Greetings fellow metalheads!

Another month is behind us and we've got another dose of all kinds of metal which make a really good soundtrack for this year.

As usual we start with a set especially for people with musical ADHD, who can't focus on one band for too long. Some of you probably remember making your own compilations on various recordable devices and now you don't have to do that - I'm doing this for you by assembling "The Best of November 2020". Things worth mentioning - after re-releases from Humanity's Last Breath we get a little peek into their next release, we've got a teaser from death metal legends Asphyx before their full-length is out, Therion gave us a single (I wonder how long is the next album going to be, if you want to start placing bets, e-mail me and I'll give you my bank account details), Moonspell is also planning to release something (no growling on this track) and this is probably all from the section "the taste of things to come". The link to all singles I've managed to find in November below:

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/singles

The list of EPs is short as usual, so let's get the full list: Malfested (death metal), Bloodline (melodic metalcore), Humanity is Cancer (death metal), My Dying Bride (legends of doom metal), Greenwitch (death metal), Corrupt Moral Altar (as I always say - younger, unruly brother of Napalm Death) and obviously it's time for Christmas-themed stuff, so German heavy/speed metal outfit released "Christmatized" with their own take on King Diamond's "No Presents for Christmas". You've been warned (well, maybe not about everything), so now you can click below:

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/EPs

Now, somehow the list of albums is really long this month. And again we've got a gallery of real titans: AC/DC, Phil Campbell and the Bastard Sons, Sodom, Fates Warning, Macabre, Killer Be Killed and Dark Tranquillity. But we've got really a good collection of all possible subgenres of metal, including a very mysterious Smoke and Mirrors' all-stars production "All in One". I was thinking of giving you another full list of all bands here, but it would be way too long, just go there and check for yourself. There's definitely something for every taste, over 40.5h of music is within your reach, the only thing you need to do is to click the link below:

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/albums

We've got some legends on our playlist with live releases, too - Iron Maiden, Voivod or Katatonia. In addition to that we can listen to full live shows from Batushka (Krysiuk's one), Jinjer, King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard, Periphery, Sulphur Aeon and Windhand. Singles from Domkraft, Elephant Tree, Horsehunter, Inhalement and Summoner. Enjoy the experience of music being played live and if you think it's not good enough you can always scroll back up and return to studio albums:

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/live

Some bands decided to take their older albums off their dusty shelves and give them some renovation in November: Belphegor, Diamond Head, and Krosis (they even added an instrumental version in case you're not happy with their new vocalist). Ingested are planning some re-issue soon and Rotting Christ gave us the opportunity to listen to their track from 2012 split with Negative Plane. All of these can be found here:

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/re-releases

Some artists think they can do better compilations than me. Well, you can judge if Doro, Lord Belial and Precaria are as good at it by clicking the link below:

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/compilations

Don't forget to have a look at older playlists, too as I'm trying to update them as soon as I find some new good headbanging stuff.

Mosh responsibly \m/

Yes, finally one of my all-time faves In The Woods made it to the Ruhr Area again after 9 years absence. So I was looking forward very much to this evening and, let me anticipate so far, didn't get disappointed.

But first of all Swiss Cân Bardd offered their music to the crowd and they were celebrated frenetically by some guys in the audience. Shame on me, I didn't know them before and I must say that their music is really good. I mean, if I hadn't looked up on metal-archives, I would have said that they come from Scotland or Ireland because of their Celtic touch so the air smelled like if someone had spilled some bottles of Scotch in the Matrix. I really liked this calm, folkloristic touch in their black metal that made it very smooth to listen to them.

Setlist: Une Couronne De Branches / Shadow Of The Wyvern / My Ancestors Celestial Horizon/ Devoured By The Oak Pt. I / Devoured By The Oak Pt.. II

After that great start into the evening German Imperium Dekadenz were next to play. I had seen them one year before and as usual they really kick ass. Their music was the heaviest that evening, playing some more traditional black metal stuff but it really worked well. Playing a lot of new tracks from their latest album Into Sorrow Evermore they also had a nice surprise on board. With "Schwarze Wälder" they went way back to their first album that is almost 20 years old. Great show without any flaws (at least I think so), although I have heard some rumors about some mistakes, haha!!

Setlist: Bis Ich Bin / Aura Silvae / Awakened Beyond Dreams / Aurora / Memories…A Raging River / Schwarze Wälder / Striga

…In The Woods just have released a very strong new album called Otra (which is a hot candidate for the album the year in my humble opinion). So the guys around Anders Kobro (who is the only remaining original member of the band) had to show a lot of that new stuff and for that the audience was pretty grateful. Especially the new songs are full of energy and amazing melodies and were received much better than songs from the previous albums. Of course the old classics from the masterpiece "HEart Of The Ages" were welcome that evening as well as the Otra tracks. And with vocalist Bernt Fjellstadt they have a great singer on board now who brings over the mood of the songs in a very natural and authentic way.

Setlist: Heart Of The Ages (Intro) / The Cowards Way / The Crimson Crown / A Misrepresentation Of I / Empty Streets / Things You Shouldn't Know / A Wonderful Crisis / …In The Woods

Scottish Saor were awaited very eagerly by the fans. Their latest release Amidst The Ruins is a masterpiece of folk black metal and so it's no big surprise that they played a lot of new songs. The show was really fantastic, what I liked very much is that they had support from Ella Zlotos performing the flute and Uilleann pipes live. The band seemed to enjoy the show very much, playing very well together and the sound was really great (like as the other bands had a good sound, too). Although the songs all last quite long, the time really flew and the show was over way too soon.

Setlist: Amidst the Ruins / Echoes / Glen of Sorrow / The Sylvan Embrace / Rebirth / Aura

To sum up, once again Redback Promotion made a fantastic line-up for a successful European tour and there is only to hope that we can see a continuation of all this soon. Besides, after the show, the bands had to leave at 2 AM to head to Paris – this is really rock n' roll and a fantastic tour life – uargh!!