Retarded Noise Squad

Gojira are a French metal band from Ondres, formed in 1996 as Godzilla and renamed Gojira in 2001. They fuse technical death metal, groove, progressive and post-metal into a percussive, pinch-harmonic-driven style, wrapped in lyrics about spirituality, philosophy and the environment. Their lineup of the Duplantier brothers with Christian Andreu and Jean-Michel Labadie has been unchanged since the rename; they became the first French band to top the Billboard Hard Rock Albums chart and, in 2024, the first metal band to perform at an Olympic opening ceremony.

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Solo dissonant death metal/grindcore project from Todesfelde, Germany, formed in 2022 (https://www.metal-archives.com/bands/Ryona_Hime/3540547934) and run by producer 'The Popu,' who writes, records, mixes, masters and illustrates under genre tags including 'animegrind,' 'weebgrind,' 'dungeongrind' and 'trancegrind' (https://ryonahime.bandcamp.com/album/ritv-s-hrapta). Releases such as 'Ritvōs Hrapta' (2023) pull in guest musicians - clarinetist Yumi Sakata, guitarist/vocalist Alice Simard of Filesharemaiden, and vocalists Billy Qvarnström, Jesse Agiomamitis and Starlix - wrapping technically demanding, fretless-bass-driven dissonance in an anime-inflected aesthetic.

The Deserts of Traun (stylized TRAUN) is an experimental, multi-genre metal project from Santa Barbara, California, founded and largely composed by drummer Dave Murray, formerly of Estradasphere. Its self-titled 2003 debut features Murray on numerous instruments alongside contributions from Estradasphere guitarist Jason Schimmel and others, blending metal, jazz, progressive rock and soundtrack styles. Murray later carried the project's polyrhythmic-metal sensibility into High Castle Teleorkestra.

Killer Be Killed is an American heavy metal supergroup formed in 2011 by Greg Puciato (The Dillinger Escape Plan) and Max Cavalera (Soulfly), later joined by bassist/vocalist Troy Sanders (Mastodon) and drummer Ben Koller (Converge). Conceived by Puciato and Cavalera in the vein of Cavalera's 1990s project Nailbomb, the band signed to Nuclear Blast and released its self-titled debut in 2014, with drums by Dave Elitch. Elitch left in 2015 and was replaced by Koller, who plays on the second album, Reluctant Hero (2020).

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Strapping Young Lad is Devin Townsend's industrial/thrash/death metal band, active 1994–2007 with a stable lineup of Townsend, guitarist Jed Simon, bassist Byron Stroud and drummer Gene Hoglan (also of Dark Angel, Death, Testament). Built on polyrhythmic riffing and blast beats, the band is best known for a hyper-dense, multitracked "wall of sound" production style critics compared to Phil Spector and Frank Zappa, drawing on the harsh industrial/noise lineage of Foetus and White Noise. City (1997) was the critical breakthrough; The New Black (2006) leaned back into the band's tongue-in-cheek black humor before their 2007 disbandment.

Zelophilia is the solo studio project of Lou Kelly, based in Ukiah, California, releasing one full-length, Lust, Loathing & Love, in December 2011. Blends death metal, hardcore, and mathcore with baroque classical touches and absurdist, humor-laced songwriting.

Azusa is a multinational progressive extreme metal supergroup formed in 2014 by cousins Christer Espevoll (guitars) and David Husvik (drums) of the Norwegian band Extol, joined by bassist Liam Wilson of The Dillinger Escape Plan and vocalist Eleni Zafiriadou of Sea + Air. Their sound blends melodic thrash, jazz-fusion, hardcore and early-90s riff-pop, a style the band has tongue-in-cheek dubbed "Avant-Thrash." They released their debut album Heavy Yoke in 2018 and the follow-up Loop of Yesterdays in 2020, via Solid State Records (US) and Indie Recordings (Europe).

Interstellar Islandsplay in the dock

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Extol is a Norwegian extreme metal band formed in 1993 in Bekkestua, celebrated for a restless fusion of technical and progressive death metal with black metal, thrash, and melodic, prog-rock sensibilities. Emerging from the Christian metal underground, they evolved sharply across records from the blackened death of Burial (1998) to the genre-defying, atmospheric The Blueprint Dives (2005) and the reunion-era self-titled album (2013). The core is built around the Espevoll cousins Peter and Christer alongside longtime drummer David Husvik and multi-instrumentalist Ole Børud. After their hiatus, members Christer Espevoll and David Husvik went on to co-found the international progressive metal band Azusa.

Betrayalplay in the dock

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Cavalera Conspiracy is a Brazilian-American heavy metal supergroup formed in 2007 by brothers Max Cavalera (vocals/rhythm guitar) and Igor Cavalera (drums), reuniting the pair for the first time since Max left Sepultura in 1996. Trading in a raw fusion of thrash, groove, and death metal, the band made its debut with Inflikted (2008), on which Gojira's Joe Duplantier handled bass alongside guitarist Marc Rizzo. The project functions as a family channel for the brothers' primal, tribal-tinged riffing, running in parallel with Max's Soulfly and Igor's other work.

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Sepultura is a Brazilian metal band formed in Belo Horizonte in 1984 by brothers Max and Igor Cavalera, and the most internationally successful heavy metal act to emerge from Brazil. Their late-1980s records helped codify a raw strain of thrash and death metal before Chaos A.D. (1993) and Roots (1996) pivoted the band toward a percussive groove metal laced with Brazilian tribal rhythms and indigenous instrumentation. Max Cavalera's 1996 departure fractured the classic lineup, but guitarist Andreas Kisser and bassist Paulo Jr. carried the band forward with American vocalist Derrick Green from 1997 onward.

Roots Bloody Rootsplay in the dock

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