneath everything.

How did Vishnu Reddy joining on drums change the way the band approaches tension and release inside a song?
Vinay: Vishnu understands tension and release perfectly well, considering he’s played in some fairly experimental projects before Maneating Orchid. His addition has solidified our form and songwriting even more. The tension is tight and uncomfortable, and the release is grand and satisfying.

Was there any point in the writing process where the material felt like it was resisting completion, almost refusing to settle into final form?
Vinay: Absolutely, that’s a part of writing. There were a few sections that probably didn’t feel right or whole, but you sit with it and let it brew and hope you find a way out. In one instance, I can recall the outro on “Malformed Horizon,” where the writing and arrangement took quite a toll on me and the mix engineer’s mental health. I’m joking, of course. Distancing yourself from the music helps a lot during these times because ear fatigue blurs sonic direction and gets in the way of making clear decisions.

Compared to Hive Mind and Miasma, what part of your writing identity has become more extreme over time – density, unpredictability, or emotional distance?
Vinay: I think we’ve always been a fairly unpredictable band, so that has remained the same, or it has probably become more prominent with this release. Some passages do have abrupt shifts. I also think “Cold Logic” is definitely our densest record. Some sections are claustrophobic and dissonant, which probably weren’t as much a part of our sound on the previous albums. Using the harmonium has definitely helped achieve that density.

When you think about bands like Voivod, Gorguts, or Discordance Axis in relation to your sound, what influences have become absorbed into instinct rather than consciously referenced?
Vinay: The sheer intensity of these bands, along with their clear and deliberate sense of songwriting, is what has become fairly internalised to us, especially during the writing process. With time, there is a growing conviction in our musical direction that the above influences have helped hone. You have to stand behind what you put out, and all our favourite artists do so, however absurd or simple the music may be.

The album moves through ideas of identity dissolution and post-human transformation – how do you translate something so abstract into something that still feels physically intense in music?
Kaushal: I’m really fascinated with the kinds of ideas explored in darker science fiction films and literature. Things like identity dissolution, post-human transformation, distorted perception, and cosmic insignificance are difficult to represent in a literal way, but they naturally carry a strong sense of tension and unease. Musically, we translate that through dissonance, abrupt shifts, dense layering, and sections that feel unstable or overwhelming. The goal was never to sound “technical” for the sake of it, but to create an atmosphere that feels immersive, unsettling, and physically intense in the same way those ideas feel psychologically overwhelming.

Do you see the suffocating 34-minute runtime as a constraint that sharpened the material, or as a natural endpoint of the ideas themselves?
Vinay: I think a 35 to 40-minute record is the perfect amount of time to listen to music of this intensity. It’s not a constraint by any means, but a conscious decision to keep it this way. Extra/newer ideas can always be carried into a future release.

How does your songwriting process handle repetition, given that repetition can either feel hypnotic or completely against the logic of your music?
Vinay: I think songwriting in general is a repetitive process. With time, you become more aware of ideas that are worth exploring and those that aren’t. When it comes to our music in general, repetition to the same degree is not really a thing. The sound, the parts, and our playing keep constantly changing and evolving. While we might have a signature sound, we aren’t really afraid to explore unknown territories as long as it keeps things interesting.

When you step back from Cold Logic, what part of it feels most “human” underneath all the fragmentation and dissonance?
Vinay: The very experience of the music is human underneath it all. While the album sets the scene in a distant, cold world, the feelings of discomfort, isolation and dread can very well be mapped onto the realities that we experience daily.

Looking across your discography, where does this album sit in terms of risk – was this a refinement of your language or a point where the language itself started to break? Thank you!
Vinay: This one is definitely a refinement in the sound of Maneating Orchid. Our previous releases were kind of headed in this direction, but “Cold Logic” has made it very specific and focused. Our music is generally a little bit out there and “risky,” if that’s what we want to call it. It’s not a thing we take into account at any point because we’re always going to write and play music that’s interesting to us, risky or not. Risk is for pop stars to worry about.

Pre-order/Bandcamp link: https://maneatingorchid.bandcamp.com/album/cold-logic
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/maneatingorchid
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/orchidtelevision
Apple Music: https://music.apple.com/in/artist/maneating-orchid/1495730532
Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/artist/6FExdyOzhM4KgbZIbT5N38
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/maneatingorchid
Bandsintown:https://www.bandsintown.com/a/15641786-maneating-orchid