May 312012
 

I should probably just go ahead and designate May as Iceland Metal Month at NO CLEAN SINGING. So far this month we’ve featured music from Severed Crotch (here), Svartidauði and Vansköpun (here), Azoic (here), and Dynfari (here). Since today is the last day of the month, I thought I’d close it out with three more Icelandic metal bands.

GONE POSTAL

This band from Kópavogur was formed in 2007. They released a debut full-length titled In the Depths of Despair in 2008 through Iceland’s own Molestin Records as well as three subsequent releases, of which Promo II (2011) is the latest.  In March of this year, they won the Wacken Metal Battle contest in Iceland, which will give them the right to perform at Wacken Open Air this summer.

I gather from a few things I’ve read that the band’s style of music through the early releases was a kind of experimental death metal. What I’ve heard are the three songs on Promo II, and those songs instead reflect a pronounced black metal influence. The music is shot through with ripping/roaring tremolo guitars, vicious rhythms, and an air of bleak dissonance. The vocal style flexes between harsh growls and eviscerating shrieks. The production is as raw as a fresh wound. Yet as cacophonous as the music often is, strange melodies ring out through the tidal wash of bile, lending the music a kind of sick fascination.

Keep your eyes on Gone Postal. They’re going places. Here’s one of the songs from Promo II:

“Morbid Days of Contempt”

[audio:https://www.nocleansinging.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/03.Morbid-Days-of-Contempt.mp3|titles=Gone Postal – Morbid Days of Contempt]

I also found this high-quality video of Gone Postal performing at the Wacken contest. The song seems to be a new one — “Unortheta” — and it kills:


 

Gone Postal’s Facebook page is at this location, and their 2011 promo can be downloaded for free (with the band’s permission) via one of these locations:

http://deathmetalinvasion.blogspot.com/
http://www.taflan.org/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=50816

It appears that the band is at work on a new full-length album, titled Spearheading the Umbrageous.

ANGIST

Angist is a four-piece band from Reykjavík, two of whom are women, including vocalist Edda Tegeder Óskarsdóttir. Here’s a photo of the band, which I suspect is going to fool you about the music:

In October 2011, Angist released a debut EP titled Circle of Suffering. It includes five songs and features that extremely eye-catching cover art you can see above by Christian Sloan Hall.

Two of the EP’s songs — “Death Incarnate” and “Godless” — are streaming on Angist’s ReverbNation page, and I’ve listened to both of them. They deliver scalding black metal vehemence with intricate instrumental flashes, dynamic pacing, and winding morbid melodies. There’s an almost experimental quality to the sonic onslaught, in the vein of bands like Deathspell Omega. And the vocals are horrifyingly bestial and wraithlike — not at all what you might expect from a female vocalist. Hear for yourselves:

Agonist can be found on Facebook via this link, and Circle of Suffering can be ordered from this place.

OPHIDIAN I

This is another Reykjavík band, formed in the summer of 2010, and they happen to share their drummer (Tumi) with Angist. Their line-up also includes members of Severed Crotch and a band named Beneath, who won the Wacken contest in 2009 and whose debut album will be released on July 17 by Unique Leader.

Ophidian I have recorded their own debut album, Solvet Saeclum, which will be released sometime this summer by a Russian label called SFC Records. The cover art is by the very talented Marco Hasman. They claim as their influences tech-death bands such as Obscura, Necrophagist, The Faceless, and Odious Mortem.

Earlier this month the band started streaming the title track to their new album, and it certainly matches up with that list of references. It’s a racing whirl of bounding bass lines, manic percussion, and unpredictable riffs. Head-spinning melodic solos leap out of nowhere and the vocalist roars and barks like a dog of war. Very impressive. I’m definitely looking forward to this album.

Ophidian I have a Facebook page that you can find via this link.

  9 Responses to “MORE FIRE AND ICE FROM ICELAND: GONE POSTAL, ANGIST, AND OPHIDIAN I”

  1. awesome stuff!!!!! will need to check these bands out for sure!!!! Going broke any minute now

  2. Angist is one of the best metal discovery of the year for sure. I’ve seen them live in France and they’re as great live as on CD. Plus Edda’s vocals are beast-like and make Angela Gossow sounds like a choirboy, haha!

  3. I liked that one band. Yeah, the one with the people in it. You know, the one with the drumming and the screaming and the strumming and picking and stuff. Yeah, yeah! Them!

  4. Just so thats clear, Tumi is not playing on those Angist recordings, only in the Ophidian I song 🙂

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