MARY CHRIMMAS

 LISTMANIA 2012  5 Responses »
Dec 252012
 

Despite my general bah humbug! attitude toward Christmas, I confess there’s one thing I’m feeling kind of moistly emotional about today, and that’s this blog and everyone who supports it with their writing and their eyes and ears. I am genuinely thankful for what all of you have given me in this ongoing labor of love.

I actually feel this way almost every day, though I don’t often express the feeling in print. What’s making me gooey about NCS today is our Listmania series, and in particular how enthusiastic people have been about it this year, not only in the level of interest readers have shown in the posts (as reflected both in site visits and the volume of comments), but also in the participation we’ve seen in both The NCS Readers Lists and in guest post submissions.

So far we’ve published 10 year-end guest posts, and as of this morning we’ve still got 11 more to go! What’s especially cool about this, apart from the enthusiasm of the support we’re receiving, is the tremendous diversity reflected in these lists. It really hasn’t been the same thing repeated over and over again, not by a long shot, and that diversity of interest is going to continue in the lists that are up-coming. Diversity means new discoveries, and new discoveries (at least for me) are the main reason year-end lists are worth reading.

We’ve also got more NCS staff lists on the way. For example, in our next post today we’ll begin a multi-part year-end series by BadWolf that I’ve really enjoyed reading. Continue reading »

BYRD’S 10 FAVORITE FREEBIES OF 2012

 Free Shit, Listmania, LISTMANIA 2012  32 Responses »
Dec 252012
 

(byrd36 has been hanging around the site since at least September 14, 2010, which is when he taught me the origin of the name Naglfar in his first comment at NCS. In addition to being a long-time supporter of what we do here, dude also knows his metal, as he showed us while writing for Death Metal Baboon, and as you’re about to see again.)

Hello, NCS readers! Friends, brothers and sisters in Metal, I come in peace and offer gifts! I left my list of my favorite twenty metal albums in the NCS Readers’ Lists if anyone cares to get a glimpse of my overall tastes this year. Part of my reason for doing that was my intention to do this list, and with no DMB, I knew I’d probably be pushing my luck trying to sneak just one on here. You know, quality control and such.

Anyway, the idea for this came to me last year at list season and I enjoyed putting one together at DMB then, and figured it may be a good tradition to start. Sorry in advance if I come across a little short on words. Any of you who may be familiar with my previous “writings” will know I’m not a writer, just a fan saying “check this shit out!”.  So, please bear with me as I present you with my ten favorite free and name-your-price releases of 2012.

Just to fuck with y’all, I’m going to put the top three in alphabetical order and then restart the bottom seven in alphabetical order. I refuse to order the list and separated the top three only because they are in my overall top twenty.

Abyssal – Denouement

This one is loaded with plenty of brutal, lots of blackness, and an atmosphere that will most likely smother you where you sit. All of this with a damn fine production, if I may say so. This came out on the second day of this year and I acquired it very shortly afterward. It’s been in heavy rotation ever since.

http://abyssal-home.bandcamp.com/ Continue reading »

FUCK CHRISTMAS

 Mosh Pit  28 Responses »
Dec 242012
 

Yes, it’s time for my annual Christmas rant. I don’t have much new to say, though I have tried to think of new ways to say it.

Serious question before this post goes downhill like a mountain goat in an avalanche: Is there a country or culture outside the West where people commemorate the birth of a major religious figure by spending galactic amounts of money they don’t have buying gifts for people who don’t want them (or at least don’t really need them), especially where the major religious figure himself probably wouldn’t approve if he had any say in the matter?

Hell, why limit it to the commemoration of births? Let’s include death, marriage, getting laid for the first time, performing a big miracle, or any other key event in the life of a god, demi-god, child of god, messiah, prophet, saint, wise man, or fool who occupies an important place in a religious faith.

Here in the U.S. I’ve got a bird’s eye view of the Christmas pocket-emptying, but I have no idea whether anything like this happens outside the part of the world in which Christianity is the dominant creed. I could do some research myself, but who has time for research when you need to be thinking about what needless presents to buy and for whom?

I’m guessing the answer is No. Not because cultures and countries outside the West are any smarter than we are, but because they’re not as rich or as fully engulfed by capitalism as we are. It’s tougher to induce people to blow money in the name of religion when they’re kinda short on discretionary income. Continue reading »

KATATONIA / ALCEST / JUNIUS – LIVE AT RESCUE ROOMS, NOTTINGHAM, DEC 18, 2012

 Concert Reviews  3 Responses »
Dec 242012
 

(NCS writer Andy Synn turns in this review of the live performances by Katatonia, Alcest, and Junius in Nottingham, England on December 18, 2012. Andy also filmed videos of the performances, which appear at the end of the review.)

Funnily enough, for some reason I was a little apprehensive about this show. In hindsight I’m not entirely certain why, as Katatonia were, without a doubt, in the best form I’ve ever seen them at Summer Breeze earlier this year. I can really only ascribe my trepidation to my own lukewarm reaction to the new album.

Thankfully though, there was really very little to worry about, as the Swedes have, for the past several years, been improving as a tight, driven live act, their moody sound much improved by the three-way vocal interplay that they’ve pretty much perfected now.

But before the headliners, we had two other bands, who would both provide their own form of deeply emotive musical catharsis. Continue reading »

VONLUGHLIO’S TOP 25 OF 2012

 Listmania, LISTMANIA 2012  14 Responses »
Dec 242012
 

(As we forge ahead with our 2012 Listmania posts, we’re pleased to present a year-end list from one of our most ardent supporters, who lives in the Dominican Republic and goes by the name Vonlughlio.)

Everyone is doing their end-year list of best metal albums of 2012 and I  would type up my list as well, in order to post it on NCS. But first I just wanted to say that this has been my first year reading NCS and I’ve become a great fan of the site for the following reasons:

1) The music I discovered from the site and the great posts by the man with no head, Islander, the other writers, and guests.

2) The discovery of Bandcamp. I don’t need to state why I love it, because there have been plenty of posts already that basically show why, with all the advantages for records labels, bands, and fans.

3) The love triangle between Islander, Phro, and myself. Hoping we can all get together and go on either a camping or fishing trip and explore!!!

I did a top 25. These albums are just fantastic and a lot of them came from reviews or posts on No Clean Singing. So here is my list: Continue reading »

ANOTHER GODDAMN FUCKING CHRISTMAS STORY

 Phro's Posts  6 Responses »
Dec 242012
 

(In what has become a holiday tradition at NCS, Phro brings us another fucking Christmas story from his residence in Japan. In what has become a holiday tradition at NCS, you may want to have a reliable anti-emetic on hand before you begin reading. I picked the images accompanying this story. I hope Phro likes them.)

“Jingle bells, jingle bells…”

The small mall where I awoke in a puddle of my own green and red vomit was playing the most dreadful MIDI Christmas music, which is a little redundant but whatever. Half of my face was covered in what I assumed had once been the contents of my stomach. I wondered briefly what I had eaten to produce such ghastly vomit, but the appearance of mall security distracted me.

The security guards were both older men…probably in their sixties, I would have said. They smelled like cheap Asian cigarettes, black coffee, and unwashed armpits. I gurgled pathetically in answer to the rapid-fire questions of the first one to reach my side. He gave his partner a look of annoyance and made sharp, shrill clucking noise like a semi-brain-dead chicken attempting to sing a power metal song.

As they conversed in a regional dialect that sounded like a combination of Chinese, Japanese, and angry German Christmas carols, I let my head take a rest from trying to deal with reality and enjoyed the simple warmth of the vomit. After a few moments, though, I noticed a sharp, jabbing pain in one of my butt cheeks as if miniature miners were trying to dig straight through my ass to my colon in search of shit ore. Continue reading »

TR00 NATE’S LIST: THE TOP 30 OF 2012

 Listmania, LISTMANIA 2012  12 Responses »
Dec 242012
 

(At my invitation, former metal blogger Tr00 Nate shares with us his list of 2012’s best albums, and a kvlt list it is.)

Hello everyone, it’s me Tr00 Nate, of the former Number of the Blog. It’s been awhile since I last wrote something for the internet (the last thing I wrote was my 2011 list actually), so please excuse me if I’m more incoherant than usual.

So despite the fact that there’s a ton of shit I still want to listen to, I have managed to sit down and assemble a list of my favorite 30 albums of 2012. However, I’ve only felt composed enough to actually write shit out for the top ten. So yeah, whatever. Each Band – Album Title thingy should take you to a song from that album, because honestly, the music does these albums much more justice than any words that I could say.

#30. Necrovation – Necrovation [Death]
#29. Morbid Saint – Thrashaholic [Thrash]
#28. Desaster – The Arts of Destruction [Black/Thrash]
#27. Entrapment – The Obscurity Within [Death]
#26. Desolate Shrine – The Sanctum of Human Darkness [Finn Death]
#25. Ultra Beast – Out For Too Long [Speed]
#24. Rottrevore – Blind Sided Attack [Death]
#23. Lustre – They Awoke to the Scent of Spring [Black/Ambient]
#22. Deiphago – Satan Alpha Omega [Black]
#21. Aluk Todolo – Occult Rock [Black/Drone]
#20. Seven Kingdoms – The Fire is Mine [Power] Continue reading »

KATAKLYSM: “VICTIMS OF THIS FALLEN WORLD”

 Album Reviews  5 Responses »
Dec 232012
 

(TheMadIsraeli continues his reconsideration of the music of Kataklysm. To see what this is all about, check out his introduction to the series here.)

Yes. That’s really the album cover.

I can just imagine what it must have been like for a fan of Kataklysm to buy this album upon its release in 1998. Because of the more limited channels for disseminating information (compared to now), people who weren’t local and in touch with the band probably didn’t know that vocalist Sylvain Houde wasn’t in Kataklysm anymore, and didn’t know that with the exception of Iacano and Dagenais, the lineup was completely new. They probably weren’t prepared for this album.

You start the first track “As the World Burns” and a resounding “what in the fuck?” permeates every fiber of your being. It’s a melodic death metal riff. One of the most insane, feral death metal bands from the Great White North begins their opening song with a mid-paced melodic death metal riff that you would have heard a million times already, if you had caught wind of anything from Sweden in the 90’s.

I mean, the riff is good, really good actually. It’s got a triumphant marching-into-battle feel and a memorable progression, but still, this probably wasn’t what you bought this album to hear. Continue reading »

DAEMONICUS, HUMANITY DELETE, YELLOWTOOTH

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  1 Response »
Dec 232012
 

I’m still catching up on new music and videos that I noticed over the last week. The songs from the three bands that I’ve collected in this post share a certain something, a death metal kinship, a bond forged with massive hammers and tempered in the fires of a crematorium. It’s music that is un-tempted by the flash and fireworks of modernity, quite happy to simply smash bones into splinters and scatter blood spray like a driving rain.

But although all of the songs have a primarily primal appeal, they’re all really good, really powerful, highly capable of awakening the reptile brain that dozes in all of us and getting it moving and shaking. And they each bring a special flair and style that elevates them above your standard old-school pummeling. Hope you enjoy these holiday goodies from Daemonicus (Sweden), Humanity Delete (the one-man project of Sweden’s Rogga Johansson), and Yellowtooth (U.S.) as much as I have.

DAEMONICUS

Daemonicus came together in 2006, and have recently released their second album, Deadwork, via Abyss Records. Stupid me, I’ve had the promo for this album since September but failed to pay attention until yesterday, when I heard two of the album’s tracks via the internet — an official video that debuted at the end of November for “Nothing But Death” and another song named “The Grandeur of Total Termination”. I fear that I may never manage a proper review given how backlogged I am, but I’m at least going to say something about these two songs. Continue reading »

METAL KVLTVRE

 Mosh Pit  43 Responses »
Dec 232012
 

(Here we have an NCS first. We’re delighted to publish an academic paper prepared for college credit by one of our long-time supporters, a frequent commenter, and a regular source of excellent musical recommendations: His NCS moniker is Utmu. Both Phro and your humble editor happily agreed to be interviewed for Utmu’s project. Usually we only see our names cited in police reports, so this is a refreshing change.)

See what I did there with that title? Yeah, I know, it’s corny. Anyway, I recently took a sociology class and I thoroughly enjoyed it, and luckily for me one of the choices for a final project was a research paper, and I decided to cover heavy metal culture. Also luckily for me, my teacher was quite lenient about sources and other things regarding this paper, and I don’t normally enjoy this sort of thing. Also fortunately for me, I have friends who are metalheads and those friends have opinions and experiences regarding metal culture; both Islander and Phro were very cooperative in the interviews on which I based this project, and I’d like to thank them for their help!

I really enjoyed interviewing them and I also enjoyed writing my paper (even if I did get about 98% of it done from around 2:30 AM to 5 AM the morning of its due date) and I think I did pretty well. I wish I had put more analysis in it, but sadly I had to be able to fit information into 5 or 6 pages — I couldn’t even include everything from the interviews. Also, I realized after reading the project that I utilized in-text citations frequently, but I’m afraid I’m a bit paranoid when it comes to such things.

I sent this in to Islander for a number of reasons: It’s the first academic paper on NCS, I get to help the blog out by contributing something, and maybe this can spark a good discussion (if it does I’d like to send this in to my instructor). Anyway, here is my paper, simply titled “On Metal Culture”. Continue reading »

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