So good to be back in Seattle after a fucking 6-hour flight home last night. Did you know that your feet swell up something fierce after 6 hours at 40,000 feet? Did you know that this is really not a good thing if you’re trying to recover from a serious ankle sprain? Did you know that it could cause your toes to turn black and your ankle to turn red and blue even a week after your accident, so that it feels like weasels are ripping into it? Well, now you know.
Did you know that if your hearing is sort of shitty and you try to listen to metal at the proper head-wrecking volume on your earbuds during a 6-hour night flight that your neighbors who are trying to sleep will look at you like they want to set you on fire? Did you know that if enough neighbors look at you like that, and you’re a weenie, you will sheepishly remove the earbuds and lose out on the chance to catch up on new metal for 6 hours and instead drink heavily and become surly and morose? Well, now you know.
Did you know that when your body’s time clock is still in a time zone that’s three hours later than where you are, your body will wake up thinking that it’s 6:30 a.m. when in fact it’s 3:30 a.m.and you’ve only been asleep for 4 hours after being awake for nearly 24 hours and you will feel like day-old shit with your ankle throbbing and be unable to fall asleep again? Now you know.
Did you know that even when you’re a really important metal blogger and you’re mostly out of touch with metal for more than a day, metal is still happening, as if it did not depend on your paying attention in order to continue happening? Amazingly, that seems to be true.
Here’s what I found this morning in between hobbling trips to the coffee maker to recharge my bowl-sized Deathwish coffee cup: Crypticus (U.S.), Nidingr (Norway), and Arkhum (U.S.).
CRYPTICUS
Crypticus is a two-headed monster that appears to dwell in the vicinity of Denver, Colorado. One head is Patrick Bruss (vocals, guitar, bass) and the other is Brynjar Helgetun (drums). This monster has just spawned a really filthy, venomous, ill-tempered offspring by the name of Insieme Verso Terrore. It’s a five-track EP available on Bandcamp, about which I’ll have more to say quite soon.
If you visit that Bandcamp page you’ll see that the fifth track, “Rigour Morgue”, isn’t available for streaming, though it’s included in the EP download. HOWEVER, Crypticus has just put the track up on SoundCloud, and I’ve been letting it rampage repeatedly through my aching head this morning. It’s about as perfect a representation of corpse-strewn, old-school, Scandinavian-styled death metal as I could want this morning.
The chainsaws grind, the drums pound like meat tenderizers, the riffs are catchy (and the guitar leads will rip your flesh), the grisly melody oozes pus, and the vocals . . . the vocals are to die for, a death-metal duet between that monster head named Bruss and a she-golem named Vanessa Nocera, whose name you should recognize based on how often I’ve written about one of her many other bands, Skeletal Spectre (she also fronts Scaremaker and Wooden Stake).
Fuck, that was a long sentence. Maybe I should ease up on the coffee. Here’s “Rigour Morgue”:
NIDINGR
I first wrote about this band on NCS about a month ago. Nidingr are a Norwegian collective who’ve been rattling around since 1996. Their third album, Greatest of Deceivers, will be released by their new label Indie Recordings on November 20 in North America. Their membership includes Hellhammer (Mayhem, Arcturus) on drums — though Øyvind Myrvoll was the drummer on their new album – and Teloch (NunFuckRitual, The Konsortium, and live performer with Mayhem, 1349, God Seed, and Gorgoroth) and Blargh (DHG (Dødheimsgard)) on guitars and bass.
When I wrote about them a month ago, DECIBEL had just premiered a track from the new album. This morning I saw that the band have just released a second track for streaming — “Vim Patior”. It’s a killer, and a great follow-up to that Crypticus song.
The vocals on this one — by Cpt. Estrella Grasa — are outstanding. They remind me a bit of Martin van Drunen. And once again, the bounding bass line is a kick in the ass to hear. For that matter, the whole song is a kick in the ass:
ARKHUM
I hope you remember Portland’s Arkhum. I’ve sure as hell written about them enough that you should (previous posts collected here). Following up on their 2010 debut album, Anno Universum, the band have been working on their second full-length effort, Earthling, with assistant engineering being handled by a cat named Mia (above). I think this is a groundbreaking move by the band, and I’ve been really curious to hear Mia’s influence on the new record. She looks kind of like a Zen master in that photo.
This morning I saw that Arkhum have begun streaming samples from several of the songs on Earthling, and man it really sounds interesting. Rather than attempt to describe it, I’d rather just let you be surprised. And by the way, it appears Vendlus Records plans to release the album in January 2013. You can fucking count on the fact that we will have more to say about this album in the ramp-up to its release.
P.S. There is a silver lining to a 6-hour night flight when you can’t listen to metal without offending your neighbors: you can finally finish Leviathan Wakes. Space opera done right, for which I enthusiastically thank Ben C. (Church of the Riff) for the recommendation.
P.P.S. Apologies to Frank Zappa, though I guess he probably doesn’t mind at this point.
25 Responses to “WEASELS RIP MY ANKLE: CRYPTICUS, NIDINGR, ARKHUM”
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Hope you are alright my friend!!!! Did you know that you could go to a doctor??? BTW amazing bands!!!!
I might try that doctor thing, but I’m going to use some leeches first and see if that reduces the swelling.
Doctors are for pansies…you should have either healed by now, or lopped it off at the knee with a rusty cleaver
I was thinking a circle saw would be a little faster. I just have to clean chunks of gristle out of the teeth from the last time I used mine.
Its hard to get the right leverage on a circular saw from that angle
…err…I may have said too much
It may put you off that you’d have to be honest to the doctor to get adequate help in return. Annoying questions like “How/When/Why did it happen?” tend to produce lies to cover your shame. To be crucified by questions again (I’m sure your wife did that already… 🙂 ) may seem too much a discomfort from the help you could get.
However, you’d be surprised how many people actually are willing to help you… in between laughing. Seriously now, I hope it gets better soon. Thanks for the music again (and I’m glad you’re working on your library of read books as well; reading books is undervalued these days). Keep up the good work!
Thank you sir. I’m actually pretty used to explaining my acts of idiocy to third parties, because I have so much past practice doing that. I’ve just always viewed a doctor visit as the last resort for just about anything. One of these days I’ll have to think about why that is.
“One of these days I’ll have to think about why that is.”
You have a penis. That’s why.
Yeah, that’s probably right. It explains many other moronic aspects of my character.
The fact that this post does NOT feature a band called Weasels Rip My Ankle was a huge disappointment.
I apologize for that. I realized after the fact that it could be mistaken for a band name, which I am now going to copyright. 🙂
too late..and their demo material is awesome
HA! Nice try dude. I just googled Weasels Rip My Ankle . . . and you know what comes up first, and exclusively, don’t you?
Thats because theyre so underground they dont even know theyre a band yet
Well, there doesn’t seem to be any such band – not any that people on Last.fm are listening to, at least.
There does appear to be an album named Weasels Ripped My Flesh by Frank Zappa though.
Yup, a landmark album . . . and the reason for my apologies to the late great Zappa at the end of the post.
Oh… Right. Missed that bit. 😐
I don’t think Zappa liked metal. If you listen to his speech to that committee… I forget the name… that Tipper Gore helmed, he seemed to refer to metal as something that doesn’t bring people up in an emotional way.
weasels In My Ass is Islanders favorite activity. Mistype on his part.
Huh. I wondered where those weasels came from that were ripping my ankle.
Also, Weasels In My Ass doesn’t seem to be taken as a band name. I’m copyrighting that one too.
There does seem to have been a band named Screeching Weasel, which is pretty fuckin cool.
How about Cum Guzzling Gutter Weasels?
Or 18 Inch Weasel Cock?
Or Weasels on Parade?
Or Lady Gaaaaaah! Weasels!
Why does everything have to be about cum and cocks? Why? Why?
Lady Gaaaaaah! Weasels! has a nice ring to it.
Fine. Jerk.
Weasel Bum Rush.
Weasely Vagoo Blood.
Baby Weasel Fuck Pit Snack Time.
I pick “Fine.Jerk.”
How about “Fine Jerk”?