Hong Kong demonic possession horror Devil Fetus, directed by Hung-Chuen Lau, ambitiously bundles together a host of influences in a way that can’t help but be entertaining. 

From Second Run Films, here we have a three Blu-ray set collecting together most of the climactic output of Zoltán Huszárik- a Hungarian filmmaker whose work has a very distinctively visual quality. The set brings together his two feature films- 1971’s Szindbád and 1979’s Csontváry, as well as five short films dating from between 1966 and 1976. All of Huszárik's work sits within the arthouse genre- yet it’s all fairly approachable, with a creative and rewarding visual palette,  as well as compelling concepts and themes.

Re-Animator is one of the key/ important horror films of the 1980s, for more than a few reasons. First off, it brought the mad doctor horror form up to gory and black comedy date. It introduced cult horror writer HP Lovecraft to a wider horror audience,  and it stood as one of the key films released by Charles Band’s Empire studio. It’s also a damn fine film, with wonderful pacing, a well-selected cast, and still surprisingly effective with its special effects, and blend of shocking horror and comedy. Here from Second Sight is a new two-disc- featuring a new 4k scan, new and old commentary tracks, and a good selection of old and new extras.

Venus DIE-trap is a highly campy and extremely low-budget tribute to when monsters invade small-town America sci-fi/ horror. The 2025 film has a limited cast of just four or five folks, with a blatant use of stock footage, bad CGI backdrops, hamming it up acting, and a monster made of painted papier-mache & flaying fake vine leaves. Here from SRS Cinema, those seekers of all things low-budget/ SOV fare is a DVD release of the film, taking in two commentary tracks, and a few more extras.

Director Colin Minihan, Grave Encounters (2011) and It Stains the Sands Red (2016), brings his horror credentials to the Hollywood Hills with Coyotes, a gleefully blood-soaked  2025 survival thriller that refuses to take itself too seriously. 

From the fab-folks at Germany’s Bear Family Records, here's Santa Is Rockin’ And Rollin’. It’s a twenty-five-track CD compilation focusing on festive rock ‘n’ roll/ related genres from between the 1950s and 1960s- and as we’ve come to expect from the label, this is another wonderful, varied & well sequenced affair.

Death Ride (aka VIP Death Seat) is a 2025 Thai film set on a bus. It blends elements of thriller, horror, and action with a few sprinkles of off-key/ toilet humour. Here from International Media Network is a barebones DVD release of the film. Though the case doesn’t tell you this is a Thai film with English subtitles.

Don’t Open Until Christmas is a British slasher.  The early 1980s film features inventive murders, a creepy masked killer, a fair bit of sleaze, and some unintentional humour- due to the more ropy/ bad acting. It’s set in London, and regards people dressed as Santa being murdered. Here from 88 Films, as part of their Slasher Classic series, is a release of the picture. The Blu-ray takes in a 2k scan, a new commentary track, and a few more extras.

During the 1970s, Nazi-exploitation- one of the more distasteful, unpleasant, and at times downright nasty sub-genres in exploitation- rose and then fell. SS Experiment Love Camp was part of this cycle. 

Chock full of noisy electro punk riffs, burning social commentary, and enough energy to power a small city, East LA's Plezzure drop their first official release with this self-titled EP. Fifteen frantic minutes, Plezzure is a quick hitting, buzzing and bopping piece of punk rock constructed with electronic instruments and arrangements. This duo (Andres "Dres" Huerta and Juan "Bunchie" Vera) has already made a name for themselves in the LA scene with their energetic and frenetic live shows, and this EP on GIve/Take hopes to invite the rest of the world to the frenzied Plezzure party.

Here’s a grimly horror-focused wall noise split bringing together two US projects. There’s Strom Lake, Iowa’s May Cause Death, who severs up two decidedly baying & nasty walls. And Portland’s Hana Haruna, who presents us with more haunted, yet still seared wall-craft.

Splinter is the second solo album from Poland’s Daniel Szwed ( Woody Alien). It serves six slices of pounding, bounding, and hissing electronica/electro-industrial soundscaping.

Elektroniczne Systemy is the debut EP from Polish two-piece Marmur, which brings together Artur Rumiński (Furia, Thaw, Arrm, and many others) and Macio Moretti (LXMP, rumoured to be Mitch & Mitch, and many others). The sound over the three tracks is lo-fi electronica, with subtle guitar elements and a rather moody, at times abstract feel.

Danheim is the project of Danish producer Reidar Schæfer Olsen, who has here created an album of what I would describe as cinematic tribal ethnic downtempo - primarily hand drum rhythms and chants, which sound digitally produced and sequenced. It sounds akin to the soundtracks of Hollywood blockbusters like 300 or Gladiator or a show like Game of Thrones. Looking up his credits, he actually did the soundtrack for the show Vikings.

Stärker, a Canadian-French duo, really know what they're doing. Their latest release, the captivating Spectral, is pitch-perfect, each sound source simultaneously exacting and expansive, precise and yet open like a chasm. 

A White Horse Is Not a Horse arrives on CD in a card gatefold wallet from the esteemed ESP-Disk, featuring five tracks varying from about four minutes in length to twenty-four minutes. Tang and Golden present improvised pieces which largely revolve around similar sounds and techniques - certainly from Tang, who performs with electric guitar, piano, electric keyboard, vocals, and small percussion, whilst Golden assaults the drums

The Shadow And The Wind: 1973- 1974 is a five-CD set looking at both the live and studio output of British rockers/ proto heavy metal merchants/approachable prog dealers, Uriah Heep in the early/ mid 70’s. The primary focus here is live material, with three of the five discs taken up by live albums, showing the five pieces as confident and versatile performers.

Five Thousand Pretenders Who Passed the Test By Luck Alone is a new(ish) long-form work from Massachusetts-based drone maker/moody noise creator Howard Stelzer. The single, just over fifty-minute track moves through a fair bit of varied sonic territory, from ringing and dense soundscaping, onto smaller/ detailed sound crafting, through to drone/ field recording crossbreeds, and beyond.

Scat Punk is the first slice of scuzzy & crude walled noise freefall from this new project from UK’s Tom Wilson(The Night Porter, Slowgurn, and Death To Dynamic label).  This digital release takes in a single nearly hour-long track, which blends a constant searing rush & churn with fleeting darts of other tone/ texture.

Alpha Omega was album number three from New York’s Cro-Mags. First released in 1992, the nine-track album saw the band tighten up their sound, which blended elements of hardcore punk, metal, and thrash.

First released in 1993, Near Death Experience was the fourth album from Cro-Mags. It saw the New York band deepen their Crossover thrash/ metal sound from their hardcore punk roots. It found the more pumped-up metallic/ punk attack tempered with moments of moodiness and spiritual themes. Here from Arising Empire is a recent CD reissue of the album.

Plot Of Fear is a mid-1970s gialli that blends in elements of Poliziotteschi and proto slasher. The film centres on a group of people from an exclusive and kinky club, who are being murdered, with each body a page from a children's book is left. As you’d imagine with such a plot, there is a fair bit of sleaze/flesh on display, and while the killings themselves aren’t elaborate, they are varied- all finished off with an unmasking/resolution I didn’t see coming. Here from Powerhouse- as either a UHD or Blu Ray- is a new release of the film, taking in a well-defined 4k print, a new commentary track, and a selection of old and new extras.

From the early 70’s, Craze is a British film focusing on an antiques dealer, who accidentally kills someone in front of an African idol,  finds a fortune coming his way, and decides to take up murder. In the lead, we have Jack Palance, with appearances of the likes of Trevor Howard, Suzy Kendall, and Diana Dors. The film is a thriller/ horror crossbreed- with light touches of both gore and nudity, making for an engaging enough & lightly campy 70’s cinematic ride. Here from 88 Films is a recent release of the film, which is available as either a Blu-ray or DVD, taking in a 4k scan, a new commentary track, and a few other old/ new extras.

One half of electronic/psychedelic duo Japanese Gum, Paolo Tortora heads off on his own for his debut solo, Waves of Fading Memories, via Torto Editions. Four pieces consisting of shimmering tones, waves, warmth, and soft, fuzzy nostalgia, Tortora's solo is the perfect soundtrack for spending time reviewing, reinvestigating, and reliving one's memories. Like waves crashing on the shore, their moment is fleeting, but their impact is timeless. While one wave lapping the sand may not seem like much, the life, nutrients, calm, beauty, and, conversely, destruction makes its mark before drifting away, only for another wave, another memory to be formed. Structured around layered guitar tones, soft, synth drones, wave sounds, and other effects, Waves of Fading Memories is rich with atmosphere, ambiance, and is the perfect setting for one to rekindle and relive their myriad memories.

From the early 90s, Baby Blood is a French film that sits somewhere bloody ‘n’ sleazy exploitation & glum/offbeat drama, with moments of limb-ripping violence, demented body horror, and dark humour. It regards a female circus worker, who gets something strange slipping into her, which slowly but surely starts growing. Here from Studio Canal- as either a Blu-ray or UHD- is a recent(ish) UK debut release of the film, taking in a 4k scan, and new/ archive extras.

Sergio Corbucci’s The Hellbenders (I Crudeli) was released in 1967. Sandwiched between two bigger and brasher efforts often cited as the director’s best, Django (1966) and The Grand Silence (1968), it’s no wonder that it’s often relegated in conversations of Corbucci’s work. Its profile is limited by swapping the action of those better-known movies for suspense and, on the face of it, reworking the plot of 1965’s The Tramplers (directed by Albert Band, who uncoincidentally produced this).

Malpertuis is an early 70’s blend of fantasy, horror, and off-kilter family drama. It’s a film that’s laden with occult imagery/ themes, with a huge cast of weird ‘n’ wonderful characters that appear from nooks and crannies of the Labyrinthian house the film is set in.  Here from Radiance is a wonderful, classy reissue of the film, taking in a 4k fully uncut version of the picture, a second Cannes cut, new interviews with the director/ genre experts, and a good selection of new/old extras. It comes presented a mystical symbol-dotted slip case, with a colourful eighty-page booklet.

Here from Radiance is the second volume in their Daiei Gothic series, which focuses on period-based Japanese ghost stories. Once again, the set offers three films, dating between the 1960s and 1970s. These move between a hunting a demon action fantasy -come- palace-court drama, a vengeful cat ghost chiller, and a swamp revenge meets melodrama that brings back the dead.

Nestled somewhere between Throbbing Gristle and Einstürzende Neubauten, with a bit of Mark E. Smith thrown in, Split Apex's Thoughts in 3D is a throwback recipe, to be sure, except the ingredients themselves sound very much of today. 

Breaking Point was the debut studio album from LA’s Heretic. Originally surfacing in 1988, the ten-track release offered up an often dramatic & memorable blend of power and thrash metal. And while you can certainly hear nods towards the likes of Metal Church, Anthrax, and a few other bands, it makes for a decent debut album, with the band managing to add in a few of their own touches here & there. Here from Punishment 18 Records is a CD reissue of the album

First released in 2002, Through The Cracks Of Death was the third studio album from this Oakland, California, Death metal band. It saw the three-piece deepening the hardcore punk, doom,  and straight-out metal/ rock elements, for a more distinctive sound, which stood out from the run-of-the-mill stateside death metal. Here from Peaceville is a CD reissue of the album, which adds an extra fifteen bonus tracks- featuring assorted 7”, demos, and split release tracks.

Between The Wall severs up a thickly churning and grit-rattling slab of HNW from this highly prolific/long-running California-based project. The single track slides in at the twenty-nine minute mark, and while it's fairly simplistic in its presentation, it makes for an entrancing/ nicely world around you block-out ride.

Here from Cincinnati, Ohio’s Whore’s Breath are two weather-themed examples of the wall noise form. Each runs around the twenty-six-minute mark, making for a just over fifty-two-minute full-length release.

Here’s a three-way wall noise split, taking in three twenty-minute walls- each themed around each artist's favourite Vtubers.  All of the projects are from the USA, with  a fair variety between each of the tracks

Nightsweater is seemingly the debut release from this Oregon-based wall of noise project. It’s a twenty-minute ‘wall’ with a decidedly soothing clutter & mellowly juddering quality to its crumbling ‘n’ crusty unfold.

Dracula (aka Dracula: A Love Tale) is a 2025 film directed and written by Luc Besson -Subway (1985), La Femme Nikita (1990), and The Transporter( 2002). It stars Caleb Landry Jones, Christoph Waltz, Zoë Bleu, and Matilda De Angelis.

Taking their time and doing it right, Portugal's The Ominous Circle return with Cloven Tongues of Fire, the follow-up to their 2017 debut, Appalling Ascension. Dark and moody, Tongues revels in atmosphere, allowing the mid-paced death to expand out in different tempo directions as needed to punctuate the thick, black, dissonance that fills the speakers. Carried on the backs of five long tracks (with an intro and interlude as well), Cloven Tongues of Fire skillfully continues death metal's Gorgutsian trend of extended, sonically saturated pieces soaked in dissonance and well timed chaos to bring about an unsettling and uncompromising atmosphere. 

A Hyena In The Safe (Una Iena In Cassaforte)  is a crime mystery/ crossbred with glamorously turned-out criminals, disturbingly heady breakdowns/ freakouts, and lots of double crossing/ backstabbing. The late 60s Italian film regards a group of six robbers meeting at a mansion- each with their own key- to open a safe full of diamonds, but one by one they get killed off.  Here from Celluloid Films is a Blu-ray release of the film, taking in a new HD print, a commentary track, and a few other extras.

From the mid-1960s, The Diabolical Dr. Z blended mad doctor horror, revenge thriller, and low-key sci-fi with a largely grim tone, which is informed by both gothic horror and noir genres. The film is one of the earlier releases from Infamous euro-cult director Jess Franco, and it’s a monochrome affair, being a lot more subtle compared to his later work, though it has a very tangible/dread-filled atmosphere. Here from Eureka is a new Blu-ray release of the film, taking a 2k scan, a new commentary track, and a selection of new/ old extras.

So Unreal is a 2023 documentary film from writer/director Amanda Kramer (Paris Window, Give Me Pity! and By Design) that looks at technological advancements through the lens of sci-fi cinema in the 1980s and 1990s. Narrated by Blondie legend, Debbie Harry (Videodrome,  Hairspray and Tales from the Darkside: The Movie) it takes a look at where filmmakers' anxieties and neuroses lay in the 1980s and 90s as these technological developments became ever more chillingly real. 

Here from Film Masters is a double-bill of two stateside versions of Euro horror films featuring Klaus Kinski. There’s Creature With The Blue Hand- a late 60’s horror focused Krimi. And Web Of The Spider, an early 70’s gothic ghost story where Kinski plays Edgar Allan Poe. The dual Blu Ray takes in HD prints of each film, as well as a commentary track for each picture. Also included is an alternative version of the first film, new featurettes, and a few archive extras.

Ohad Fishof is an Israeli experimental musician and composer with many previous works, who often integrates dance and visual components into his work. Witchcraft and Gardening is his new LP on Solid Coated, and according to their website, his first solo work since 2019. It is a colourful multigenre recording that spans from experimental jazz to vocoder-laden synth pop, apparently with a majority of instruments played by Ohad himself, though there are a couple of guest credits.

La Serenissima is a two-CD set bringing together organ and harpsichord pieces composed by Richard Rijnvos. He’s a radical Dutch composer whose work is often concerned with stacking melodic patterns. Or utilising non-musical elements such as magic squares and chessboards to create his work. Most of his compositions are themed around locations, as is this collection, which takes its title from a nickname for the historical republic of Venice. 

First published in the year 1979, The Tuxedo Warrior looks at the early bouncer career of Cliff Twemlow. Who later went on to become a key figure in micro-budgeted/ often SOV  action/horror/sci-fi cinema of the UK, which this year has been celebrated by the excellent InterVision/ Severin Blu Ray Boxset Bloody Legend- which brought together a doc about the great man, eleven of his features and much more. Here from Severin/ Encyclopocalypse Publications is a reprint of the book.

The All-Night Video Guide: Slashers 70’s & 80’s is a glorious dive back into the golden age of slash ‘n’ stalk films. Instead of an in-depth/ definitive guide to the genre/ period, this is much more of a personal look at some of the favourite films of writer Robc. And it’s all the better for it, as it’s a wonderful, honest, down-to-earth, sometimes informative book, which feels like you're chatting in a bar with a buddy about films, instead of a stuffy study of the genre.

When visionary producer Haruki Kadokawa inherited his father’s publishing business in the mid-seventies, he promptly set about combining his two great interests - books and filmmaking – and transforming the Japanese film industry. In a bid to compete with the blockbusters that were arriving from the US (and which were very popular), he started to introduce 1970s Japanese audiences to the home-grown version.  First up in 1976 was the instantly popular murderous epic The Inugami Family, followed swiftly a year later by the masterful thriller Proof of the Man. Set in New York and Tokyo, it boasted a stellar cast of George Kennedy, Robert Earl Jones (James’ father)  Ozu favourite Mariko Okada and Kurosawa muse, Toshiro Mifune and went on to become Japan’s second highest-grossing film of all time (for a while anyway). 

Appearing four years before his slasher genre-defining classic Halloween, Dark Star was the first feature-length film directed by John Carpenter.  The film is a low-budget slice of Sci-fi regarding a spaceship manned by bearded, long-haired crewmen, who spend their days in deep space blowing up unstable planets. It’s a low-key parody/send-up of the genre, blending bickering/ bored crewmates, bombs that talk back,  a red ball with claws pet alien, a ship captain frozen in ice, and the odd subtle chuckle. Here from Fabulous Films is a dual UHD/Blu-ray release of the film.  It features two cuts of the picture,  a selection of new and archive extras (including a feature-length documentary), along with repro stills and posters, and a limited edition online exclusive clamshell/o-card package with a Dark Star patch.

Deadly Friend was the seventh film directed by horror icon Wes Craven (Last House On The Left, Nightmare On Elm Street, Scream). And the mid-80s film certainly stands as his most weird and tonally unbalancing creation, as it shifts from cute robot family movie to teenage abuse drama, to mad doctor meets supernatural slasher blend. Here from Arrow Video is a recent Blu-ray release- taking in a new commentary track, and a selection of new/ archive extras.

Shelf Life is the previously unreleased final film from director Paul Bartel (Death Race 2000, Eating Raoul and Lust in the Dust). Filmed in 1993, Bartel’s final film is a dark comedy with a fairly original premise that sets it apart from most other comedies of the time. Shelf Life stars O-Lan Jones (Mars Attacks, Edward Scissorhands and Beethoven), Andrea Stein (Hard to Kill, Trouble in Mind and Lois and Clark), Jim Turner (The Lost Boys, Kicking and Screaming and Joe’s Apartment), Paul Bartel (The Usual Suspects, Piranha and Escape from LA) and Shelby Lindley (Noragami, Puella Magi Madoka Magica and K-On!).

Bringing works of William S. Burroughs to the screen alongside an experimental soundtrack from some of the era's biggest names in industrial music, 1984's Decoder stands as a cyberpunk cult classic. With a number of songs by Genesis P-Orridge & Dave Ball, as well as FM Einheit, Einstürzende Neubauten, Soft Cell, and The The, its soundtrack is a testament to a fascinating piece of cinema nestled in a distinct and equally fascinating place and time. Filmed in Hamburg and Berlin by Klaus Maeck and Muscha, Decoder uses current industrial music as a revolution, sparking subterfuge, with the hunter trying to suppress the dissent. Available on a standalone CD for the first time in 33 years (there was a DVD/CD release in 2010), Decoder can now easily be heard by the masses without turning to auctions or haggling with secondhand resellers.

Vermilion Hours is a collaboration between French pianist Melaine Daliber and British soundscaper David Sylvian. The CD or vinyl album takes in two long slices of piano minimalism/ low-key simmering ambience, with two shorter versions of the same tracks topping off the release.

For Volin and Electronics Volume II is a  CD release collecting together nine tracks where violin and electronica wonderfully meet. Irish violinist Darragh Morgan is a supremely talented & versatile player, who here adds his deft/ at times detailed string work to the work of nine different composers.

The instrumentation on Jon Porras' Achlys is hard to pick out, and perhaps that is intentional. Whether guitars or soft synths, the sound sources on this ambient work are kind of all background, with little fury or pathos--very few lead lines or licks. That is the point of this kind of music, at least according to its chief architect, Brian Eno. The lack of counter point and inherent conflict was certainly welcome then, and maybe still is, too. Much on Achlys sounds like a refinement of Eno's early ambient works, specifically Ambient 1 (Music for Airports), the soundtrack to ambivalence. The transitioning and mixing of that seminal work are revived in Porras' hands, smoothing shifts between tracks, eight in all.

Mercedes Bryce Morgan’s third film is a fascinating mash of genres that keeps its audience guessing. On the face of it, the 2024 picture is a punchy entry in the brewing Airbnb horror subgenre popularised by films like 2020’s The Rental and 2022’s Barbarian. Horror fans, however, may be surprised at how well they take to an opening hour of mystery that unravels as an awkward romantic drama before things take a dramatic turn for the bloody.

Foutu is a recent four-track album from Bordeaux-based Raté . It’s another sonic journey into hope-numbing/nihilistically battering walled noise from the project. Each track comes in at just shy of fifteen minutes, and each is as unforgiving/ unrelenting as the other.

Incessant severs up an hour and seven minutes of wall noise head-roasting from this Hungarian project. The track blends thick roiling lows with jittering ‘n’ hissing mids, for a total sonic engulfment.

Etherfall is a new four-track/full-length release from Polish wall noise project Olion. Each ‘wall’ comes in around the fifteen-minute mark, with the entire release featuring an Icelandic ice desert and waterfalls theme.