Heavy Metal Resource Reviews-Every Mother's Nightmare, Flaw, Devilfire, Soil, and Nocturnal Rites

Index

Here is a band that I spent a lot of time with back in the heyday of the early 90's just before the floor fell out on the scene. Always enjoyed what the band had to offer with their first couple of releases. 'Grind' offers a solid platter of hard rock music that really sounds great. There are 11 tracks total with 8 of them being studio and the other three being live. Five of those 8 are from the band's self released ep. The songwriting is very good with an excellent groove weaving from track to track. In ways it will have a familiar feel to the band's early releases. I really dig the vocal work courtesy of Rick Ruhl. He sounds great and after listening to this, it will be hard to not be singing most of this for awhile after. Very memorable songs. The live stuff sounds good and shows the band in tight form. Glad to see these guys releasing very good quality rock and roll again!

Release Date: October 6, 2017

Flaw offer up a companion ep to last years 'Divided We Fall' album. The ep contains 6 tracks of which 4 are studio material and the other two tracks are recent live material from the bands great debut. Musically, it's what you expect from Flaw. A solid modern hard rock sound with some melody infused in for good measure. The live stuff sounds good and features the first single 'Payback' as well as one of my favorite tracks by the band 'Only the Strong'. It's nice to see the band active as there was an era of uncertainty after about a decade or so without a release. After a full length album and now this ep maybe things have become a bit more stable as it seems the band still have their creativity and sound intact. I also throw kudos their way for remembering our first responders and military as is evidenced in the live material. Short, but worth checking out as always!

Release Date: September 1, 2017

The first thing that I found stunning about this release is is the high quality of everything about it. Keep in mind, this is a debut release. You could make the case that debut releases tend to have more time spent on them and are not rushed efforts. That would be the case here. Quite a bit of attention was paid to every angle and the results are amazing. The sound is a melodic hard rock sound that has a fair amount of polish overall. The music is memorable and quite consistent as you progress through the album. The band recently spent some time on the road with former Nightwish singer Tarja which should have been good exposure for the band. To sum it all up, this is a very consistent and polished melodic hard rock release that I found quite enjoyable to listen to. This band has a promising future without a doubt. Keep your eye on this band!

Release Date: October 6, 2017

Here is a good bang for your buck album. Modern rockers SOiL have been on the scene for some time now and have quite a bit to offer when it comes to their catalog. This is one of those albums that allows you to pack this around and have a good mix of things one may want to hear. There are quite a few alternate versions of songs. There is some live material. There are even tracks with guests such as 'Give it Up' that feature the late Wayne Static. If that isn't enough, there are cool cover tunes such as 'Black Betty' and 'Gimme Some Lovin'. You get the idea, tons of different things that make this a cool unique album by the band. There are 20 tracks total on this release and a running time of close to an hour and 10 minutes in length. It has a different feel than a greatest hits album does obviously which makes it even more cool. A decent release by a decent band!

Release Date: September 15, 2017

Looking at time when it comes to music, a decade can be a very long time, and can be a bit dangerous. It has been about that amount of time between releases for Swedish Metallers Nocturnal Rites. Seems the band have been putting that time to good use. Their latest release 'Phoenix' is solid start to finish showing the bands continued relevance to the metal community. The music has a good melodic tone to it, but has a good amount of intensity as well. Music is well crafted and sounds fairly traditional, but at times you also get some modern feel to it as well. The album will have appeal to fans of both styles. It is also worth mentioning the consistency of the music. There is a pretty even delivery from track to track. I feel this album had some good attention to detail paid to it as it was written. This is a very good return for the band and should make the fans happy!

Release Date: October 6, 2017