![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/Kalaveraztekah-Nikan-Axkan-01-500x500.jpg\")
<\/p>\nThere are months when the Record(s) o\u2019 the Month feels like a sacred duty. It is the noble, worthwhile culmination of rigorous listening and passionate discourse. And then there\u2019s May. May, a month in which Dr. A.N. Grier tried to vote for a band called\u2026 SEXCAVE or some shit four or five different times using different pseudonyms (but the same IP address), and where Dolphin Whisperer almost made me rage quit by making a single comment about \u201csky-tearing tonalities,\u201d which, like\u2026 what kind of pretentious fucking bullshit is that? Do you people even listen to music, or do you just sit around all day making up stupid poetic ways of saying absolutely nothing? But if we\u2019re fair, he wasn\u2019t entirely wrong. Sometimes a record arrives that doesn\u2019t just demand attention, it seizes it like an Aztec death deity grabbing the sun. So for the first time in a while, the best album in May came from an unsigned band. And not just any unsigned band. It came from a band proficient in bull riding!<\/p>\n
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The beauty of the Unsigned Band Rode\u00f6 lies in its chaos. No expectations. No promo sheets. No preconceived narratives. Just music dropped into our laps like cursed artifacts. On Nikan Axkan, which was self-released on May 2nd, 2025 [Bandcamp<\/a>], Kalaveraztekah<\/a> weaponizes its vision of death metal through the lens of pre-Hispanic culture and indigenous cosmology. There\u2019s no sense that these Hidroc\u00e1lidos are some kind of novelty act. They aren\u2019t a Mexican Eluveitie, just playing Dark Tranquillity riffs while putting a Ritual Death Flute over it for 40 seconds in every song. Rather, Nikan Axkan is a muscular, seething, and deeply rooted record that radiates conviction from every grinding riff. The percussion rumbles like a procession of drums echoing through stone temples, fusing to a brutal core of death metal that just fucks. There\u2019s a Blood Incantation-like spaciness that offers a counterbalance to all this brutality and adds unexpected depth. After spending the better part of a week in what my physician has called a \u201critualistic fugue state,\u201d I managed to pull myself out of the netherworld to write that when Kalaveraztekah\u2019s two pillars\u2014the atmospheric otherworldly and the brutal death metal\u2014meet, \u201cthey crash into each other like storm fronts, creating something beautiful and terrible to behold. Nikan Axkan is simultaneously brutal and thoughtful, grindy and melodic, atmospheric and immediate,\u201d and it\u2019s the Record o\u2019 the Month.<\/p>\n Runner(s) Up:<\/p>\n \n\tGive in to Your Anger:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"There are months when the Record(s) o\u2019 the Month feels like a sacred duty. It is the noble,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":55813,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[30456,2325,30457,30458,30459,30460,30461,96,22839,30462,30463,30464,128,30465,30466,30467,30468,30469,30470,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-55812","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-music","tag-and-oceans","tag-2325","tag-amgs-unsigned-band-rodeo","tag-amorphis","tag-dark-tranquillity","tag-eluveitie","tag-emperor","tag-entertainment","tag-independent","tag-jade","tag-kalaveraztekah","tag-may25","tag-music","tag-mysteries-of-a-flowery-dream","tag-nikan-axkan","tag-records-o-the-month","tag-records-of-the-month","tag-self-releases","tag-the-regeneration-itinerary","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55812","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=55812"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55812\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/55813"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=55812"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=55812"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=55812"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/and-Oceans-The-Regeneration-Itinerary-01-350x350.jpg\")
\u2026and Oceans \/\/ The Regeneration Itinerary<\/a> [May 23rd, 2025 | Season of Mist | Bandcamp<\/a>] \u2014 \u2026and Oceans is having an Amorphisesque second act and I am here for it. They\u2019ve always walked the line between symphonic grandiosity and black metal chaos, and with The Regeneration Itinerary, they\u2019ve engineered their third very good platter in 5 years. The record combines sharp, Emperor-style riffing with theatrical synths, industrial flourishes, and ruthlessly precise pacing. \u201cDemonstrating a degree of evolution in their craft\u201d and with \u201cexceptional [performances] across the board,\u201d \u2026and Oceans have once again hit that sweet balance\u2014and ever-more unique sound in this current black metal soundscape\u2014that makes their revitalization so welcome. But it\u2019s not just that it\u2019s a good continuation, I feel like they are continuing to refine and revitalize the launch with each new album they release. It\u2019s always fun to watch bands defy Angry Metal Guy\u2019s Law of Diminishing Recordings\u2122, and while The Regeneration Itinerary isn\u2019t their best record yet, 30 years after their debut, \u2026and Oceans is still releasing vital music that\u2019s impossible to overlook.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/Jade-Mysteries-of-a-Flowery-Dream-1-350x350.jpg\")
Jade \/\/ Mysteries of a Flowery Dream<\/a> [May 9th, 2025 | Pulverised Records | Bandcamp<\/a>] \u2014 Mysteries of a Flowery Dream is an atmospheric death metal record that unfolds like a guided hallucination. It\u2019s melodic. It\u2019s moody. It\u2019s weirdly elegant. And it doesn\u2019t care about my riffs-per-minute quota. It takes things slow and keeps them dreamy. Jade trades bludgeoning immediacy for textured dream-logic, and while it takes a few listens to understand what\u2019s happening, once it clicks, it\u2019s hard for listeners to shake. And yet, it balances out the problem that atmospheric records rarely feel heavy, because they\u2019re too busy padding the sharp edges with \u201catmosphere.\u201d But Mysteries of a Flowery Dream accomplishes its heaviness by feeling oppressive, dense, claustrophobic, and crushing\u2014leaving the listener feeling like they\u2019re in an experimental submarine on their way to see the Titanic. And while it\u2019s not the easiest record to penetrate, Owlswald wants you to know that \u201cthose who actively immerse themselves in Jade\u2019s expansive world will be handsomely rewarded. The excellent songwriting, replete with its cohesion, balance, and dynamism, is impressive, steadily shifting my initial apathetic impressions to genuine appreciation. So don your finest headphones, sit back, and let Jade immerse you in their dreamlike world.\u201d<\/p>\n