Aurora, Colorado's Voyage of the Blastronaut have been orbiting the death metal and grindcore intersection since 2013, bringing a sardonic cosmic sensibility to music that is otherwise relentlessly brutal. The name is part science-fiction absurdism, part honest description — the music blasts with grindcore velocity while death metal's low-end gravity keeps everything from flying apart. Over more than a decade they have refined this particular combination into something distinctly their own.

Voyager formed in 2004 and have spent over two decades building a dense, slow-moving sound rooted in doom and atmospheric sludge metal with post-rock reach. Their compositions are patient and expansive, allowing weight and atmosphere to accumulate gradually rather than arriving through brute force alone. The blend of sludge heaviness and post-rock's textural sensitivity gives their work an emotional scale that the straightforwardly heavy cannot always achieve.

Cleveland's Vulgar Devils have been playing no-frills heavy metal since 2016, carrying the torch for the blue-collar hard rock grit that once defined the Ohio scene. Their sound is rooted in the classic tradition — riffs first, attitude always.

Holy Terror-style crossover thrash from Dallas.

Formed in Pittsburgh in 2022, Vulgar Mephitis deal in the kind of punishing brutal death metal that feels at home in a city built on steel and smoke. Their approach is dense and suffocating, favoring weight over technicality.

Morgantown, West Virginia's Vulgar Royalty formed in 2021 with a sound that collapses grindcore, hardcore, and sludge metal into one misanthropic heap. The combination gives their music a relentless forward momentum shot through with the kind of slow, grinding dread that sludge does best.

Denver's Vulgarian have been fusing crust punk's antagonism with the slow-burning weight of sludge metal since 2020. The collision suits the mile-high city well — equal parts driving rage and heavy, oxygen-thin atmosphere.

Seattle's Vulgaris formed in 2019, drawing on both the city's heavy music heritage and the Pacific Northwest's overcast gloom to craft a sound that moves between doom metal's funeral-paced weight and traditional heavy metal's hooks. The tension between those two poles keeps the material unpredictable.

Houston's Vulgarnaut have been hauling their stoner-doom payload since 2016, with a sound thick enough to match the heat and humidity of the Gulf Coast. Their riffs move slowly and deliberately, stacking fuzz and feedback in the tradition of the heaviest Texas underground.