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In recent years music has become a commodity, something to stick on shuffle or toss away depending on the weekly trend.

Fans and musicians can forget that music isn’t just a tune, but an artform; the pouring of love, hate, fear, anger and everything in between onto a tape. But some bands know the strongest connection comes deep from within. Recorded live and directly to tape in California, Deafheaven’s new opus is a tsunami of noise, swelling and crashing like waves sent from Poseidon amid a vast ocean.

At times the storm subsides and open waters come into full view before the ferocity of San Francisco’s poetic post-black metal assault submerges you in a world of extremes – from the retching vocals to unstoppable blastbeats to deafening shoegaze, this is pain in its purest form. Let it wash over you, drag you deep into the abyss these five harbingers of destruction have created, and drown you in a sea of aggression and truth.

Luke Morton joined Metal Hammer as Online Editor in 2014, having previously worked as News Editor at popular (but now sadly defunct) alternative lifestyle magazine, Front. As well as helming the Metal Hammer website for the four years that followed, Luke also helped relaunch the Metal Hammer podcast in early 2018, producing, scripting and presenting the relaunched show during its early days. He also wrote regular features for the magazine, including a 2018 cover feature for his very favourite band in the world, Slipknot, discussing their turbulent 2008 album, All Hope Is Gone.