That's Not Metal

At least one of the most anticipated heavy albums this decade hits our radars this month as Loathe, Muse, The Menzingers, The Xcerts, Fuming Mouth, No Cure, and Arise From Worms are reviewed, along with speculation about the seemingly imminent return of Gallows.

Loathe 37:32
Muse 1:09:13
The Menzingers 1:31:55
The Xcerts 1:49:20
Fuming Mouth 2:11:10
No Cure 2:24:04
Arise From Worms 2:33:29

It's the week where br00tal returned (and football season is over), as we make our way to Bring Me the Horizon's Count Your Blessings | Repented shows and into the re-recorded album for the biggest event in 2006 deathcore since... 2006.

Releases:
Final Resting Place - Third World Tribunal
Loathe - A Stranger to You
Motionless In White - Decades
Boundaries - Yearning: The unbeautiful after
Protest the Hero - Within
As It Is - As It Is
The Menzingers - Everything I Ever Saw
Quicksand - Bring on the Psychics
Fuming Mouth - The Ringing Bell
Fed Ash + HIRS - I AM BODY HORROR
Left to Die - Initium Mortis
Psycroptic - The Pulse of Annihilation
Imperium - Exodus Unknown
Emptiness - Nowhere Speaks
Haken - In a Fever Dream
Red Method - As In Life

Sound the charge, into glory ride, as Album Clubs look at the maddening effect Twenty One Pilots' ragga-pop Blurryface had on rock, the most metal band of all Manowar's debut Battle Hymns, Turnover's mastering of emo dreampop on Peripheral Vision, and one of the 21st century's greatest and wickedest rock bands The Devil's Blood with The Time of Time No Evermore.

This episode was originally published July 2025 on patreon.com/thatsnotmetal.

Both Metallica's No Repeats weekend and My Chemical Romance's 20th anniversary Black Parade musical theatre reimagining hit UK stadiums, plus Damon Albarn beefs with an unlikely underground metal target.

Releases:
Bring Me the Horizon - Count Your Blessings | Repented
The Plot In You - The Plot In You
The Xcerts - i think i want to go home now
Show Me the Body - Alone Together
DevilDriver - Strike and Kill
No Cure - It Is Going to Get Dark
Daydream Plus - Second Last Day of Summer
If These Trees Could Talk - The Hidden Hand
Arise From Worms - A Bleeding Tree Hanging Self Destruction
Mourir - Nous, le venin

Two hard and heavy events hit the UK heat this week, as Outbreak Festival brings Hatebreed, Converge, Alexisonfire, Basement, & loads more, and Acid Bath's mad reunion brings the swamp to town their first ever UK appearance.

Releases:
Muse - The WOW! Signal
The Pretty Reckless - Dear God
Butthole Surfers - After the Astronaut
The Dead Pioneers - Wagon Burner
Truck Violence - The Weathervane is My Body
Junius - Sotera
Phantom - Not Midnight Yet
Speedslut - Cimbrian Rites
Nunslaughter - Satanic Chaos Legions
Astriferous - Atavistic Unraveling
Nargaroth - Apocalyptic Steel
Forsmán - Brenndar Rústir & Fuðrandi Fjörur
Miracle - The Living Likeness of My Electric Daemon
Shane Embury - Bridge to Resolution
Mortiis - Ghosts of Europa
Fief - VII
Arcane Roots - A Wave, Across the Sea
Fiddlehead - Baby I’ll Change
Deep Purple - Splat!
Dominum - Night is Calling
Moonspell - Far From God
Witchsorrow - The Devil and All His Works
Soothsayer - The Unbinding
Mortem - Mørketid

From twenty year waits to four month breaks, we mop up some of the biggest heavy records of the last few weeks reviewing Converge's second album of 2026, Marmozets, Static Dress, Turnover, Guilt Trip, Warning, Stormkeep, & Funebrarum.

Converge 26:04
Marmozets 48:34
Static Dress 1:15:35
Turnover 1:30:00
Guilt Trip 1:41:39
Warning 1:53:38
Stormkeep 2:20:01
Funebrarum 2:38:26

Sam returns from Asia (and through a robo-mic, sorry about that) to talk about Japanese hardcore hijinks at Bloodaxe Festival, Voivod and Midnight speed through the UK together, and we unpack the news no one saw coming that Faith No More are returning in 2027.

Releases:
Warning - Rituals of Shame
There Were Wires - Vessel
Chainlacing - Messuage
Iron Kobra - Eternal Dagger
Saidan - Fangdriller: Scars Beneath Memory’s Wrist
Mork - Monolitt
Einherjer - Lifeblood
Liminal Sky - All Tomorrow’s Darkness

On top of a stream of new music from across the heavy spectrum, we weigh in on the debate following End It's targeting of the man in a banana costume at their show, why the frustration and resentment towards meme behaviour and influencer culture exists at subcultural events, and whether this particular incident went too far.

Releases:
Sublime - Until the Sun Explodes
Sleeping With Sirens - An Ending In Itself
Pussy Riot - CYKA
Yes - Aurora
Tarja - Frisson Noir
Swiss Army Wife - I Love You, But I Hate It Here
Khemmis - Khemmis
Joseph Tholl - It Might Be Art
Nuclear Tomb - Epoch Inhumane
Genghis Tron - Signal Fire
MONO - Snowdrop
BIG|BRAVE - In Grief or In Hope
Fleshcrawl - Epitome of Carnage
Fires in the Distance - Circadian Promise
Defiled - Altered State
Stormkeep - The Nocturnes of Iswylm
Véhémence - Assiéges pour l’éternité
Fyrnask - Íosir
Iron Reagan - Demonetization
Devourment - Pious Impiety
Still Remains - Spirit Breaker
Mystifier / Craven Idol - Demystification of the Fallen Souls

Fortress Festival returns bringing worldwide black metal exclusives to the British seaside, with Gallowbraid, Old Man's Child, Dødheimsgard, Misþyrming, A Forest of Stars & more darkening the skies over the 2026 bill.

Releases:
Devin Townsend - The Moth
Turnover - Down on Earth
Static Dress - Injury Episode
Sparta - Cut a Silhouette
‘68 - They Are Survived
Healing Wound - Bodies of Heavenly Violence
Deafkids - Cicatrizes do Futuro
All Them Witches - House of Mirrors
Elder - Through Zero
Monolord - Neverending
Godthrymm - Projections
Funebrarum - Beckoning the Void of Eternal Silence
Tyrann - Tyrann Forever
Trelldom - …by the Word…
Hecate Enthroned - The Corpse of a Titan, a Lament Long Buried
Converge - Hum of Hurt
Evanescence - Sanctuary
Death Cab for Cutie - I Built You a Tower
100 Demons - Embrace the Black Light
Guilt Trip - Armour of Angels
August Burns Red - Season of Surrender
Blood Incantation - All Gates Open (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack)
A.A. Williams - Solstice
Slift - Fantasia
Evergrey - Architects of a New Weave
Dwarves - Jenkem
Voivod - Symphonique
Gurt - Survival of the Shittest

It's all about vaporwave prog, French oi, and choo choo train black metal as a whip round the underground picks up Basement, Frozen Soul, Haggard Cat, Fire-Toolz, Prisonnier du temps, A Forest of Stars, Panopticon, and Scimitar for the month's most blistering records.

Basement 15:40
Frozen Soul 33:44
Haggard Cat 51:10
Fire-Toolz 1:05:09
Prisonnier du temps 1:15:41
A Forest of Stars 1:25:27
Panopticon 1:47:30
Scimitar 2:02:45