The best albums of 2021 include Marina Diamandis, The Marias, The Fratellis, Maximo Park, Morgan Wallen, Wardruna, Prince, At the Gates, Hayley Williams, Andrew W.K., Miranda Lambert, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah and Liz Phair. RIFF’s writers reviewed hundreds of albums in 2021, and although the year isn’t over,…

Back in 1996, on the heels of their career-defining Slaughter Of The Soul, Gothenburg, Sweden’s At The Gates suddenly called it quits. Band members persisted through the 2000s in heavy outfits like Skitsystem, Cradle Of Filth and The Haunted. Then the entire classic lineup of At The Gates reformed…

Greta Thunberg is at the forefront of a new wave of eco-metal. As former President Barack Obama pointed out, Finland holds the most metal bands per capita—but neighboring Sweden also sports a robust underground tradition. From death metal pioneers Entombed and melo-death titans At The Gates and black metal blasphemers…

Even without considering the band’s landmark collaboration with Merzbow, Full of Hell embodies boundary-pushing insanity like few others. As the quartet has built on its combination of power electronics, grindcore and black metal, the caustic chaos has yielded mixed results with regard to cohesion. Having recently signed with Relapse…

Nergal of Behemoth performs at the Regency Ballroom in San Francisco on Nov. 23, 2018. Photos: Shawn Robbins. SAN FRANCISCO — Polish black and death metal band Behemoth descended upon the Regency Ballroom on Black Friday. The spectacle was a grandiose display of metal theater that was a direct…