Random 2017 finds

A buck each:

Howling Syn - Devilries
Average gothic metal.  It's not as overblown and theatrical as the band pics might suggest, but it's nothing great either.  The vocals are the weakest element here.  The clean vox are quite mediocre across the board.  It's as if they tested out several vocal styles just for the sake of variety, not caring about the quality or if they actually added anything to the atmosphere.  The female vocalist is the main offender since she shows up so much but isn't a particularly great singer--unspectacular on main vox, and adds none of the ethereal atmosphere you might expect from good backing vox.  The male vocals aren't that much better, especially the deep clean vox and the dramatic spoken word-style vocals.  There are some DM growls that work well with the music, but of course they're used very sparingly.  As for the rest of the music, it's okay for gothic metal, but nothing spectacular.

Lilitu - The Delores Lesion
This actually wasn't quite as avant-garde as I was expecting.  The majority of the music is Dark Tranquillity-style melodeath, but punctuated with various atmospheric parts and elements--most of these sections have a gothic metal/rock feel, although there are some Opeth influences too.  There are a couple of really nice acoustic guitar parts on the album, but unfortunately they're few and far between.  While most everything works pretty well together, the clean male vox used in several places don't contribute positively to the atmosphere.  I really liked the short instrumental interlude track "Ether," which seems like it's going in a depressive Katatonia-esque direction, then suddenly throws in that very dreamlike guitar part at a minute in.

Totimoshi - Ladron 
Think I'd heard of the band as the name seemed familiar, but didn't associate them with metal.  Mainly picked this up since it was on Crucial Blast.  Overall I'd describe them as some sort of heavy garage rock, though they occasionally get more experimental and play with twangy atmospheric acoustics.  At their most straightforward they go full-on stoner rock with clear 60s/70s influences, but as the album progresses there's a lot of more modern sounding material reminiscent of garage rock and Sabbath-inspired '90s alternative bands.  Think a weird 21st century mutation of sounds from the old SST Records roster--both straightforward rock and more experimental/jammy stuff.