Screamworks: Love in Theory and Practice is … very HIM: nothing unexpected. The band’s seventh album is true to love-metal form, with no hidden surprises or slap-in-the-face-drop-dead-awesome tracks. HIM fans will most likely be pleased but not ecstatically running down the street with new heartagram tattoos and Ville Valo face masks.

The 80s undertone present in HIM’s signature love-metal music matures in Screamworks, which presents poignant synth harmonies that contrast with the band’s familiar rock distortion and Valo’s melancholic vocals. Songs including Dying Song; In the Arms of Rain; Love, the Hardest Way and Heartkillers, which will most likely become the album’s most popular song, are reminiscent of the Bowie-inspired New Romantic movement of the early 80s. Screamworks says hello to androgyny, quiffs, eyeliner and lipstick.

HIM’s theme of tragic love persists and liebestod is expressed through Valo’s historical, mythological and religious references. The song master’s lyrics are sufficiently poetic and metaphoric to ensure that a sense of mystery remains. The irony in phrases like “little deaths to a dying song/ Sound a lot like life” (Dying Song) and “The promise of heaven pushed us right back to hell / Turned three sevens into three sixes again” (Disarm Me) entice listeners to explore Valo’s interpretation of life and love, and expression thereof through music.

From the new-agey vibe of The Foreboding Sense of Impending Happiness to the heavier In Venere Veritas and the catchy chorus of Like St. Valentine, the broad spectrum of HIM fans should be satisfied with Screamworks, and perhaps a couple of new fans won over.

The Fall of Troy’s fourth studio album, In the Unlikely Event, is a cacophony of sound that makes no sense but, at the same time, makes perfect sense. The three-piece band from Mukilteo, Washington has progressed its experimental mathcore sound to the next level: the time signatures are all the more irregular and album’s erratic song format lends itself to the band’s lyrical exploration of life’s inconsistencies and ambiguities, on an experiential level. (more…)

“Imagine a person, tall, lean and feline, high-shouldered, with a brow like Shakespeare and a face like Satan … one giant intellect, with all the resources of science past and present … Imagine that awful being, and you have a mental picture of Dr. Fu-Manchu, the yellow peril incarnate in one man.” The Insidious Dr. Fu Manchu

Author Sam Rohmer’s evil criminal genius is the namesake for hard rock band Fu Manchu, which has been infiltrating the minds of skaters and stoners with its heavy fuzz riffs for almost two decades. Fu Manchu is gearing for the launch of its eleventh studio album, Signs of Infinite Power, to be released on October 19. The album resonates a raw sound that is derived from its live recording – the four band members flogging it out together in one room has captured the insubordination of the 80s punk/70s rock vibe that Fu Manchu love to flaunt. Built into the subversive nature of the Californian band’s punk rock sound is the spirit of Dogtown. Twenty years down the line, the band is still singing about old muscle cars, choppers, vans, skateboarding, science fiction, pinball, drugs and women – and what’s the problem with that? Forty year old dudes living in their moms’ basements, sitting on torn spongy couches playing Tony Hawk and chillin’ with the homies will totally relate. The album busts no surprises and there is no experimental content. Why change a formula when it has been successful for twenty years? In other words: if you are an established fan, you won’t be disappointed; if you are a cynic, you won’t be converted; and if you are looking for something new to listen to, give the album a try but don’t expect any ‘sign of infinite power’.

Fu Manchu, which boasts the longevity of its cultish namesake, is to celebrate its 20th anniversary in 2010, so keep eyeballs peeled for news on upcoming live events and some extra special vinyl releases.

Mötley Crüe is revisiting the success of 1989’s Dr. Feelgood with the launch of a double-CD Deluxe Edition in celebration of the album’s twentieth anniversary. Dr. Feelgood reached #1 on the Billboard charts in 1989 and sold more than 7 million copies worldwide. “Dr Feelgood” and “Kickstart My Heart” were both nominated for Grammy awards for Best Hard Rock Performance. Thumbs up to the glam rockers! The 80s would not have been the same without the tattooed, high-heeled, make-uped motley crew who spent many a drug induced hour cavorting, on their motorcycles, through strip-clubs and jail cells: debauchery deluxe. The chorus from “Time for Change”: (more…)

Arch Enemy’s new album, The Root of All Evil, confirms the band’s position as a fundamental pillar of the current metal scene. The album consists of re-recorded songs taken from the band’s first three albums, Black Earth (1996), Stigmata (1998) and Burning Bridges (1999), which feature the vocal styles of original singer Johan Liiva. Liiva was replaced by screamstress Angela Gossow in 2001 and Arch Enemy has since released five albums (Wages of Sin (2001), Anthems of Rebellion (2003), Doomsday Machine (2005), Rise of the Tyrant (2007) and The Root of All Evil (2009)), which have catapulted the band into the metal limelight. Puppet master, also guitarist and backing vocalist, Michael Amott has, once again, driven the production of a masterful record, which parades the band’s unique blend of thrash/melodic/death metal that comes spiced with a touch of ‘old-school’. The Root of All Evil was recorded at a few different locations in Sweden and was produced by Arch Enemy with Daniel Erlandsson and Rickard Bengtsson handling the engineering. Recognised record producer Andy Sneap (Killswitch Engage, Opeth, 36 Crazy Fists), who has worked with the band on previous albums, was once again responsible for mixing and mastering the record. (more…)

Debut album Another Year of Disaster by Swedish metalheads Adept proves that this is a band on the up and coming. Embracing the American metalcore scene, Adept follows in the steps of bands including Atreyu, Underoath, Killswitch Engage and All That Remains. Band members: Robert Lung (vocals), Jacob Papinniemi (guitar), Jerry Repo (guitar), Tobias Ottoson (bass) and Gabriel Hellmark (drums) have let loose a well produced album of metal mayhem for all the world to sink its teeth into and, upon first impression, it is fair to deduce that the world’s teeth will remain sunk. Adept is here to stay. (more…)

Paradise Lost, renowned host of the masters of doom and gloom, has released its twelfth studio album entitled Faith Divides Us – Death Unites Us. The band’s twenty-plus year career (conceived in 1988) and twelve-album history have been fraught with a bipolar reaction from both fans and critics alike. The resulting sense of turbulence resounds loud and clear in the new album, which boasts a fusion of metal mania and melancholic depression. Birthed in Halifax England, Paradise Lost has an ironically temperamental relationship with its English fans, many of whom are of the opinion that the band has been in the process of ‘making a comeback’ since the release of its ‘last good album’, Draconian Times, in 1995. The band, however, remains extremely popular throughout the rest of Europe, which has chosen to assess each album on its own merits rather than as part of a greater whole that accommodates no variation. (more…)

Arkona is due to chant the masses into submission with some folky chorals and double-bass drumming in October this year with the release of its fifth studio album Goi, Rode, Goi!. Since the band’s conception in 2002, the pagan folk metallers have worked to create a synergism of Russian folk music and black/death metal. The Russian musos are inspired by Russian folklore and Slavic mythology and, through the poetry of lyricism, inadvertently adhere to the oral tradition of story-telling associated with the preservation of folklore. The longevity of the pagan ideology that defines the band’s lyrical content and sound is enveloped in the name “Arkona”, which was the name of the last pagan Slavic city-castle. (more…)

Saltatio Mortis, or “Dance of Death”, has recently released its seventh studio album Wer Wind Saet, which follows a line of consistent production since the band’s conception in 2000. The Medieval metallers, hailing from Germany, have combined folk music with metal to invoke a time machine that transports listeners back to an age of the Chaucerian knight who feasts on meat and mead whilst preparing for great battles and jousting contests as he plays the courtly lover, by flashing his very long sword and very big codpiece, in an attempt to woo his unrequited love. (more…)

Leaves’ Eyes third album, Njord, follows closely in the wake of predecessors Lovelorn (2004) and Vinland Saga (2005) with the amplification of its symphonic goth rock/metal sound. The band, comprising: Liv Kristine Espenaes Krull (vocals), Alexander Krull (vocals), Thorsten Bauer (guitar), Mathias Röderer (guitar), Alla Fedynitch (bass) and Seven Antonopolous (drums) hails from Norway and Germany. The sextet has successfully interlaced the musical and fictional folk elements derived from their native lands with the fantastical world of myths, sagas and legends to create an atmospheric sound that transports the listener into a world of old. Lyricist and main vocalist Liv Kristine is inspired primarily by nature, and the beauty of her lyrics is reflected in her harmoniously ethereal voice. (more…)