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Slave to the Scalpel (2021)
Featured Death Metal Album
Hands of Eternity (2024)
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Featured Groove Metal Album
State Of Unrest (2023)
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Browse World Metal Bands
13 bands found
Black Sheep Wall is a Moorpark, California sludge and doom metal band formed in 2006, named after a StarCraft cheat code. Their minimalist, downtuned approach draws comparisons to Eyehategod and early ISIS, delivering some of the heaviest and most oppressive post-metal to emerge from the American West Coast. Notable releases include No Matter Where It Ends (Season of Mist, 2012) and I'm Going to Kill Myself (2015), albums that pair crushing riff architecture with extended dynamic tension.
Boris is a Tokyo trio—Wata, Atsuo, and Takeshi—formed in 1992 whose discography of over 25 studio albums crosses sludge metal, drone, noise rock, shoegaze, ambient, and J-pop without settling in any single genre. Their debut Absolutego (1996) featured a single 65-minute drone-doom track, while Flood (2000) and the internationally reissued Pink (Southern Lord, 2005) introduced the band to Western audiences and widespread critical acclaim. Few acts in heavy music have maintained Boris's level of formal ambition and prolific output across more than three decades.
Brain Tentacles is a Chicago-based experimental metal and jazz trio comprising Bruce Lamont (Bloodiest), Dave Witte (Publicist UK, Circle of Animals), and Aaron Dallison (Keelhaul), formed in 2013. Their self-titled debut album (2016) blends structured and improvised passages across noise rock, sludge, doom, jazz, and ambient territory in a manner critics compared to John Zorn's Naked City and Mike Patton's most experimental work. The group operates as a self-described 'sound adventure' project, prioritizing textural exploration over genre categorization.
Départe are an Australian black and post-metal band formed in Hobart, Tasmania around 2011 under the name ØRANNIS. They shed their black metal orthodoxy as the lineup expanded, incorporating death metal, post-metal, drone, and doom into a sound described as emotive and hypnotic. Their debut demo MMXIV (2014) and full-length Failure, Subside (2016) on Season of Mist brought them to wider attention, and they have shared stages with Gorguts, Ulcerate, and Portal.
Ex Eye is a New York-based experimental metal quartet formed in 2016 by saxophonist Colin Stetson, drummer Greg Fox (Liturgy), synthesist Shahzad Ismaily, and guitarist Toby Summerfield, signed to Relapse Records on the strength of their festival performances before releasing their first studio material. Their self-titled debut album (2017), recorded live at Ismaily's Figure 8 Studios in Brooklyn, fuses noise, progressive metal, and avant-garde jazz into four sprawling, high-density compositions. The project represents a meeting point between Stetson's extended saxophone techniques and the percussive intensity of contemporary extreme metal.
Savannah, Georgia's Kylesa carved a singular niche in heavy music by layering sludge metal's crushing weight with psychedelic textures and dual-drummer propulsion. Albums like 'Spiral Shadow' and 'Static Tensions' showcased their ability to balance punishing riffs with hypnotic, swirling atmospheres. Though largely inactive since 2017, Kylesa's catalog remains a benchmark for adventurous, genre-blurring heavy music.
Obsidian Kingdom is a progressive and post-metal band from Barcelona, Spain, formed in 2005, whose sound has been characterized as drawing equally from progressive rock, post-metal, black metal, alternative, and electronic music. Their 2012 debut Mantiis drew attention for its eclectic approach, while A Year with No Summer (2016) on Season of Mist refined the band's identity into something genuinely difficult to categorize. MEAT MACHINE (2020) pushed the band further into industrial and alternative territory, cementing their reputation as one of Spain's most adventurous extreme music outfits.
OCEANS is an Austrian modern metal and post-metal band based in Vienna, formed around 2017 and signed to Nuclear Blast Records. Their debut The Sun and the Cold (2020) established a sound blending metalcore heaviness with atmospheric post-metal textures, followed by Hell Is Where the Heart Is (2022) and Happy (2024), each expanding the band's emotional and sonic range. OCEANS draw from both European metalcore and the introspective tendencies of post-metal to craft a distinctive hybrid sound.
Ragana are the Olympia duo of Maria and Noel, formed in 2011 and known for expansive heavy music that fuses black metal, doom, sludge, and post-metal atmosphere. Their songs often move between quiet, mournful passages and enormous distorted crescendos, using repetition, stark vocal shifts, and dense guitar textures to create a ritual-like emotional weight. Early releases such as All's Lost, Unbecoming, and Wash Away established the band's austere approach, while later work including You Take Nothing, the Thou split Let Our Names Be Forgotten, and Desolation's Flower broadened their reach without sanding down their intensity. Ragana's music is heavy but not only through speed or aggression; it relies on patience, contrast, and an immersive sense of grief, fury, and endurance. The duo's live and recorded identity is tightly focused, with minimal personnel and a sound that feels both intimate and overwhelming, often stretching metal's boundaries toward dark folk-like atmosphere and cathartic doom.
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World Metal Index is an index of World heavy metal bands — death metal, black metal, thrash metal, doom metal, metalcore, hardcore punk, and all heavy music. Browse bands by genre, find metal concerts near you, and discover the World metal scene.