The Finnish four man combo Circle of Contempt formed in 2006 and recorded Artifacts in Motion as their first album in late 2009. CoC play straight technical deathcore more than anything else, the sound is heavy, complex and diversified, riddled with stop-and-go riffs and raging drums. CoC is quite demanding to listen to but Artifacts in Motion also has its more melodic moments. The record is overall well crafted, played and produced.

Listen: Zerohour - Remnants Left - Color Lines - (close)

Oceana introduced itself with a lot of screams on their first record The Tide. Fortunately, this did not change much. The new record Birtheater however, features some refreshing clean but powerful vocals by new singer Brennan Taulbee. Oceana did a major step in improving their sound, creating an amazing atmosphere throughout the album, not least because of the new singer Taulbee. Unlike the previous album, Birtheater also brings some quite catchy songs, for example The Family Disease. Convince yourself with some samples inside.

Shadows Fall raised the bar again with their brand new work Retribution: On this fifth studio album the New England melodic thrashers improved their style beyond solid. Although the record is still pure "Shadows Fall", their sound definitely evolved. On the one hand, the record is moderate and well tempered, on the other hand thrashier, straight to the point, with a lot of heavy, non-stop assault parts. This is undoubtedly Shadows Fall's finest work to date!

Rise from Silence is Tread's first full-length studio album. Despite years of development on their sound and several ups and downs in the history of the band, the debut album is finally released. The record starts with intense and heavy vocals but the sound quickly turns into a melodic, heavy rock atmosphere with some decent metalcore influences. The album is consequent and straight but without sacrificing any diversity. The songs are all stunning, simply magnificent heavy rock at its peak. Make sure you check some tunes!

Dynamic, diverse, harsh, raw, intensive, unexpected, demanding, creative, all these attributes characterize Curse at 27's new work. The newcomers from Australia demonstrate solid skills on their debut album The Departed. The recording is great, their sound is powerful with heavy varieties in vocals, speed and style. Curse definitely found their very own niche as the album is a very unique piece of work. Regrettably, the disk is very short with about an half-hour of playing time. However, be warned, don't expect a few whiny emo-boys playing a cute song... prepare for the evil.

Textures, a band from the Netherlands, plays an aggressive, complex and progressive style with many clean vocals and melodic parts, which rather sound like hard rock than metal, nicely integrated into the raw but atmospheric, heavy parts of the album. Those who liked former progressive posts in this blog like Harcride and The Ocean Collective will love this one. Take a shot inside!

The band Five Finger Death Punch was founded by Zoltan Bathory and is composed of former members of Motograter, U.P.O., and W.A.S.P. The Way of the Fist brings us thick guitar riffs balanced with very nice clean and scream parts. Catchy melodies are spread all over this great album. Nearly every song is a real clacker! Read on and check out two songs of this fantastic album.

The ever evolving band Zao, with no less than 16 former members in the history of the band, returned with a great, new album. Zao is one of the pioneers in the metalcore genre and on Awake? they remained true to their sound. The production of this record is clean, aggressive deathcore vocals, few melodic parts with clean vocals and coarse, raw guitar work. A solid enrichment of the bands already impressive discography.

The german metal band MAROON offers us a new well planed record which sounds exceptional brute. While listening you will feel the atmospheric closeness which guides you trough this album. Beside Heaven Shall Burn, MAROON are another figuredhead for well produced german metalcore. Read on for some vids and remember "Stay Brutal"!

Hacride started out as technical Death Metal band but developed over their second album Amoeba and third album Lazarus to a complex and experimental, progressive metal band. The band combines strong vocals and a dark sound with both, heavy and melodic parts in diversified, lengthy songs. Fans of Gojira, Messhuggah and even Isis will definitely get their money's worth!

This Age of Silence is the debut album of Anterior, a band from the United Kingdom. The style of the band differs from other bands in this genre, Anterior combines catchy metalcore sound and heavy vocals with impressing guitar work all over the songs. As a result, Anterior presented a well-balanced debut album between heaviness, speed and beautiful melodies suited for a broad range of listeners. Watch out for the samples inside!

Although Mastodon's new album Crack The Skye is a conceptual piece like their previous releases, the record's sound is not as experimental as before and will actually reach more people and develop a wider basis of fans. According to Dailor Mastodon wanted to stick to elements as air was the element of the previous record. The element of the new record is ether, which is what the soul is made of.

Gojira has been an ever-evolving experiment in extreme metal. The France band has indeed opened a new bag of tricks for The Way Of All Flesh, while not abandoning the sound that showed a massive promise of potential in their first albums. The Way of All Flesh is all about death and mysteries surrounding the phenomenon of death as a step on the path of the soul.

Shadow Hearts is the second full-length release of the German metalcore band. Caliban released three more records in 2004, 2006 and 2007. Unfortunately, these records show a different, more commercial sound with a lot of clean vocal parts. In April 2009, Caliban is about to release their sixth studio album Say Hello To Tragedy, and it is said to be a bit darker and heavier than the previous ones. Back to the roots, Caliban!

My Mind's Weapon played along with other great bands like Alexisonfire, Bleeding Through and Cult of Luna, but strangely almost nobody knows them. The band from Scotland sounds intentionally different and sets oneself apart from the mass. Their innovative mix of Thrash Metal, Metalcore and Technical Metal elements is definitely a fresh breeze for the scene!

While listening to Hollow Crown you feel like following a path of destruction. This well produced album brings some heavy breakdowns and moshparts. At first you'll maybe a bit confused by the well strewn chaotic elements all along the record. But if you going to listen more intensively you may get to another level of this kind of music. Adiccted to the album name: read on to hear the inofficial mathcore kings in action!