Tag: Messa

2025 Best of Metal: #7 Messa-The Spin

Release date: April 11, 2025
Origin: Cavaso del Tomba, Italy
Personnel: Sara Bianchin-vox, Alberto Piccolo-guitar/keys, Marco Zanin-bass, Rocco Toaldo-drums

Haunting doom metal out of Italy. These guys made it on the list a few years back and their latest album is another step forward. Solid songs all the way through and vocalist, Sara Bianchin, is a very distinctive voice. Their brand of doom metal feels different than the stuff coming out of England and Scandinavia. I always find it refreshing when non-traditional metal countries put a unique spin on a traditional metal genre.

4.5 flip flops out of 5

The list so far:
7. Messa-The Spin
8. Kadavar-I Just Want To Be A Sound
9. Harakiri For The Sky-Scorched Earth
10. 16-Guides For The Misguided
11. Lo-Pan-Get Well Soon
12. Hooded Menace-Lachrymose Monuments of Obscuration
13. Byzantine-Harbingers
14. Wretched-Decay
15. Green Carnation-A Dark Poem, Part I: The Shores of Melancholia
16. Scorpion Child-I Saw the End As It Passed Right Through Me
17. Benediction-Ravage of Empires
18. Testament-Para Bellum
19. In Mourning-The Immortal
20. Allegaeon-The Ossuary Lens

2022 Best of Metal: #18 Messa-Close

Release date: 3/11/2022

Origin: Cittadella, Italy

Personnel: Sara Bianchin-vox, Alberto Piccolo-guitar, Marco Sanin-bass, Rocco Toaldo-drums

This one feels like the bastard child of Black Sabbath and Jefferson Airplane. And I totally mean that to be a compliment of the highest order. This was my first experience with Messa and this album feels like such a good one to get acquainted with this band. Sara Bianchin’s vocals just recall a version of Grace Slick with a little more range. Combined over top of just some massively heavy riffs and middle-eastern flourishes, this is a mystical and magical doom metal masterpiece. It felt like metal from Italy used to mainly be in the power metal realm. But, of late, it feels like scene there is starting to flourish a bit more and we’re seeing bands like Messa pop up with some really cool takes on different genres. Definitely dig this one if you’re into Candlemass or Pallbearer and the like.

4.5 flip flops out of 5

The list so far:

18. Messa-Close
19. Ty Tabor-Shades
20. Lamb of God-Omens