December and 2011 are both over, and with the end of the last month, it’s time to round up what we saw over the last 30 days about forthcoming albums.

We usually try to post these updates on the first of the month, but the first of this month was New year’s Day, and I was moving kinda slowly that day. Plus, I’ve been focusing on year-end lists from a variety of sources, and, well, I’m late with this. I have more excuses, if you’d like to hear them.  No?  Okay, I understand.  I’ll just shut up and get going with this list.

So, here’s the deal:  In these METAL IN THE FORGE posts, I collect news blurbs and press releases I’ve seen over the last month about forthcoming new albums from bands we know and like at NCS (including occasional updates about releases we’ve included in previous installments of this series), or from bands that look interesting, even though we don’t know their music yet. In this series, we cut and paste those announcements and compile them in alphabetical order.

Remember — THIS ISN’T A CUMULATIVE LIST. If we found out about a new forthcoming album before December, we wrote about it in previous installments of this series. So, be sure to check the Category link called “Forthcoming Albums” on the right side of this page to see forecasted releases we reported earlier.

This month’s list begins right after the jump. It includes some real eye-openers. In fact, it’s not too soon to say that 2012 is already looking like yet another royally skull-fucking year for metal. But as usual, this list is half-assed rather than comprehensive. I confess that in December I was even more half-assed than usual in keeping my eyes open for news about new albums. So, feel free to leave Comments and tell all of us what I missed when I put this list together. Let us know about albums on the way that  you’re stoked about, even if you don’t see them here!

Here at NCS, little whispery things nag at the back of our diseased brains. We’re not talking about the transmissions from space — that’s another story. We’re talking about things we’re supposed to remember. Like paying some fucking bill, or feeding the cat, or checking in with the parole officer, or seeing if some new album we wanted to hear has finally been released (because we’re not hot-shit enough for labels to send us advance review copies of everything we’re interested in).

Half the time we don’t remember stuff like this until it’s too late. But sometimes the truly important items break through the cranial fog. Case in point: Soreption. We wrote here about Soreption’s ass-kicking 2008 EP Illuminate the Excessive. And then we wrote two more updates here and here about the band’s progress on their debut album. Guess it’s evident we’re a tad obsessive about this band.

And so earlier this week we remembered that Soreption was supposed to release their debut album in March. We checked, and sure enough — it’s now available (iTunes and Amazon MP3). And now we’ve heard it.

A few days ago, we got immersed in exotically melodic new metal from Romania’s Negura Bunget, and we waxed rhapsodic about its powerful allure. But Soreption’s new album, Deterioration of Minds, isn’t about melody. It’s all about the rhythm. Therefore, we need to change our vocabulary to talk about this carnivorous beast of technical death metal. How about this:

It. Fucking. Rules.

(more after the jump, including a song to stream . . .)

We’re now almost two months into 2010, and it’s already time for our second update to the list of forthcoming new albums we posted on January 1.  (See the original list here and the first update here.) Below is a list of still more projected new releases that we didn’t know about on January 1 or at the time of our last update about a month ago — and there’s a lot of them.

Once again, we’ve cobbled together news blurbs about bands whose past work we’ve liked, or who look interesting for other reasons. Needless to say (but we’ll say it anyway), these are bands that mostly fit the profile of music we cover on this site.

So, in alphabetical order, here’s our list of cut-and-pasted blurbs from various sources over the last month about forthcoming new releases:

1349: “Prosthetic Records will release the brand new album from Norwegian black metal legends 1349 in North America via an agreement with Indie Recordings. The new CD, which promises ‘a return to the band’s more traditional, raw-yet-technical black metal sound,’ is due on April 13. In support of the yet-to-be-titled record, 1349 will embark on a North American tour in April and May as the support act for CANNIBAL CORPSE (alongside SKELETONWITCH and LECHEROUS NOCTURNE).”

ABACABB: “ABACABB are currently out on the road headlining the Hot Dice On Black Ice Tour featuring Upon A Burning Body!. The tour just hit Texas and will be in California this weekend. Following the tour ABACABB will enter the studio with producer Will Putney at Machine Shop in New Jersey and will have a new album to be released sometime this summer.”

AEON: “Swedish death metallers AEON have set Path Of Fire as the title of their third album, due later in the year via Metal Blade Records. The CD was recorded in September 2009 at Empire Studio in Östersund, Sweden and was mixed the following month at Mana Recording Studios in St, Petersburg, Florida by Erik Rutan (HATE ETERNAL, MORBID ANGEL, CANNIBAL CORPSE). The mastering was handled by Alan Douches at West West Side Music (CONVERGE, HATEBREED, THE DILLINGER ESCAPE PLAN) in New Windsor, New York.”

AMORPHIS: “AMORPHIS will release its first-ever live DVD, Forging The Land Of Thousand Lakes, in early June via Nuclear Blast, in time for the band’s 20th anniversary. The filming took place on November 20, 2009 at Club Teatria in Oulu, Finland, where AMORPHIS was supported by STRATOVARIUS and BEFORE THE DAWN. In addition to the full-length live show, the anniversary DVD will include plenty of bonus material documenting the band’s impressive career.”   (much more after the jump . . . )

These dudes have really let me down.

In one of our previous Math Metal Monday features, we wrote about Swedish tech-death band Soreption and their awesome June 2008 EP Illuminate the Excessive. Illuminate included only four tracks, creatively entitled 1, 2, 3, and 4. Then we saw (and wrote about) a report that the band would be releasing their debut album, Deterioration Of Minds, on March 3 via Ninetone Records — and that the tracks would be entitled 5 - 12. How perfect!

We were crushed to discover this morning that the band has sold out: They’ve decided to use actual song names for the tracks on Deterioration Of Minds, instead of numbers. And they didn’t even use any of our shark cartilage song names. I bet the label made ‘em do it. According to the band’s blog, the tracks will now be called:

01. Suppressing The Mute
02. The Hypocrite, Undying
03. Breeding Exile
04. …To Dim The Aching
05. A Wolf Among Men
06. Deterioration Of Minds
07. By Venom Entitled
08. March Of The Tyrants

I already miss the old song titles. Plus, I think this is really confusing. I mean, they’ve previously released four songs on the EP, but this full-length begins with Track No. 1 instead of No. 5. What’s up with that?!

On the bright side, Soreption has posted a brief portion of one new song, “March of the Tyrants,” for streaming on their MySpace page. And short as the clip is, it’s definitely Soreption — which means it’s definitely awesome.

Maybe they’ll decide to tell the label to fuck off and change the album title from Deterioration Of Minds to 2.

In one of our previous Math Metal Monday features, we wrote about Swedish tech-death band Soreption and their June 2008 EP Illuminate the Excessive. Illuminate included only four tracks, creatively entitled 1, 2, 3, and 4.

We didn’t discover these guys until sometime in the middle of 2009, but from the first listen, we realized these guys were turning out some genuinely original music. Only problem was that those 4 tracks flew by way too fast.

Now we have some very welcome breaking news about Soreption: the band will release their debut album, “Deterioration Of Minds”, on March 3 via Ninetone Records. The tracks will be entitled 5 – 12. But hey, if the full-length really picks up right where the EP left off, we could hardly be happier.

These dudes have excellent technical chops and songwriting ability. This is fast, intricate, brutal music that you should check out here if you haven’t already. Or go back to our earlier Math Metal Monday post and stream the track we made available then.

And then start counting the days to March 3.

SOREPTION

One week ago, on another day that wasn’t a Monday, we published a feature called Math Metal Monday about four technical metal bands whose albums we really enjoyed during 2009.  And then, within a matter of days, I realized we’d left off three bands we listened to repeatedly in ’09 that well and truly belonged on that list: Soreption, Obscura, and Dismal Lapse. Shit!  What were we to do?

And then it hit me.  There would be another Monday!  In fact, another Monday would come pretty damn quick!  Man, was I relieved.

OK, you’re thinking, why is this dude so impressed with himself in figuring out there would be another Monday? It’s not like he invented the electric light, or some shit like that. But what I’m thinking is, I’ve so shredded my brain with all the metal I listened to over the holidays that I’m lucky to remember there’s even a day called Monday. Unfortunately, I still can’t remember what day Monday is.

Anyway, please read about those three overlooked bands after the jump.