I am so happy when I discover new bands that I like and learn to love their music, the same as I was back in the days of tape trading and waiting for weeks for your new music to arrive via snail mail and sometimes discovering your new favorites through such tapes. Now, it is easier, especially when you run a webzine for seventh year now, but the principle is still the same, scratch beneath the surface of underground and find what you like yourself and learn everyday new stuff in our beloved extreme music scene. So, I am so happy that I discovered LA´s Dawn of Ashes. But I am at the same time a little bit ashamed. Why? Because I found out late about them and they have been in the scene for more than twenty years now, delivering their punches and this is their ninth full length opus. This one contains 12 songs, some being intro and intermezzos between the maelstorm of Hellish sadomasochistic rites, darkened atmosphere, Satanic rituals, sex, death, life all of three being interlinked in one undividable whole of us as puny humans on this planet.

Dawn of Ashes play a mixture of industrial ebm metal, with symphonic black metal parts here and there, some gothic metal songwriting thrown in and whole lot of atmospheric darkness. I always respect and love the use of samples and Dawn of Ashes use samples so clever and so fantastic that it made goosebumps on my skin while listening to this opus. Electronic is great in adaptation with guitar parts, thundering drums, keyboards and superb vocals. The latter are special and it is so amazing to hear singer Kristof Bathory changing his voice from black metal croaking to screaming, back to gothic spoken word, some singing and altering back to industrial almost robotic voice. If I must compare this band to some it would be Kovenant from Norway in Animatronic period, but Dawn of Ashes sound richer and superb, also it would be a more upgraded black metal version of Combichrist. My personal favorites are Bane of Your Existence, Heart Beats Cold and Scars of the Broken. My recommendation for you, check this one out!

9/10