After few days we will say goodbye to 2014 and hello 2015. It was a rich year because The Egyptian Metal Scene witnessed a lot of effective events: New bands, new releases and changes in the bands’ lines up. Check the list below, so you’ll make sure of all the updates in the scene!
Fresh Bloods In Our Scene:
Abominated Purity
A Technical Death Metal band formed by: El Hussain Shrief and Ahmed Yassin. The band released one track entitled ‘Abominated Purity’.
Astray
It is the second mutual project between Egyptian and Italian Musicians after Hateful Desolation. The band is a Depressive Black Metal Band. The Members are Veirg and Azghâl from Italy and Void from Egypt. They announced the release of their first full album When The Stars Collide soon.
Bovem
Bovem is a Progressive Death/Black Metal band. The band’s members are: Mostafa Sokkar, Shady Mohamed, Mohamed Hani and Ahmed Samy . They released one track entitled ‘Enlightments’ and they gained the second place on ReverbNation Metal charts for Alexandria, Egypt . The band is currently working on their first album.
Hecate
An Atmospheric Extreme Black Metal/Blackened Death Metal. The Members are: Lord Mist and Zandar Adam. The band released its first full length ‘The Order Of The Black Light’ .
Midwinter
They are a Doom Metal band. The members are: Alfred Ehab , Mo3taz and Moka. The band released 3 tracks from their upcoming EP. Last track released is called ‘Perpetual’.
Prophecy In Chains
It is a side project for the vocalists of Sinprophecy and Destiny In Chains Sayed Ragai and Zandar Adam. The band released one track entitled ‘The March Of The Dead’.
Resolve
They are a Heavy Metal/Hard Rock band. The members are: Shady Bahgat, Youssef Mohamed, Hailala Osama, Mohamed Mahib and Selim Hamdy. The band don’t have any released tracks yet.
Thunderstruck
Another Heavy Metal/Hard Rock band. The Members are: Nour Tharwat, Anjie Tarek, Amanda El-Ghaffari, Mohamed Mahib, Amr Farid and Moe A. Mokhtar. The band released just one track from a jam session entitled ‘Criminal’ in addition their Album intro.
Slogan
A Thrash Metal band consisting of: Mostafa Ezzat, Bedo A.Hesham, Abdelrahman El Amrawy, Rockey and Gaser Ahmed. The band participated in some concerts in Alexandria. Recently, the band announced the departure of Mostafa Ezzat and Abdelrahman El Amrawy.
Worsens
Finally an Arabic Metal band. The members are: Ahmed Ali, Ahmed Soliman and Magdy Hanafy.
Releases:
Most of the Egyptian bands released awesome. This year we had all kinds of releases; Full Length, EP, Splits and Single or even tracks of their upcoming albums. Enjoy this list and discover which track you missed:
Scarab – ‘Pyramid Of Illusions’ (From their upcoming full length Serpents Of The Nile) – Check our review.
Excimer – Thrash From Fire (Full-length) – Check our review
Enraged – Jeremiad (EP) – Check our review
Midwinter – ‘Colors Of Gray’- Review, ‘Time Inevitability’ and ‘Perpetual’ – Review (From their upcoming EP Portrait Of Doom)
Gorynov – ‘Divide And Conquer’ and ‘War Ruins’ (Singles) – Check our review + interview.
Crescent – Pyramid Slaves (Full-length) – Check our intevriew here.
Hateful Desolation – ‘Withering In Dust’ (Demo) – Check our review here.
Nader Sadek – ‘The Malifice: Chapter 3’ (EP)
Sinprophecy – ‘Summoning’ and ‘The Midnight Walker’ (Played Live)
Kato Hafez – ‘Belad El Akhlaq’ and ‘El Hal Mapaqash’ (From his upcoming mini album)
Svarte – Wanderer Between The Light And Dark (Full-length)
Thunderstruck – Intro and ‘Criminal’ (From their upcoming album)
Riket – ‘A Funeral Phantom Train’ (From their upcoming album The Mist The Shadow And To The Oblivion)
Hecate – The Order Of The Black Light (Full Length) Read the review
Prophecy In Chains – ‘March Of The Dead‘ (Single)
Veritatem Solam – ‘As I Rule The World Of The Dead’ and ‘The Ultimatum’ (Singles)
El-Azif – ‘Cull Of The Meek’ (From their upcoming album Singularity) – Check our review here.
Bovem – ‘Enlightments’ (Single)
Bastard Breed – ‘Poet’s Litany’, ‘The Great Fall’, ‘Beyond Good And Evil’ and ‘Chims Of Insanity’ (From their upcoming EP From Sickness Comes The Cure)
Wyvern – ‘Snakes Of Seduction’, ‘Heal The Pain’ and ‘Queen Of The Garden’ (Singles)
Frostagrath – Scars Of Isolation (Split), Isolation (Demo), Death Waltz (Split) and ‘A Defective Incarnation’ (From their upcoming full length A Defective Incarnation)
Lord’s Castle – ‘Contact, Wait Out’ (Single)
Maqpara – Intro and ‘Black Victory’ (From their upcoming full length Legion Of Hatred)
Sallos – Blast Of The Eastern Storm (Full Length)
Abominated Purity – ‘Abominated Purity’ (Single)
Astray – ‘Intro + Astray’, ‘Cold Dawn’ and ‘When The Stars Collide’ (From their upcoming full length When The Stars Collide)
Thorvald – ‘Dreaming Of Scandinavia’ (From their upcoming EP Nordic March)
Nathyr – ‘A Diabolical Cane’ and ‘Attaghoot’ (Singles)
Absolution – ‘1658’ (From their upcoming album)
Hate Field – Jagerbomb (EP) Read the review
Anarchy – Asylum (From their upcoming album Asylum)
Darwasha Project – Bekhoor, Maazef and Asma (Singles)
Line-up changes:
New bands and old bands couldn’t keep themselves in the safe zone from Line-up problems. Check this list to know the new members who came to our scene:
Enraged Lost their Bassist
Enraged announced the departure of its bassist Beshoy and his replacement with Mohammed El Farra.
Al-Azif’s Bassist And Vocalist
El-Azif announced few days ago the departure of its vocalist “Zak Hassan” and the bassist “Tarek Zakaria”. “Za” is replaced with “Mohamed Atef”.
Slogan Guitarist And Vocalist
Slogan is a new Thrash Metal band from Alexandria. The band couldn’t keep itself in safe and they lost their vocalist Mostafa Ezzat as well as their guitarist Abdelrahman El Amrawy.
Cheva left. Elave is back, and Cheva is back again!
One day all the Egyptian sinners received very hard news; the first part was the departure of the bassist Mostafa Khaled and the drummer Ahmed Alaa El din and days later the sinners received the biggest shock ever; Cheva’s departure. Cheva was replaced with Elave Salah and Ahmed Alaa El Din is replaced with Michel Khater. Few days ago Sinprophecy announced their new bassist. Guess who? Cheva!
Black Swan Theory
The band announced their new front man is Ahmed Safwan instead of Mohamed Emam. Earlier to that Adel Samakia – the drummer – left the band and Mohamed Hesham El Assal replaced him.
Absolution
The band was facing a difficult and different phase this year, anyhow, it ended up by the founder announce that Absolution is a one-man band project until further notice.
Italian scene merges with the Egyptian Scene
Hateful Desolation announced this year the joining of a young, emotional, talented Italian vocalist Gray Ravenmoon to be Void’s partner in the band.
Nathyr
Nathyr suffered a lot this year from continues changes in their line-up. In the beginning of 2014 Gaber Shemony and Eslam Ismail joined the band then they left it as well as Mostafa Hamady. Later Max A. Hassan joined the band then he left it also. Recently Mahmoud Ali and Khaled El Sisi joined the band. The band is currently working on their upcoming full-length album.
New Comers to Kato Hafez
Kato Hafez announced the joining of Khaled El Sisy as guitarist, Max A.Hasan as bassist and Mahmoud Ali as drummer.
Excellent Musicians get together
This year, Sherif Zaki announced that Moustafa Ali Moustafa has joined Riket. Mostapha Ali Mostapha is recording the vocals of the upcoming Riket album.
Sad announcement from Origin
Origin is one of the best bands in Egypt and they have lots of fans in the scene. This year the band announced the departure of Mostafa Rashad and Nesma Mahgoub. All Egyptian fans miss Origin.
Guitarist Wanted
Devour announced this year the departure of their guitarist Omar Damien.
New Members In The Family
Ahl Sina announced that their new members this year, and they are Patrick Khalil (drums), Amr Taha (Guitars), Boudy(Keyboards) , Hannah Selim (Vocals) and Youssef Hassan (Bass).
Heavens Disappeared and Burtus Split up
This year the fans witnessed some videos from a jam session for Heavens, months later we heard news about the departure of the members, then we found out that the band’s page has been removed and the video were removed from YouTube. This year Burtus announced the band’s split up as well.
The Scene was really exciting through 2014, events, new lines, new bands and a big number of releases. We all hope to see our scene in better in 2015.
Special Thanks to: Mahmoud Ezzat
Written by: Rana Atef
Edited by: NJ Bakr
– Special thanks to Arab-Metalheads.com – مجتمع الميتال العربي and The Egyptian Metal Scene for their help to write this article.
