Soundcheck

“Thinking Of” “Mausoleums” “Rivers of

Reversed”

“Boreas” “Blood From

“Declining

“Bombolo

With each EP and the “wind” it represents, siblings Tyler and Maggie Heath explore the stages of answering that question. Boreas, the northern wind, ushers in the harsh frosts of lonely winter. The arrangements evoke images of snow-blanketed darkness, candlelight behind cupped hands, and a vast night sky filled with stars and auroras. The fourth and final installment of the series is set for release in the coming months. studio album with Firehouse’s Perry Richardson on bass and background vocals. Renowned for a distinctive brand of “heavenly metal,” crossover success and venerable endurance, Stryper gained prominence in the 1980s with Top 40 hits like “Calling on You” and “Honestly” and the landmark LP “To Hell With the Devil.” Unlike many of their peers, they’ve managed to retain a dedicated fanbase despite a changing musical landscape.

Named after the wild expanse near Afel Bocoum’s Malian hometown of Niafunké, “Lindé” is a remarkable blend of deep tradition and innovation. The album was recorded in Mali’s capital, Bamako, and stitches together the age-old music of the Niger bend with styles from across the globe, boasting performances from a number of eminent Malian musicians including Touré and Diabaté as well as the late “Hama” Sankaré. The record also features the recently departed Afrobeat pioneer Tony Allen, Joan as Police Woman and Gordon. Traditional instruments like the ngoni, njurkele, kora and calabash blend with guitars, percussion and calland-response vocals. The result is a gently swelling flow that emanates from a source hidden deep in the historical and mystical traditions of Bocoum’s native land, enriched along its way by musical tributaries and crosscurrents.

COURTESY OF JEHN.W.A was recorded in the band’s hometown of Stockholm, Sweden, and to suggest the final product is grotesquely heavy and good is an understatement. The quartet offers a perfect soundtrack to what may well be the end of the world as we know it. Despair, hopelessness, fury and perhaps a glimmer of bloody triumph and distant hope in the inevitability of a new beginning are all contained within “II.” The songs are a pile of bleak upon bleaker riffs that move from a slow and low crawl into D-beat and black metal territory with a smattering of influences from the New Wave of British Heavy Metal thrown in for good measure. “Boreas,” the new EP from acclaimed brother-sister folk duo The Oh Hellos, is the third in a series of four that was named after one of the four Greek mythological wind deities that bring the seasons. The series is driven by the overarching question: “Where did my ideas come from?” Philip H. Anselmo, right, fronts En Minor, whose full-length debut drops on Friday.