Here at Revolver, we're always on the hunt for new songs to bang our heads to — indeed, it's a big part of our jobs. With that in mind, here are the tracks released this week in death metal, hardcore, deathcore and more that have been on heavy rotation at Revolver HQ. For your listening pleasure, we've also compiled the songs in an ever-evolving Spotify playlist.
Callous Daoboys - "What is Delicious? Who Swarms?"
By the time you learn how to pronounce their name, you'll have already been won over by the Callous Daoboys. "What is Delicious? Who Swarms?" is simply god-tier mathcore. It's impossible to write within this genre and not reference foundational acts like Dillinger Escape Plan and Botch, but the level of mischievous energy and quirky humor that the Daoboys bring to their songs — which are equal parts brutal, hooky and confoundingly experimental — far transcends their influences. It's not easy to sound this singular.
Anklebiter - "My Creator"
While their lineup features members of heavier hardcore acts like Broken Vow and Pummel, Anklebiter's brand new demo is no-nonsense hardcore punk that does everything right from top to bottom. An insanely charismatic vocalist with a unique range, straightforward yet catchy riffs that're played tightly but ooze personality, and songwriting that's simple and true to the time-tested form, but also bright, colorful and youthful as all hell. "My Creator" sounds like a phenomenal hardcore band in the making.
Amon Amarth - "Get in the Ring"
"If Berserker was our 'heavy-metal' album, then The Great Heathen Army is our 'death-metal' album," Amon Amarth guitarist Olavi Mikkonen has promised of the Swedish Viking horde's upcoming LP. Gnarly and nasty yet epic and triumphant, "Get in the Ring" lives up to its billing, delivering deathly licks and sepulcherous bellows right out of the Nile playbook.
Ithaca - "Camera Eats First"
Ithaca's songs have the emotional trajectory of a therapy session. "Camera Eats First," an intense meditation on eating disorders and body image, comes in roaring with oppressive heaviness and unvarnished anger, vocalist Djamila Boden Azzouz's roaring screams piercing through the torrent of incessant chuggery. It's fucking brutal, but then comes the catharsis, as the guitars switch to clean tones and Azzouz's voice croons with a newfound grace. Maybe her troubles aren't solved, but they at least sound temporarily soothed.
Babirusa - "Mandatory Malevolence"
Earlier this year, we named Australia's Babirusa one of 10 deathcore bands pushing the genre forward on the strength of their dual vocal attack and savory balance between tech-death virtuosity and neolithic mosh ignorance. They've since swapped one of their vocalists in a lineup change, but the band's core sound ain't shook on "Mandatory Malevolence." The two frontmen trade throat-searing screams over techy grooves and neck-snapping chugs, the latter adorned with a cool synth arpeggio that adds a flavorful twist. They're back.
The Machinist - "PIG"
Penned amid both the height of the COVID pandemic and the Black Lives Matters protests, the Machinist's latest seethes and spits against police violence and systemic racism, vocalist Amanda Gjelaj nearly roaring herself hoarse. Yet, for all its deadly serious subject matter, the song — the NYC extreme-metal band's first in three years — rides a grooving riff that's just fun as fuck. "Here we go! Here we go!" Indeed.
Terminal Nation - "Curators of Brutality"
"Curators of Brutality" is both a great song title and a great way for Terminal Nation to describe themselves. The Arkansas quintet's new split with the Japanese doom-core unit, Kruelty, is chock full of knuckle-dragging sonic behemoths, but Terminal Nation's first of three songs hits the hardest. Blurring the lines between death metal and hulking metallic hardcore, the track churns with a torrential force, somehow getting heavier and nastier every time the main riff comes back slower and slower.
Counterparts - "Unwavering Vow"
Counterparts' upcoming seventh album, A Eulogy for Those Still Here, revolves around frontman Brendan Murphy's fixation with "mourning the loss of someone that's still alive or saying goodbye to something that hasn't left yet." The sadness and massiveness of that concept pervades lead single "Unwavering Vow," which swerves and swells like the Canuck metalcore crew's best, most dynamic work. Murphy's lyrics, meanwhile, find a morbid sublimity, as in the recurring refrain: "In dreams I watched you die/Now I can't wait to close my eyes."
