Amenra

Neurosis is an American post-metal band formed in December 1985 in Oakland, California, founding a genre by fusing hardcore punk roots with heavy, atmospheric, slow-building song structures on landmark albums such as Through Silver in Blood (1996) and Times of Grace (1999). The band runs its own label, Neurot Recordings, and maintains the experimental ambient alter ego Tribes of Neurot, which comprises the same members. Co-founder Scott Kelly was expelled in 2019 after the band learned of his domestic abuse, which he publicly admitted in August 2022 before retiring from music. In 2024 Aaron Turner (Isis, Sumac) joined on guitar and vocals, and the band surprise-released the album An Undying Love for a Burning World in March 2026.

Formed in Montesano, Washington in 1983 around the constant core of Buzz Osborne and Dale Crover, Melvins fused punk with a heavy Black Sabbath influence and in doing so godfathered sludge metal, leaving fingerprints on everything from grunge to doom and stoner rock. Relentlessly prolific shapeshifters, they have cycled through bassists and configurations — including the Kevin Rutmanis era and the double-bass-driven Melvins Lite with Trevor Dunn — while releasing a torrent of albums on Mike Patton's Ipecac Recordings since 1999. Their gravitational pull is such that Japan's Boris took their name from the title of a Melvins song, and collaborators have ranged from Fantômas and Jello Biafra to Lustmord and Napalm Death.

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Made Out of Babies were a Brooklyn noise-rock/sludge quartet active 2004-2012, fronted by the extraordinary Julie Christmas, whose lurching between whisper and shriek gave the band its volatile character. They released Trophy (2005) and The Ruiner (2008), with the Steve Albini-recorded Coward (2006) widely rated their high point; early records came out on Neurosis's Neurot Recordings. The lineup drew from the wider New York heavy underground, with guitarist Brendan Tobin (Red Sparowes), bassist Eric Cooper, and Christmas also fronting Battle of Mice.

The Canyon Observer are a Slovenian quintet formed in 2011 whose experimental post-metal fuses black metal, noise, doom and sludge with delicate atmospheric passages into something 'chaotic, deranged and powerfully disorienting'. Across the FVCK (2015) and NØLL (2018) LPs on Kapa Records they alternate crushing heaviness with hallucinatory atmosphere, staged live amid fog and strobes. Their experimentalism lives largely in noise and genre-collapse rather than any single exotic ingredient.

Cult of Luna is a Swedish post-metal band formed in 1998 in Umeå, emerging from members of the local hardcore group Eclipse. Widely regarded as a leading force in post-metal alongside Neurosis and Isis, their songs are long, slow and crushing, layering heavy distorted passages with orchestral interludes and post-rock-esque forays. Their discography includes Salvation (2004), Somewhere Along the Highway (2006), and the Metropolis-inspired Vertikal (2013). In 2016 they released the space-themed collaborative album Mariner, recorded with American vocalist Julie Christmas.

Circle is a Finnish experimental rock institution formed in Pori in 1991, built around bassist/vocalist Jussi Lehtisalo, the band's only constant presence and de facto leader. Their restless, ever-mutating music fuses motorik krautrock repetition with heavy metal riffing, ambient, prog and psychedelia, a sound they half-jokingly branded the New Wave of Finnish Heavy Metal. Absurdly prolific across dozens of albums, they release most of their work through Lehtisalo's own Ektro Records, and their 2017 album Terminal appeared internationally on Southern Lord.

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Killing Joke are an English post-punk band formed in Notting Hill, London in 1979, whose 'tension music' fused aggressive rhythms with gothic, industrial and metallic weight across landmark records like Night Time (1985) and Pandemonium (1994). Frontman Jaz Coleman's apocalyptic delivery and the band's dense, dubwise heaviness made them a widely cited influence on industrial and alternative acts including Metallica, Nirvana and Nine Inch Nails. Longtime bassist Paul Raven, who joined in 1982, was later briefly recruited for a planned Godflesh US tour that collapsed before it began.

Mutyumu (夢中夢, 'a dream within a dream') was a six-piece Japanese band active 2002–2010, blending post-rock, classical minimalism and heavy metal around operatic vocals, strings and piano alongside blast beats and screamed vocals. Contrary to secondhand descriptions of it as a solo project, sources consistently describe a full band led by vocalist Hatis Noit. Their two albums, 夢中夢 (2006) and イリヤ -Il y a- (2008, on Gyuune Cassette), fold folk melody and droning classical passages into a metal/post-rock framework, with the latter featuring guest contributions from World's End Girlfriend, before the band split in 2010.

Squalus are an avant-garde sludge/doom quartet from Pacifica, California, formed in 2015 by Aaron Gregory, Zack Farwell, Andy Southard and Bryan Beeson -- all former members of Giant Squid -- after that band went on hiatus. Rejecting guitar entirely in favor of two basses, keyboards, and samples, the band built its debut album The Great Fish... (2017, Translation Loss Records) as a song-cycle retelling of Jaws with lyrics spliced from Peter Benchley's novel. They followed with the split LP Mass and Power alongside Shadow Limb (2018, Translation Loss Records).

Helium Horse Fly are a Liège, Belgium avant-garde/experimental-rock act formed in 2009, fronted by vocalist/keyboardist Marie Billy alongside guitarist Stéphane Dupont, bassist Dimitri Iannello and drummer Gil Chevigné (who replaced founding drummer Bastien Dupont in 2014). Critics have described their sound as 'progressive baroque hardcore' and compared its dark, brooding intensity to Kayo Dot, spanning EPs A Dispute to Redefine Clearly Frontiers Between Devils and Angels (2010) and Fishing for Ghosts (2011) through the albums Helium Horse Fly (2013) and Hollowed (2019). Reviewers place them across post-metal, art rock and experimental-rock tags.

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