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Trash Titans Flotsam And Jetsam are back with another exquisite slab of Heavy Metal. Following hot on the heels of 2024’s I Am The Weapon, Rats In The Temple showcases the world-class talent of the band. Flotsam And Jetsam have been around for four decades, and their legendary status as one of the most prolific Thrash bands continues with yet another superb album. 

Flotsam And Jetsam – Rats In The Temple

Release date: Out Now

Words: Kenny Kendrick

The album opens up as it means to go on with Harvesting The Hate, an epic anthem. The absolute precision of the band really is a thing to behold. Ex-Alice Cooper/House of Lords drummer Ken Mary is one of the best drummers on the planet, and a perfect fit in the Flotsam And Jetsam camp. He plays his arse off throughout the album in a supreme performance.

Damnation kicks off with an operatic feel before we are kicked head first into some trad Metal with a catchy whoa whoa chorus. Absolution heads off into full-on Thrash territory.

Huge riffs from guitarists Steve Conley and Michael Gilbert are the order of the day on Rats In The Temple, and the duo work effortlessly together to create some of the band’s best work. Let us not forget the huge contribution from vocalist Eric AK Knutson. He sounds better than he ever has here, a superb effort.  

Blame The Knife is my favourite track on the album. Staccato riffs, double bass flourishes, and some thought-provoking lyrics combine to make a real standout track. The title track again highlights Ken Mary’s unbelievable chops. I cannot emphasise enough how good he is. He elevates every track with his meticulous performance. 

The Ghost Behind The Door is another solid track, with its chunky riffs, excellent lead guitar work and a memorable chorus. Other standout tracks include the super heavy First On The Spike, The Edge Of Nowhere with its full-throttle thrash attack, and the epic Not Goin’ Down That Way. 

Flotsam And Jetsam are a band that should be spoken about more often when we talk about the Big 4 of Thrash Metal. They are more than worthy to be up there with the likes of Testament, Exodus, etc in the conversation about contributions to the Thrash genre. 

Rats In The Temple is a kick-arse record with ferocious performances from the band. 2026’s version of Flotsam And Jetsam are by far their best incarnation.

Go and have a listen to Rats In The Temple and tell me you do not agree.

Flotsam And Jetsam – Rats In The Temple is out now via Napalm Records. For more details, visit napalmrecords.com/flotsam-and-jetsam.

The post Flotsam And Jetsam Deliver Thrash Metal Excellence On Rats In The Temple first appeared on MetalTalk – Heavy Metal News, Reviews and Interviews.

In the proliferating bustle of the AMG promo bin, citing Elder, King Buffalo, and Slift as comparable artists will absolutely grab my attention. Hence, I seized The Curse of Nephtar, the third album from French psych-rockers Pelegrin, with much excitement. Thus Spoke, however, tempered my enthusiasm with her Mixed review of the band’s previous outing. While Thus enjoyed Ways of Avicenna (2023) for its groovin’ riffs and hooky choruses, she found these to be fleeting moments on an incoherent album.¹ In their press sheet, Pelegrin promise that The Curse of Nephtar ups both the catchiness and heaviness factors. Meanwhile, the album’s narrative arc—an allegory about the tragic influence of fossil fuels on the Middle East and the world at large—suggests attention to cohesion.

The aforementioned acts sonically capture The Curse of Nephtar, though a hint of originality comes through. Here’s the elevator pitch: Pelegrin sounds like Elder, King Buffalo, and Slift collaborating on the Dune soundtrack. The latter two bands stand as especially apt comparables, seeing as Pelegrin is also a power trio. In his role as guitarist, François Roze deals in mixed-mode melodies, metal-adjacent chuggery, and psychedelic solos (“Eons”). Bassist Jason Recoing possesses a rattling tone that initiates grooves (“Sun and Blood”) and builds bridges (“Price to Pay”).² Rounding out the trio, drummer Antoine Ebel establishes the album’s chill vibe, propelling the heavier riffs with a peppery swagger when needed (“Plenty”). Seasoning Pelegrin’s Middle Eastern tonalities with what they describe as ‘a dash of Arabian spices’ are guest vocals from Halima Joy and sound effects from Mathieu Houeix. Couched in organic, airy production, Pelegrin submits a unique enough entry into the contemporary pantheon of heavy psych rock with The Curse of Nephtar, even if the album isn’t as heavy as the band wants it to be.

In his role as vocalist, Roze vacillates between vibe-setting and hook-sinking on The Curse of Nephtar. His voice sits in a lower-to-upper middle range, sinking into the musical sand and then surfacing to attack. On standout song “In the Company of Stars,” Roze amplifies tasty psych grooves and key shifts with a catchy chorus, powered by bluesy undertones and riveting high notes. Other verses and choruses on The Curse of Nephtar, however, fail to reach these heights. Sometimes, it sounds like Roze is searching for a stable hook and not quite finding one. Because the music of Pelegrin isn’t overtly proggy, or heavy, or jammy, the vocals need to carry more memorability than they do. Still, Roze’s is not a bad performance by any means—his voice fits the psychedelic aura Pelegrin is going for.

Like its vocals, The Curse of Nephtar’s narrative generally satisfies while leaving this listener wanting more. That striking black orb on the equally striking album cover is Nephtar itself, ever-so-slowly surfacing from a prehistoric ocean to subdue all living things on earth (humans included). Initiating the narrative, “Eons” overlays voiceovers that collide with the harmonization of the irresistible main riff, conveying a sense of grandeur.³ The shift from the upbeat “In the Company of Stars” to the doomier “Drawn to Nephtar” nicely veers the narrative into sinister terrain. Meanwhile, some songs don’t live up to their narrative station. “Price to Pay” serves sweet melodies, heavy riffs, and proggy tempo shifts, but Roze doesn’t quite convey the unleashing of chaos with his vocals. The same can be said for the epic closer, “Break the Omen”; it deals out delectable riffs and wah-wah solos, but Roze doesn’t vocally bring it home. The Curse of Nephtar clocks in at a somewhat svelte 43 minutes, which is a good and bad thing here. Pelegrin should be applauded for broaching a timely eco-political concept in a timeless, economical manner. Still, a little more time and space would suit this eons-in-the-making narrative.⁴

In the end, The Curse of Nephtar counts as a positive step forward for Pelegrin. The band has struggled on past efforts with the meandering temptations of psych rock, but their third album feels more immediate and impactful. Still, it’s hard not to hear Pelegrin’s latest as more potential than payoff, especially in the vocal department. In a year where Elder and Slift⁵ have released high-quality albums,⁶ The Curse of Nephtar sits below these stalwarts. But Pelegrin possess the tools for greatness, and I’ll definitely be keeping tabs on them.

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Rating: 3.0/5.0
DR: 8 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps mp3
Label: Ripple Music
Websites: Instagram | Facebook
Releases Worldwide: September 4th, 2026

The post Pelegrin – The Curse of Nephtar Review appeared first on Angry Metal Guy.

TEMIC are streaming a Cesar Mindiburu-directed/edited music video for the new song called “Broken”. The latter serves as a second taste of their forthcoming long player Ceiba, which comes out on October 2nd through Season Of Mist.
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Symphonic metal six-piece Epica have announced a special 25th-anniversary show at London’s Royal Albert Hall, where they’ll be joined by a choir and orchestra.

The Dutch band will play the famous Italianate venue on October 6, 2027, as part of their on-again-off-again Symphonic Synergy format, which debuted with performances in Amsterdam and Mexico City in September and December 2024. The show will be part of a larger, yet-to-be-announced world tour.

Tickets go on general sale on Friday, September 4, at 10am UK time.

The band comment: “Playing the legendary Royal Albert Hall in London for the first time, surrounded by a full orchestra and choir, will be an absolutely magical experience. Hearing our music come alive in a way it is supposed to sound, on such an iconic stage, will be a moment we’ll remember forever – come and be a part of it!”

Epica are currently touring to promote their 2025 album Aspiral and will play in Asia later this month. The run of six shows commences at the Liquidroom in Tokyo on September 14 and concludes at the Modern Sky Lab in Shanghai on September 22.

The band’s 25th-anniversary celebrations will kick off in January with three shows at the Royal Theatre Carre in Amsterdam. All three dates are sold out. They’ll then play across Latin America in March, supported by Italian symphonic death metal maestros Fleshgod Apocalypse. At time of publication, the Royal Albert Hall date is the only show on Epica’s slate set to feature an orchestra and choir.

Guitarist/vocalist Mark Jansen founded Epica in 2002, shortly after leaving After Forever, which featured future Nightwish frontwoman Floor Jansen (no relation). Singer Simone Simons, Mark’s then-partner, and keyboardist Coen Janssen joined in the same year. The three are the only people to have performed on every Epica album. The band have sold more than one million albums worldwide.

Simons looked back on Epica’s formation during a 2023 interview with Metal Hammer, revealing that she didn’t initially want to join the lineup.

“I knew Mark [Jansen, guitars/vocals] because I was in a relationship with him back in the day,” she recalled. “He started a new band [after leaving After Forever] pretty quickly, but because I was his girlfriend, at first I didn’t want to join. I helped them search for a singer.

“I thought I should do it by the book – finish high school and then go explore the world with a metal band. But when they asked me if I wanted to [sing for them], I thought, ‘OK, let’s just give it a go.’ And here we are, 20 years later!”

She also said that she rehearsed with a black metal band before joining the symphonic group: “They were in my hometown and my friend’s boyfriend was playing in that band, so that’s why we went, but I was way too shy to sing along. Epica was my true first band.”

Epica previously celebrated their 20th anniversary with a sold-out show at Poppodium 013 in Tilburg, Netherlands, on September 3, 2022. They performed a small set of rarities and an After Forever cover under their short-lived original name, Sahara Dust, to open the gig.

Blow out the candles! September is full of rock star birthdays. Continue reading…

Technical death metal pioneers Atheist have announced a five-date tour of Mexico, set to take place this September. The tour comes in anticipation of a new album, which will be the band’s first since 2010’s Jupiter, to be released in late 2026 or sometime in 2027.
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Bay Area thrash veterans Vio-lence have announced that their guitarist Ira Black has left the band to focus on his new band Apocælypse, whose debut album Fænix was released last Friday (August 28th). While no replacement for Black has been announced yet, the band has been working on new material for a new album as of late.
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Wanna get caught in a mosh at Mangata Festival? Check out these 9 bands, for mosh pits ranging from the violent and chaotic to the immensely silly.  

Ignore anyone who says festival season is over, for next Saturday, 5 September, is Mangata Festival. Nicknamed “ArcTanGent lite” and spread across some of Nottingham’s finest music venues, the Mangata 2026 lineup spans death Metal, party doom, club Metal, instrumental post-rock, atmospheric black Metal, industrial noise pop, and more.  

While some of the day’s musical offerings are of the thunderously atmospheric, will hypnotise you to the point of euphoric bliss with their cinematic visuals kind (Nordic Giants), others are more likely to blast you into a parallel universe in which The Midnight Beast evolved into an electronicore band to rival Electric Callboy (Premier Jester). To make sure you get a good amount of mosh n movement in to balance out the moments of ethereal instrumental therapy, we’ve collated a list of some of the bands most likely to command a mosh pit at Mangata Festival this year.    

King Abyss

12:10 on Twisted Tavern Spirits Stage

One reviewer said King Abyss’ frontman Dom Bould is so commanding that some members of the crowd had the shit scared out of them. The Staffordshire thrashing hardcore death Metallers have been showing off their brutal hardcore streak for ten years, so if you haven’t already caught a whiff of their riffs, today at Mangata Festival is the day. There truly may be no greater reason to charge straight through the Red Room’s doors to the Twisted Tavern Spirits Stage than to show this festival (Dom) what you’re made of at midday with a full energy tank.   

Listen to: Weapons of Mass Delusion, Snake Oil, In the Ground

Scordatura

13:40 on Heavy Metal Hairdresser Stage 

The words “sledgehammer of a set” have been used to describe Scordatura, a set that was chock full of pit madness, crowd surfing and circle pits swallowing up the venue. The Dying Fetus / Defeated Sanity / Cannibal Corpse-influenced Glaswegian death Metallers have been living up to their reputation as a “killer live act” since 2007, playing old-school Death Metal in all its gory glory, with a sharp touch of modernity tying their sound together in a technically rabid package. Fronted by Party Cannon’s Daryl Boyce, you can expect mayhem from Scordatura – just maybe a few less bananas than at the party slammers’ recent Bloodstock record attempt. 

Listen to: Necromantic Disposition, Contorted Existence, Led Into Oblivion

Red Method

17:10 on Heavy Metal Hairdresser Stage

The industrial groove nu-Metallers Red Method don’t plan to leave any survivors during their sweat-soaked shows. Awash in their own blackened paint and blood (still paint), their shows are high-energy mayhem that looks as ravenously unhinged as it feels. Imagine what the angry love child between Slipknot and Pantera, if they were listening to Sepultura and Nine Inch Nails during conception, would sound and behave like? The answer is Red Method. The Razors Edge say they give a Slipknot-esque hammering. Devolution Magazine remark on their impressive circle pits and how they even have time to perform a sermon and rip up some pages from a bible. Bring it on?

Listen to: Detonate, Counting Corpses, Cycle of Violence

Raised by Owls

18:30 on Heavy Metal Hairdresser Stage

Raised by Owls, aka Sam’s Mum’s favourite (or least favourite) Metal band, put the comedy in death and grindcore when it comes to their particular flavour of metal. If you want to tick “see Mr Blobby dual-wield double-ended dildos” off your bucket list and partake in a non-stop death Metal party that ends in “blood, sweat and spilled beers”, then head to the Heavy Metal Hairdresser Stage at 18:30. With songs like Going for a Pint With Corpsegrinder and a cover of Limp Bizkit’s Break Stuff, you know you’re in for a very, very silly, wildly chaotic time with Raised by Owls. You may even get to participate in a circle pit of Barney Greenway impersonators, as apparently when the Napalm Death singer dances on stage he looks like “a man who’s gone for a jog and is being attacked by a swarm of wasps and it’s fucking amazing”. Blast beats and ferocious growls galore; you will not leave a Raised by Owls show wanting. Well, wanting anything except more. 

Listen to: I’m Sorry I Wore a Dying Fetus T-Shirt to Your Baby’s Gender Reveal Party, Dance Like Barney Greenway, Netflix and Kill

Maatkare

19:00 on BSB TV Stage

Maatkare are a “pharaohcious female death Metal band from the UK/Netherlands”, and their ferociousness is not just in their pun game or their death metal, but in their resounding Egyptian mythological power – a power that conjures up “visceral pits”. It’s no surprise that their debut, and to date only, album is titled Rise to Power. Total Rock managed to describe a Maatkare live show in just five words: “death metal at its finest”. There’s an ancient blackened atmosphere to the otherwise crushing death metal that this four-piece has crafted, and it’s the kind of ritualistic heaviness that wants, nay, needs, to be experienced live. Even if they go “straight in for the kill”, and you’re likely to leave the BSB TV Stage ready to storm into war in the name of “The Queen”. 

Listen to: War Before Peace, Death of One Thousand Voices, Long Live The Queen

Cober Mouth

20:00 on BSB TV Stage

One YouTube user says Cober Mouth scratch the itch left by their love for Paleface Swiss “so damn well”. Add to that an umbrella of influences including Slipknot, Architects, Northlane, Knocked Loose and Thrown, and you can imagine what kind of barking, scratching rampage the Bristolians are capable of across stages. Even if it’s at home with your furniture and “concert playlist”, their vicious nu-Metalcore sound will incite the rowdy mosher within. They even have a song called Cesspit. So as soon as they start their frantic, spitting set at 20:00 on the BSB TV Stage, you’re going to want to throw a limb or ten in the Cober Mouth “cesspit”. 

Listen to: No More, Tenacity, They’re Only There For Their Food and Then They’re There For Their Food

THE HARA

20:00 on Heavy Metal Hairdresser Stage

There are few things off the table when it comes to guessing what THE HARA will do live. Dress guitarist Zack Breen up as a panda and shove him in the middle of a circle pit? Most likely. Ignore all sense of health and safety and get vocalist Josh Taylor to climb onto anything he can get his hands and feet on, even if it’s wobbly as hell? Most definitely. Charge into a wall of death with a sword?…hopefully. When Punktastic reviewed THE HARA, they described it as “a stampede out of the zoo and into the wild”. With swirling circle pits of fans, usually around one of the band members, and bouncing walls of death, usually including one of the band members, THE HARA bring drama and high-energy bonkersness to every stage they lather their presence all over. “This is a band that doesn’t just play at a crowd – they play with them,” says Jowheretogo. So come prepared. 

Listen to: Violence, Psycho Killer, Rockstar

ten56.

21:50 on Heavy Metal Hairdresser Stage

“Go see ten56. now. Just saw them live a few hours ago and man they were crushing. Breakdowns into breakdowns into breakdowns. It was absolute chaos in the pit, insane energy from the crowd as well,” urged SexyGenguButt on Reddit. ten56. also feature in a “what’s the most violent moshpit you’ve ever been in” Reddit thread, alongside Converge in ’07, Knocked Loose, “my furniture at my Spotify playlist concert”, Bury Your Dead, and Knocked Loose. The word “brutal” features at least 56 times across their live show reviews over the past couple of years…but most make sure to elaborate that it’s a “delicious assault”. There’s a reason why this French deathcore band are this year’s headliner, and their unabashedly pissed-off and violating mechanical breakdowns mixed with their clear reputation for an “all hell breaks loose” kind of show is it. 

Listen to: Saiko, Pig, Earwig

Continents

22:10 on BSB TV Stage

Booted from their position as BSB TV Stage’s opener all the way to stage headliner are Welsh Metalcore act Continents. Electrifying. High-energy. Formidable. These are just some of the adjectives thrown around to describe what a Continents live show is like. And in addition to walls of death, crowd surfers, and riots in the moshpit, you may also get to experience “walls practically shaking from the vibrations of both the music and from the movement of the very enthusiastic crowd” if Soundscape Magazine weren’t just being metaphorical. With their tight, gristly Metalcore that explodes out of the speakers like an angry cat whose tail you just trod on, Continents are going to be a fun, and hopefully bruising, end to Mangata Festival 2026. 

Listen to: GRITTED TEETH, Drowned in Hate, BAD BLOOD

The post 9 Bands To Mosh To At Mangata Festival 2026 first appeared on MetalTalk – Heavy Metal News, Reviews and Interviews.

ADX have debuted “Le Règne Des Ecorcheurs” (The Reign Of The Scorpions), the first official single from their next studio record 13ème Choc.
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Posted on September 1st 2026, 11:22am