With their Reclamation [Independent, 2010] EP set for release May 8 at the Starlight Room in Edmonton, Alta., melodic death metallers Sonorous Odium are finally getting some results for their four years of hard work and tenaciousness.
Before the foundation for Sonorous Odium was built in 2006, guitarist Wally Fischer and bassist Eric Rodgers had been playing and writing together for a few years. With another guitarist and drummer in the band, the guys started looking for a vocalist when Fischer and Rodgers found Curtis Vieville.
“We actually approached him first. He …

In the spring of 2006, Chris ‘Savage’ Jennings responded to an ad for a local band looking for a singer shortly after work brought him to Red Deer, Alta. He met and jammed a few cover songs with guitarists Dean Scott and Mike Williams and bassist Ryan Piecowye.
“I was essentially hired once I proved I had the vocal range required to fit the music being written” Jennings explains.
Chad Hutton relocated from Vancouver to play drums and soon after, Diesel May started writing their self-titled debut album, which was released in …

Derailed have travelled down the tracks of heavy metal mayhem since 2008, at least in their current formation. There’s a wealth of experience amongst the Calgary, Alta. four-piece, but for lead vocalist Johnie Sinclair and bassist Steve Legault, the band’s two newest members, they can hardly hold their excitement when describing the feeling of performing original and fresh material in a live setting.
“This is where I have always wanted to be,” exclaims Sinclair. “When I think back to when I was 15 and 16, sitting in a garage, this is …

“When I formed the band years ago, it was just part of a dream I had to combine the two types of music I like best: traditional Celtic folk music and death metal,” explains Chrigel Glanzmann about his Swiss folk metal band Eluveitie. The eight piece group is comprised of musicians playing unique instruments such as the hurdy gurdy, fiddle and bodhrẚn, to name a few, along with the traditional electric guitars, basses and drums you expect to see weilded by a metal band. Glanzmann himself is the group’s lead …

“One of our biggest challenges is that we live on an island. We are surrounded by water and it costs us $300 return just to get to Vancouver for a show,” reveals Mike Selman, guitarist for the Victoria-based metal quintet Unleash the Archers.
Take into consideration the cost of fuel, and the amount of money an independent metal act playing original music is bound to not get paid, and Selman admits the jaunt across the water is more of a detriment.
A sure way to avoid the huge cost for a one-night …

Dark Witch Productions put together a face melting death metal show for April 3, 2010 at Vern’s Tavern. Fornication from Calgary Alta. were up first and they set the bar high for the rest of the night. This band has come a long way since they started and their set on this night was impressive. These guys actually stepped in last minute to help out Dark Witch when fellow Calgary band Ominosity was forced to drop off the bill two weeks prior, due to guitarist Andrew Schoepfer breaking his hand.
Next …

To say I’m a big Alice Cooper fan is a bit of an understatement. My fascination with the king of shock rock started back in 1988 when Alice and crew came to my hometown. After seeing the videos for “He’s Back (The Man Behind The Mask)” and “Teenage Frankenstein,” the 9-year-old me decided that this should be the first rock concert I would attend. My mother, on the other hand, did not agree and in doing so inadvertently started a life-long obsession with Alice, and heavy metal in general. These …

What do you get when you mix Swedish Vikings with Swiss Gauls? Fun. Amon Amarth stormed MacEwan Hall in Calgary, Alta. on April 14 along with their friends Eluveitie. The openers joining the two veteran bands were Holy Grail from Pasadena, Calif.
Holy Grail came on stage to an antsy audience, as most people had shown up fairly early for the concert. The band doesn’t just look like they just teleported in from the ’80s thrash era, their sound is a mix of old school thrash and power metal. The band …

The Unravelling – “13 Arcane Hymns” (CD)

“13 Arcane Hymns” Track List:
1. Move Forward Until You Are Dead
2. Becoming Chaos
3. Fire Breather
4. Open Skull
5. Last Rights Protest
6. Revived
7. Unscripted Disclosure
8. In The Safe House
9. Where Will It End?
10. Disconnect – Connect
11. My Resignation
12. Arjuna
13. Victory Song
Release Date: May 13, 2010
Label: Independent
KING: It’s impossible to explain The Unravelling’s sound in one sentence. To say it has elements of metal, rock, progressive touches and even an industrial influence that occasionally raises it’s gritty head doesn’t even begin to scratch the surface of …

You have planned everything perfectly and promoted your show to the best of your ability: hung posters, handed out handbills, stormed the Internet, called and texted all your friends, practiced hard to play a killer gig. Five hours before the doors open, you arrive at the venue ablaze with the fire of a perfectly executed metal show.
Taking the time to help the manager move all the tables, you set the lights up meticulously so that no band or entertainment is left out, and arrange and perfect every detail to its finest …

How welcoming has Alberta’s metal community been to your act?
So far the reactions have been great. I’ve been performing for just over a year now, and the bands have been very supportive and stoked to have me involved. I’m really looking forward to my next shows coming up in the summer months. I’m sure there are a few negative reactions to my “heavy metal pole dancing,” just as there are in general to the sport of pole dancing. It does have its association with strip clubs (and rightfully so sometimes) …

When the idea for Pitch Black Magazine first started to take form, we had no idea what to expect. Would anybody find us in the vastness of cyberspace? Would anybody stick around long enough to read if they did? And would they come back?
A test site was launched in April 2009, allowing us to publish a fraction of our imaginings, sucker our friends and colleagues into checking it out and giving us some much needed feedback, and then further develop our goals before unleashing the magazine full force on May …