KVELERTAK, DARK TRANQUILLITY, NACHT, AND DEEK

Here are some things I saw and heard over the last 24 hours that gave me a lift.  Mayhaps they will lift you, too.

KVELERTAK

I liked Kvelertak’s first album, but I haven’t heard the new one, Meir. But Badwolf has, and he raved about it: “[T]hey throw parties to which their music is the soundtrack, and I cannot think of better party music”. Yesterday they premiered a video on various web sites for one of those new songs, “Kvelertak”, and today it went up on YouTube.  It’s an interesting name for a song.  In a subtle way it reminds me of the name of the band. It also reminds me of why I like rock music, because it fuckin’ rocks balls.

The video is also really good. Director Stian Andersen traipsed along with the band for a handful of shows on their recent tour of Europe, and he and his crew filmed parts of the ones in London, Cologne, Paris, and Oslo, plus some off-stage stuff, too (eg, shower scenes). And then he edited all that footage beautifully. Asses will be kicked by this; mine is black and blue. Watch it:

(via MetalSucks)

 

DARK TRANQUILLITY

When Dark Tranquillity premiered “For Broken Words”, the first track from their new album Construct, I wrote: “I suspect this song is going to draw very mixed reactions as a choice for the first full track premiere. It’s neither galvanizing nor particularly vicious and it may be closer to doom than to DT’s usual style of melodic death metal. But I’m liking it, and I suspect the album is going to be musically varied, with “For Broken Words” being merely one kind of taste of what’s coming.”

Yesterday a second song premiered (at MetalSucks), and sure enough, it’s proof that the album is indeed going to be a varied assortment of music. “The Science of Noise” is closer than “For Broken Words” to the more traditional style of melodic death metal for which DT is known, with galloping riffs and infectious keyboards . . . but Mikael Stanne’s vocals continue to sound vicious. I really like this song (including the visual accompaniment in the video), and I’m getting damned hungry for the whole album.

Construct will be released on May 27 via Century Media Records. Also, it appears DT have filmed a music video for the song “Uniformity” with Patric Ullaeus, so it seems we have yet another album teaser to look forward to in the near future. Listen up:

 

NACHT

This next song made its appearance on YouTube yesterday. It isn’t really a video, because the picture doesn’t move. It’s just a photo of a stream running through a forest, which is a clue of sorts, but truthfully it’s a misleading clue, as you’ll find out. Unlike the image, the music moves . . . and is moving.

The song is “Bleak Leafs of Autumn” by a German black metal band named Nacht and it’s the second track from their upcoming full-length debut Memories, which will be released in late 2013 via Dunkelheit Produktionen. I found the song utterly mesmerizing. It’s slow, dark, and dreamlike, with a plodding, hypnotic drumbeat, and it swims in a shimmering tide of tremolo’d buzzing, reverberating arpeggios, and pulsating bass. The vocals, pleasing to my ears, are like scars raked by claws — except when they float cleanly and wordlessly above this stream or intone lyrics somberly.

There are only three tracks on the album, with the others lasting about 27 minutes and 15 minutes. “Bleak Leafs” is only 9 1/2. It’s bleak, naturalistic black metal and I’m digging it. It’s somewhere over on the other side of the universe from “Kvelertak” and “The Science of Noise”, but it’s just as nourishing to a hungry soul.

 

DEEK

A friend of mine recommended this next video to me, thinking it might have a place on NCS. I thought long and hard about it, and finally decided, yes, it has a place here. First, because our middle name is “ridiculous”.  And second, because this video was made to support a concept — in the words of its maker, Derek “Deek” Diedricksen, it’s “a concept for inner-city kids who might want a tree house-like experience, fort-wise, but might not have access to trees on their lot, and might additionally be dealing with limited space.” I can get behind that. More info about this lollipop fort of death can be found here.

And now here’s your geeky-white-boy-rap-metal for the day, with some shred at the end.