“Un-listenable, putrid, turgid, filthy, repellent, abhorrent, deplorable and the collective cultural zeitgeist of music has suffered tremendously ever since this collection of degenerate young men first learned how to desecrate a guitar,” - are all descriptors that your Church-going Grandmother might use to describe the new Sanguisugabogg offering, Hideous Aftermath.

Ba’al, a band who are more post than the penalty shootout during the England-Sweden match, are back with an axe to grind with their sophomore album The Fine Line Between Heaven and Here.

When you think of two things that shouldn't go together but somehow just works, the obvious comes to mind: McDonald's Fries and Milkshakes, Peanut butter and Jam sandwiches, and Five Finger Death Punch and a restricted hearing disability; well, thanks to Portlander’s, Dolven, we can now add ‘Acoustic’ and ‘Doom’ to that list.

Once a year, thousands of black metal purists descend upon the sunny seaside town of Scarborough in a way that is visually reminiscent of Saruman’s Uruk-Hai terrorising the gentle and pleasant village folk of the Riddermark. However, the best summary of Fortress could be heard from the locals when one of them raised the question of: “What’s with all the goths?” “It’s a heavy metal thing, the music is shit, but the people are lovely.”

Historically, listening to The Mars Volta's previous discography such as The Bedlam in Goliath, Frances the Mute and De-Loused in Comatarium has always instigated the mental image of the age old question:' What's this cocaine doing in my paella', or maybe even better, 'what's this paella doing in all my cocaine!?'

Pissgrave is so filthy they give us the musical version of having intimate relations with a sex doll you've found underneath a bridge.

Some lovely Gregorian chant meets us as we load up Halo: Combat Evolved's title menu screen, wait, it's Häxkapell's Om Jordens Blod Och Urgravens Grepp (Of earth's blood and the grave's grasp). It’s a title as catchy in English as it is in Swedish.

Here is the latest offering from everyone’s annoying Step-Father’s second favourite prog band, obviously behind the immortal Rush (F Neil Peart): Dream Theater, a band that is as brilliant as it is pretentious.

So, let’s pour a glass of fine scotch, think of the Highlands and let the Northern winds tickle our balls through our tartan kilts.