Heavy Song of the Week is a feature on Heavy Consequence breaking down the top metal, punk, and hard rock tracks you need to hear every Friday. This week, No. 1 goes to Behemoth’s new single “The Shadow Elite.”
Behemoth have largely been a black metal band playing death metal for a few album cycles now. Spiritually and conceptually the former; sonically the latter.
The Polish pioneers break that dichotomy on the old-school black metal assault “The Shadow Elite,” a sort of rallying cry for their most dedicated, hardcore fans — as depicted in the raucous music video, the band performing to exclusive invite-only audience of its rapid followers, who are thus branded with the Behemoth sigil.
It’s an example of just how violent and unhinged Nergal and company can get when they set ablaze the atonal harshness that defined their early Pagan black metal era. An anthem for the cult, so to speak.
Honorable Mentions:
Ghost – “Satanized”
If you’re looking for heavy metal from the new Ghost single, you’re gonna have to look elsewhere. That said, you’d be hard-pressed to find a better rendering of ’80s AOR/hard rock in 2025. Styx, YES (circa “Owner of a Lonely Heart”), and even Toto come to mind on this graceful tune, the prog underpinnings somewhat obscured by the copious reverb and sheer mellowness of the production.
The Jesus Lizard – “I’m Tired of Being Your Mother”
The concept behind “I’m Tired of Being Your Mother” is so damn perfect for a Jesus Lizard song: a collection of verbal scoldings of the maternal variety, set to noise rock. And at first, it starts like your typical Jesus Lizard song with plodding drums and bass, David Yow hollering, “Why do I have to say everything a thousand times?” But then it takes a left turn, getting relatively pretty — by the band’s bruising standards — as the guitars build into a wall of chiming shoegaze-y feedback.
Teen Mortgage – “Party”
“Party” is another garage-punk nugget from the rising duo Teen Mortgage. The manic bounce of the guitars conjures the late great Jay Reatard, and there’s more of those irresistible pop hooks that snagged us on Teen Mortage’s previous HSOTW inclusion, “Box.”
Content shared from consequence.net.