Editor's note: My pal and dedicated concert traveler Josh Burke was in Austin, Texas recently and caught a small chunk of the 2026 edition of Ripplefest while he was there. Below is his recap of the Magnetic Eye label showcase. You can read some of his previous Ripplefest coverage here. 

The Flenser today released a new live album by experimental industrial noise artist Uboa, and I'm singling it out today because this release touches on the intersection of heavy music and wellness. Uboa mastermind Xandra Metcalfe has been diagnosed with some chronic conditions, and sales of this recording will help fund her medical care. Bandcamp link and full background on the recording after the break. 

Pranjal Tiwari is a California-based musician who has played in multiple metal, hardcore and punk bands. Like many of us, he needed to find new outlets to express himself during the COVID-19 pandemic, and during that time his solo synthwave project S.C.R.A.M. (Safety Control Rod Axe Man) was born. Tomorrow, on the Fall Equinox, his new album, Coma Filament will be released. While not traditionally heavy, the album is seeped in dread, pulling from inspirations like John Carpenter's scores and the music of dungeon synth legend Mortiis. 

Over email, Tiwari shared his thoughts about working as a solo musician, his musical and cinematic influences, sobriety, and much more. You can read the full conversation below, which has been lightly edited for grammar. 

Back in the late 90s, I was working in a record store in the suburbs of Minneapolis. This may sound like a foreign concept in 2026, but back then we had a good number of regulars would would come into the store just to hang out. Most of them were teenagers from the area who liked metal, hard rock, goth, or alternative music. They'd spend an hour or two just chilling in the store, listening to whatever we were playing and chatting with each other and the employees about music. Of course, when they had money they would buy CDs. Sometimes, they would be in the mood to buy something but didn't know what, and would ask for recommendations. When this would happen, I would go out to the floor, grab a copy of Songs of Love and Hate by Godflesh, unwrap it, and pop it into the CD player. 

Strictly speaking, I was not allowed to do this. If the kid looking for a recommendation wasn't into it, the store would be stuck with a copy of an album we could no longer sell as new. But that never happened. I pulled this trick with that Godflesh album at least two or three times, and every time the person decided they wanted the album about 30 seconds into the first track, "Wake." The grinding industrial noise, thrumming base, and circular, crushing guitar that kick off that album are one hell of an intro to a band. It still hits just as hard today. 

A little more than 30 years later, Godflesh is back with their penultimate album, Decay. Recorded during the same sessions that produced their previous album, Purge, Decay and the upcoming, as-yet-announced/untitled final Godflesh album will be the last for the band because mastermind Justin Broadrick has been medically ordered to retire the band. Does Decay hold the same power as the band's earlier work to convert listeners to instant fans? Read on. 

Last night, Chat Pile kicked off their tour in support of their new album, Who Loves the Sun, at First Avenue in Minneapolis. As you can see in my unimpressive photos, it was a barebones performance, with the band performing in front of a black curtain - no graphic backdrop, no fancy lighting, no other gimmicks. That says a lot about where Chat Pile are as a live band at this point - the music is all they need to keep an audience enraptured, and they know it. 

A look behind the curtain at New Music Friday: When I started this column, I would just start with a new release list on Friday mornings. Then, I started working ahead as much as possible, finding singles that were released mid-week to start working in. When I started getting early album reviews, that changed the game for me and allowed me to get my thoughts on an album down sometimes a couple weeks in advance. But I would still always pick a few new releases on Friday morning to add into the mix. Except this week - this week's column was written entirely in advance, because I've got obligations all day Friday that will preclude me from checking out anything on Friday. On the plus side, that means this column was ready to go first thing in the morning! On the double plus side, there were a lot of really great things that came my way in advance, and I'm happy to share them all with you now. 

[Editor's note: I can't leave well enough alone. I found some time Friday morning and added a couple additional album recommendations.]

Tomorrow, the second album from German black/death metal band Ch'ahom releases. 

Antrophic Rites of Sublimation is a fascinating album, combining black metal with sounds and themes of pre-Hispanic South America. There's a deep fiction to the album as well that explores otherworldly forces, cults, and self-destructive urges. I wanted to learn more about this album, so I reached out to the band via email. Members "A.G.A." and "S.P.S." responded, and the entire conversation is below, lightly edited for grammar. The complete album stream is also embedded below. 

It's been said that bad times lead to good art. Indeed, it has been fascinating and reassuring to hear how different artists have responded to the soul-crushing years we are living in. We are awash in music that is reflecting in our current darkness, and Emma Ruth Rundle does not shy away from the horrors of the world on her new album, These Killing Times. But, fortunately, nor does she shy away from hope. 

On a whim, I recently participated in an online focus group about modern country music. While listening to these song snippets, I was astonished to hear that all the songs sounded the same. Not similar, the same. The same glossy production, the same vocal styles, the same beats per minute and instrumentation. They all sounded terrible to my ears, but that’s beside the point – what I took away from the experience was the absolute lack of diversity in sound. 

Heavy music, on the other hand, is all about diversity of sound. This is my third review this week, and all three albums sound entirely different. A big part of what enables this diversity, I would argue, is heavy music’s embrace of “ugly” sounds. Other genres shy away from tension and discordance, forces that heavy musicians can wield to incredible results. Take, for example, the band Amplifiers and their new album, The Inevitability of Disillusionment. 

We live in a world where there is much to be angry about. I'm not even going to attempt to list out the major issues affecting our society today - I would certainly miss hundreds, if not thousands, of major topics that are deserving of white hot, boiling rage. Because of the nature of the music I cover, I find myself listening to a lot of albums that tackle the grand scale of injustice in the world. On the other hand, the new album by New York's Wellness presents a more focused distillation of rage. Whereas something like Chat Pile's new album takes on the collective failures of 21st Century life, Wellness are more laser-focused on more specific, yet no less substantive, societal issues, which they take on in a concentrated 16-minute explosion of righteous indignation.