One of the highlights of our adventures in the Finnish Autumn/Winter season, was most definitely the 3rd edition of Black Box Mikkeli, with on the 2nd day a celebration of Finnish metal with Lastout, I Am Your God, Balance Breach, Insomnium, the foreign black metal storm that is Gaerea, and of course an amazing set by Bloodred Hourglass, bringing their latest album in full!
Besides starting the new year properly looking to the future, this month we’re also still looking back at all the awesomeness that 2023 brought us. One of those awsome things was the already 3rd edition of the by Bloodred Hourglass curated festival Black Box Mikkeli. They were able to bring a killer line-up again on the 2nd day of their event with besides a fantastic show by themselves, Insomnium, Gaerea, Balance Breach, I Am Your God and Lastout!
Brutal death metal and deathcore machine Desolate Tomb is back with its new album ‘Scorned By Misery’ via Rottweiler Records next month, and shared a lyric video for the track ‘Writhing in the Bowels of Hell’!
Danish K-Town hardcore outfit is back with new album ‘Dead End’ next month via Svart Records after a ten-year hiatus, and have just released their new single ‘Amen’!
Our Benelux and France head of accreditation and most active photographer in that region, Tom VM, made his own selection of favorite pictures he took in 2023, including some new stuff that wasn’t shared on our site before with Biohazard, Bleed From Within, Brutal Sphincter, Brutus, Electric Callboy, Michael Schenker Group, Sepultura, Arion, Blackrain, Overdrivers, Avatar, Winery Dogs, Charlotte Wessels, Devin Townsend, Dream Theater, Extreme, Ghost, Michael Angelo Batio, Arch Enemy, Doodseskader, Halestorm, I Prevail, Powerwolf and SKYND!
We set the hard task for our photographers to choose the best 30 pictures that they have shot in 2023 out of possibly thousands of captures, and here is the result of Tom Treuten’s selection with Butcher Babies, Fateful Finality, Fear Factory, Thundermother, Hypocrisy, Spiritbox, Behemoth, Dog Eat Dog, The Cult, Skillet, Agnostic Front, Scorpions, May The Silence Fail, Cannibal Corpse, Ataraxy, Dark Funeral, Goldmann, Solstafir, Ingested, Antiheld, Lansdowne, Völkerball (Rammstein Tribute), Fettes Brot, Danko Jones, Royal Republic, Team Tot, and Mindead!
German metal outfit Any Given Day share a western inspired music video by the Schillo Brothers, for the new single ‘Come Whatever May’. Another track from the upcoming album ‘Limitless’, set for release on January 26 via Arising Empire!
German modern metal outfit Venues released their brand-new single ‘Radiate Me’ via Arising Empire, a very personal track to vocalist Robin and a fuck you to cancer.
Welcoming events that try to bring something different and out of the norm to Finland, we went to the second night of the club festival Hellsinki Techfest with Sirkuit Preiker, Khroma, Balance Breach and Hacktivist back in September for some killer music and high energy!
Without question, the biggest deathcore band in the world, Lorna Shore made their stop at Jäähalli, the biggest venue in Helsinki, bringing their biggest stage production yet to a sold out crowd on their “The Pain Remains EU Tour”, and with them they had Rivers of Nihil, Ingested and Distant, resulting in massive pits from start to finish!
