GONZO’S HEAVY ROUNDUP, END-OF-SUMMER EDITION

 Album Reviews  No Responses »
Sep 152026
 

(Our Denver-based writer Gonzo had an eventful summer, and reported on some of those events in our pages, but he now returns to reviewing and recommending albums — six of them released earlier this year.)

Well, fuck.

To say the past three months have been busy would be my own personal understatement of the year. Said months included, in no particular order: My wedding, three festivals, one World Cup road trip, one trip to North Carolina to see Acid Bath at a brand-new venue in Asheville, and other random adventures I’m somehow blanking on. June now seems like a blurry haze, July was like a metalhead’s paradise, and August was mostly spent recovering.

As a result, life forced me to break routines and generally fall behind on business as usual this summer. Among the normal routines I broke: Posting my usual monthly roundup here. And like any routine, once it’s broken, it’s hard to get back on the horse and continue riding. As it turns out, my will to write prevails.

But now that we’re about 75% of the way through 2026, it’s been quite the year for heavy music—much of which we’ve already covered here. The following five albums are some of the best I’ve heard during that stretch that still slipped through the cracks. Continue reading »

ANNIHILATION IN THE LIMINAL VOID: A DEEP DIVE WITH GALVANIST

 Album Reviews, Interviews  No Responses »
Sep 042026
 

(Today our Denver-based contributor Gonzo brings us high points of his conversation at the recent Fire In the Mountains festival with members of the Montana band Galvanist, intertwined with his thoughts about their new album The Silence Between Stars, released in May of this year via ATMF.)

There’s a particular kind of magic that only happens when you’re standing out on tribal land in the shadow of the mountains, dust coating your boots, cold drink in hand, talking heavy music with people who live and breathe it. Festivals like Fire in the Mountains aren’t just weekend party stops; they’re cultural touchstones where you discover something deeper about the music, the setting, and the people making the noise.

That’s precisely the headspace I was in when I sat down with Bozeman, Montana’s Galvanist to unpack one of the most cerebral, devastatingly heavy, and quietly fascinating projects brewing in Bozeman’s DIY heavy music underground. Continue reading »

FIRE IN THE MOUNTAINS 2026: FOUR DAYS OF DUST, WIND, FRYBREAD, AND TRANSCENDENCE 

 Concert Reviews  2 Responses »
Aug 122026
 

(Below you will find NCS writer Gonzo’s extensive and beautifully evocative report and celebration of Fire In the Mountains 2026, which took place on July 23-26 on the sovereign lands of the Blackfeet Nation in northwestern Montana.)

Fire in the Mountains has never been the kind of festival you simply consume. Over the years, I’ve come to understand that it can be demanding—not in the hollow, transactional way so much of modern life has become, but in the more meaningful sense that it asks attendees to be present, considerate, and involved. The reward is a space built around something increasingly rare: community over convenience, inclusion over exclusivity, and shared experience over consumption.

This festival is, and always has been, a vast departure from the life we’ve been told we have to live. That’s why it remains as special as it is. The people hosting this gathering are cut from the same rebellious cloth, as they dare to take risks where it counts, doing things their way, but never losing sight of what they originally set out to accomplish years ago.

Like last year, all these thoughts were surging through my head at dawn as I hit the gas on I-25 from Denver. The same thoughts returned as I finished packing my Subaru to the brim with supplies. Our destination tonight was Great Falls, MT, and we’d complete the trek to Red Eagle Campground for Fire in the Mountains 2026 on Thursday morning.

All of this seemed so familiar, as though it had already happened in a parallel universe. Or maybe it was just the welcome sense of familiarity I felt, knowing that I’d be revisiting a very special and sacred land, reuniting with the incredible people I met last year, and watching even more astoundingly awesome music there over the next four days.

Continue reading »

THERE WERE WIRES: “VESSEL”

 Album Reviews  No Responses »
Jul 202026
 

(This is NCS writer Gonzo’s review of a comeback album from Boston-based There Were Wires that was released in late June by Iodine Recordings.)

When you think “heavy music,” the small slab of New England known as Martha’s Vineyard almost certainly won’t be what comes to mind first. And if it is, I want to know where the hell you’ve been hanging out lately. But never mind that.

Way back in 1999, the band There Were Wires formed in that quiet suburb, and they proceeded to play every sweaty New England club and basement venue they could crawl into. At the time, their sound was rooted in hardcore punk’s raw aggression, and they quickly found a home on Deathwish Records soon after. But after the release of their 2004 album Somnambulists, the band played what they presumed to be their final show, and the members went on to form other acts such as Doomriders, among others.

Now, over 25 years later, There Were Wires have made a return that’s just as ambitious as it is unlikely. Vessel is probably a record that nobody saw coming, but despite that, it deserves your full attention. Continue reading »

FLATLINE FEST 2026: DENVER’S NEWEST EXTREME METAL DESTINATION 

 Concert Reviews  2 Responses »
Jun 232026
 

(Denver-based NCS writer Gonzo enjoyed a glorious couple of nights at the inaugural edition of Flatline Fest on June 13-14, and delivered to us the following enthusiastic report, accompanied by photos made by Jacob Juno.)

For heavy music, the US festival circuit is quietly growing into something that defies conventional logic. Recent years have seen the unlikely resurrection of vaunted gatherings like Milwaukee Metal Fest, while longer-running affairs like Maryland Death Fest and Northwest Terror Fest proved that even a global pandemic wasn’t enough to douse their fires for good. And deep in the wilderness outside Glacier National Park, the Blackfeet Indian Reservation enshrined a new kind of heaviness with the 2025 incarnation of Fire in the Mountains.

Obviously, these events don’t just spawn out of thin air. They’re the collective result of dedicated people putting ungodly amounts of time, energy, and creativity into something they all believe in, often at the expense of their own sanity.

But in the end, these festivals are more than just a few days of bands playing songs. They’re community gatherings where occasions are celebrated, longtime friends meet up, new friends are made, and the best kind of chaotic merriment prevails.

Evidently, nobody knows this better than Denver producer Dave Otero and co-promoter Chelsea Lowe, whose first-ever Flatline Fest at Denver’s Oriental Theater last weekend turned out to be a masterclass in how to throw one hell of a fucking party.

Continue reading »

GONZO’S HEAVY ROUNDUP, MAY 2026

 Album Reviews  1 Response »
Jun 082026
 

(With the month of May now behind us, Gonzo returns to review and recommend five albums released during that month.)

Like fucking clockwork, this column was once again interrupted by last-minute additions.

On one hand, I completely realize the futility of adding albums to a list that I conjure out of nothing each month. On the other, it’s my list, goddammit, and my commitment to being needlessly meticulous with it is something you can pry from my cold, dead hands. (Much like the collection of physical media sitting in a walk-in closet that I’ve been hoarding since I was 15.)

Alas, this sentiment tracks with how most of us approach our writing at NCS. We’re nerds about this shit.

If you read below the fold, maybe you’ll understand why I nixed such new releases from Elder, All Them Witches, and to a lesser extent, Devin Townsend, for the ones included here. You could also debate whether any of those bands fit the mold of these pages, but I don’t have the energy for that. Continue reading »

PRO-PAIN: “STONE COLD ANGER”

 Album Reviews  No Responses »
May 252026
 

(This is our friend Gonzo’s review of the first new album in 11 years from Pro-Pain, out now on Napalm Records.)

Eleven long years have passed since we last heard from New York’s Pro-Pain. And not unlike other groove-laden crossover heroes from the early ’90s — Helmet, Merauder, and Prong come to mind first — their influence has quietly given life to an entire movement of others who follow in their footsteps.

Since they first appeared on the map in 1992 with the seminal Foul Taste of Freedom, Pro-Pain has been a band that’s been more comfortable flying under the radar and delivering punishing riffs, anthemic choruses, and a raw, uncompromising sound. More than 30 years later, they’ve carried that energy with aplomb into Stone Cold Anger, an aptly titled record if there ever was one. Continue reading »

GONZO’S HEAVY ROUNDUP, APRIL 2026

 Album Reviews  1 Response »
May 052026
 

(April was a sorry month in many ways for many people, but it still yielded a lot of good heavy albums, and in his latest monthly roundup of reviews our friend Gonzo picks out four of them.)

These days, it feels like I’m behind on everything: Behind on new heavy music, behind on listening to it, and most certainly behind on writing about it.

I guess there’s a reason for that. Not to delve too far into a sob story, but this is mostly because my day job decided to callously and haphazardly lay me off last week. Having this happen so abruptly is one thing, but the fact that this unceremonious ending was the third layoff in a row for me is another. Screaming into the void is therapeutic, and by that measure, my yearly pilgrimage to Roadburn a few weeks ago turned out to be more necessary than ever.

So, fuck the corporate grind. My venom for capitalism knows no bounds. Being forced to repeat the Sisyphean and futile exercise of finding another job in this hellscape has only tempered said venom in something even more vitriolic. For these reasons, I’m sad to say I’ll be missing this year’s Northwest Terror Fest in the coming days. That bums me out more than anything else.

In the meantime, here’s some new music to keep your ears busy. Continue reading »

GONZO’S HEAVY ROUNDUP, MARCH 2026

 Album Reviews  No Responses »
Apr 062026
 

(Gonzo makes another of his monthly appearances at NCS today, with reviews of four albums released in March 2026.)

We’re only three months and some change into 2026, and I swear on Satan’s taint that I’ve already identified at least 3 new albums fighting for contention in my annual top 20 list. Dark and uncertain times always make fertile ground for raw, ferocious music, and if we can take anything from the hellscape we’re all currently stuck in, let it be that.

Let’s take a look at four of them that helped March suck a whole lot less for me. Continue reading »

NEUROSIS — “AN UNDYING LOVE FOR A BURNING WORLD”

 Album Reviews  2 Responses »
Mar 242026
 

(This is our Gonzo’s review of the first new album from Neurosis in a decade, a surprise drop last week from the band’s Neurot Recordings.)

We live in a world where it’s exceedingly difficult to keep secrets.

When it comes to new music, fans tend to catch wind of things well in advance. That’s all by design, of course. The ubiquity of streaming platforms and social media has long since given a bullhorn to every band on the planet that wants to tease “big news coming soon,” and honestly, I think we’ve all grown a little numb to those tactics.

So, when I woke up to the news last Friday (March 20) that Neurosis had not only reunited some time ago under a veil of total clandestineness, but also added post-metal demigod Aaron Turner as a fulltime member, and dropped a new album with zero fanfare, zero advanced warning, and zero indications that the band was anything other than long-dormant, the shock factor probably could’ve been mistaken for actual Bay Area seismic activity.

Obviously, this left me with a lot of fucking ground to cover. Continue reading »

 Older Entries