Cool Bands You've Never Heard Of

 Editor's Note 8/10/19: Originally written on Metal Amino.

Hey everyone! I saw this weekend's challenge and read some great blogs over the last couple days, so I figured I would talk about some of my personal #UnderratedGems. In this post, I'm going to talk about bands and not specific releases. My taste is also kind of all over the place so I'll try to put a good variety of bands in here so there can hopefully be something for everyone.

Sectioned

Mathcore

If you're into mathcore at all, you probably have heard of Sectioned's sister band Frontierer, who released one of the best albums of 2018 in my opinion. But for some reason, Sectioned don't get nearly as much attention as Frontierer despite sharing most of the band's members and being nearly as good. Definitely check these guys out of you like chaotic, pissed off mathcore like Frontierer, TTDTDE, or The Chariot. 

Asphalt Graves 

Deathgrind

Asphalt Graves are a deathgrind supergroup consisting of members and ex-members of Misery Index, Dying Fetus, GWAR, and The Black Dahlia Murder. They released their debut album a couple years back but it largely flew under the radar, so I want to talk about them here. The band all around sounds super tight (especially Shannon Lucas's drumming) and Jason Netherton sounds as good as he did on Misery Index's stuff. Highly recommended if you like MI, Napalm Death, or Nasum.

Tongue

 Post-Black Metal

One of my favorite random Bandcamp discoveries. Tongue are a band from Germany that play melodic, yet pulverizing black metal broken up with post-rock and doom influenced passages. The band just announced last week that they're recording their second album right now, so looks like more is to come from these boys.

Painfield

Nu Metal/Hardcore

Here's something a little different for you. I don't think I've ever heard a band that sounds like Painfield. They were a Swedish group that played a very weird hybrid of nu metal and heavy hardcore that I really dig, though I'm not quite sure how to describe it. The best I can come up with is: Imagine early System of a Down on crack. 

Disfear

D-Beat/Crust Punk/Melodic Death Metal

Disfear started off playing d-beat in the vein of Discharge, hence their dis-core name. But when their original vocalist left in 1998, Tomas Lindberg of At the Gates joined and their sound drastically changed. Instead of pure Discharge worship, the band started playing d-beat/crust mixed with melodic death metal and it works really well. They were also my gateway into d-beat, so I have them to thank for my love of Discharge.

Set Before Us

Melodic Metalcore

I gotta be honest with you guys, I fucking hate modern melodic metalcore. There are some exceptions (Bury Tomorrow, Any Given Day, Feed Her To The Sharks, and a few others) but I really can't stand most of it. More than anything it's the insane number of bands with atrocious cleans that turns me off. Anyway, Set Before Us are another modern melodic metalcore band that I don't hate. What I really like about these guys is the way they incorporate melody in the majority of their music effectively instead of doing the scream/sing/scream/sing thing so many bands do. You know, the thing where they have heavy tough guy verses and then melodic choruses with clean singing and whatnot, but then every single song on the album follows that exact pattern. SBU are still relatively new, but they have impressed me so far with what they've put out and I'm excited to hear more. As a sidenote, I also love how they film their music videos while wearing the most casual clothes you can imagine. It really shows how these guys don't give a shit about looks and just want to play.

The Sound That Ends Creation

   

Mathcore/Experimental Grindcore

  

I literally discovered this band a few days ago and I love it so much. TSTEC is a one man mathgrind outfit from Texas and another one of my random Bandcamp finds. The project's first two albums are just kick-ass mathgrind but on their latest offering the band just went bonkers, taking influence from a shitload of different genres like jazz, screamo, and even lounge. I can't recommend enough if you like any kind of weird grind band.

Lesser Key

Progressive Rock/Alt.Metal

Rounding out my list, may I present Lesser Key. These guys are best known for having Paul D'Amour, the original bassist of Tool, in their band but I assure you their music stands on its own merit. The Tool influence is obvious, but there's more to it than that. I think the band is best described as a mix of Tool, Deftones, and A Perfect Circle. I love the vocalist the most. He reminds me of a deeper Chino Moreno and his voice fits the moody atmosphere really well. There's also some really cool guitar work in their stuff that can give me chills. Unfortunately, they only released one EP like five years ago and there's been no sign of them the last couple years, which really bums me out since I love that EP so much.

That's all for me and my personal Gems. Props to the higher ups for this cool challenge. I hope you guys found a couple bands you like in this very spastic blog. Thanks for reading!