August 2016 - Page 10 of 11 - NO CLEAN SINGING

SEEN AND HEARD: GATECREEPER, FÓRN, PREDATORY LIGHT, HOBBS’ ANGEL OF DEATH, OPETH

Aug 032016

I’m finishing this post on the way to the airport, where I’ll board a flight for Las Vegas with my spouse to attend the wedding of one of her nieces. We’ll be there for three days. That may interfere with NCS activity for the rest of the week. If there’s not much up on the site between now and Sunday, that’s the explanation.

But it may not interfere. Everyone I know who will be at this thing, including my wife, plans to spend a lot of time in the casino. I’m not much for gambling; throwing away money in an undoubtedly losing cause tends to sap the pleasure after a while. And since I’m not keen on getting broiled outside, that leaves the hotel room… and metal.

In the meantime, here’s a quick round-up of new music. Because time is short, I have to largely dispense with reviews/descriptions today. The last time I did this, a reader jumped on me for not at least providing a genre description, so I’ll do that. Continue reading »

SHORT BUT SWEET: VOIDSPAWN — “PYRRHIC”

Album Reviews, SHORT BUT SWEET 8 Responses »

Aug 032016

Time is limited and always fleeting, while new metal seems to rush at us in a boundless flood. Within that limitless tide, some of the most remarkable gems are short releases by obscure new projects, and this is one of them.

The name of this new death metal project is Voidspawn, a duo consisting of multi-instrumentalist M. and vocalist A. Their debut EP is named Pyrrhic and it was released on July 31. Pyrrhic includes three songs, and they are stunningly good. Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: BEYOND THE DARK — “THE EMPTY LAND”

Premieres 3 Responses »

Aug 032016

At the end of last November the Roman band Beyond the Dark released their self-titled, six-track debut EP. I’ve now forgotten how I discovered it. I intended to sample only a song or two, but it pinned me in place like a butterfly beneath a needle until the last song had finished — and then I got busy writing about it. Today I have an excuse to revisit that little gem because we’re premiering a guitar play-through video for one of the songs, “The Empty Land”.

As I wrote last year, “Beyond the Dark play melodic death metal without forgetting that the genre is still supposed to be death metal.” The vocals are feral and ferocious, and the scything riffs and bone-rattling drumbeats combine to deliver a sensation of rampaging savagery. Continue reading »

AN NCS INTERVIEW: ARGUS

Exceptions to the Rule, Interviews 2 Responses »

Aug 022016

(Comrade Aleks returns to NCS with this interview of Butch Balich, vocalist of the Pennsylvania heavy doom band Argus.)

Despite the Lovecraftian monstrous form of giant Argus who dwells on every artwork of this band, the Argus outfit doesn’t exactly resemble such a brutal creature. Since the year 2005 they have played a solemn and stoical blend of doom and heavy metal, bringing down on listeners stories of endurance and damnation.

The band regularly play live shows, and usually Argus do not make their listeners wait for too long before giving them some new music periodically, but three years have gone by since the release of their third full-length Beyond the Martyrs, and it’s time to ask the obvious question about new material the band has to offer. This question is well-timed, as Argus’ voice Butch Balich has some important news for you. Continue reading »

WAKE, THEORIES, AND VERMIN WOMB TO ENGAGE IN SEISMIC ACTIVITY THROUGHOUT WESTERN NORTH AMERICA, WITH ASSISTANCE FROM NCS

Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC 3 Responses »

Aug 022016

During the month of October and continuing into the first week of November, three bands with tremendous firepower at their disposal will threaten the structural integrity of venues up and down western North America, from Tijuana, Mexico, in the south to Vancouver, BC, in the north. The bands are Wake, Theories, and Vermin Womb, and we’re helping spread the word about this tour, basically because we enjoy the spectacle of large-scale demolition jobs — and because this is a completely DIY tour booked by the bands that deserves our support.

If you get out a map and trace the precise route of this tour, it comes uncomfortably close to tracking some major fault lines that run down the West Coast. Theories play two shows in Nevada and then join Wake and Vermin Womb for performances at the Southwest Terror Fest in Tuscon (headlined by Pig Destroyer and Agoraphobic Nosebleed). After that the tour heads to Tijuana for the bands’ first-ever appearance there and then turns north and rampages right up the coast, through California, Oregon, Washington, and then on across the border into British Columbia. Continue reading »

BANDCAMP IS NOW HOME TO THE 200TH METAL LABEL

Metal News 1 Response »

Aug 022016

Today marks a milestone worth recognizing: Norway’s Indie Recordings has become the 200th metal label to set up shop on Bandcamp. We learned this through a post by our friends at Metal Bandcamp, who have been keeping track of such things since 2011. As a measure of how much things have changed, in November 2011 the founder of Metal Bandcamp, MaxR, wrote a guest post for our site (here) identifying the 10 metal labels who had established Bandcamp pages as of that time — only 10 in 2011, but now 200.

If you want to see the actual list of all 200 metal labels that Metal Bandcamp has compiled, go here, and to read more about this 200-label milestone, check out Max’s post about the event here.

Things really have changed dramatically in the distribution of music since Bandcamp first launched. Our first post about the phenomenon of Bandcamp was this one back in March 2010. After outlining the features then offered by Bandcamp in detail, I concluded with this thought: Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: ORPHALIS — “RESHAPING THE OMNIPRESENCE”

Premieres 5 Responses »

Aug 022016

In mid-June we had the pleasure of bringing you the premiere of a lyric video for a track called “Encased In A Higher Intellect” by the German band Orphalis from their second album The Birth of Infinity, which will be released by Amputated Vein Records later this month. Today we bring you a first listen for another song from the album, this one named “Reshaping the Omnipresence“.

For those of you who haven’t yet encountered Orphalis, they execute a particularly brutal form of technical death metal that’s both electrifying and bludgeoning. And those talents are on full display in this adrenaline-triggering new song. Continue reading »

SOME HARDCORE…

Album Reviews, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC 1 Response »

Aug 022016

(NCS contributor Todd Manning returns to NCS with these recommendations of recent hardcore releases and reissues.)

If Black Metal has staked its claim to the heart of winter, maybe Hardcore, Punk, and Grind should do the same for the dead of summer. This latest batch of releases does nothing if not invoke the atmosphere of furnace-like basement shows and all the blood, sweat, and beer that comes along with the territory. As Metal labels seem to take a breather from their first-quarter release schedules, their feral counterparts are here to take up the slack.

G.L.O.S.S.

And perhaps you’ve heard of this first act, seeing as how they’ve been receiving quite a bit of attention. The second release from G.L.O.S.S., Trans Day of Revenge, is an exhibition of absolutely unhinged Hardcore Punk, seething with the type of anger and outrage that is the lifeblood of the genre. There is a loose ferocity to their sound that places a premium on emotion over precision, but in this case that’s definitely a good thing. Focused on LGBT issues, their focus is laser-sharp and timely and should not be slept on. This release as well as the first demo are both available on Bandcamp at the name-your-price level. Continue reading »

SHADES OF BLACK (PART 1): NEUROSIS, PROSTERNATUR, ARÊTE, MYSTICUM, SOLAR MASS, HORN IMPALER, HORSE DRAWN

Album Reviews, SHADES OF BLACK, SHORT BUT SWEET 2 Responses »

Aug 012016

On Friday I mentioned that I would be out in the woods over the weekend and unable to post a Shades of Black installment on Sunday. I said I would get it ready for Saturday instead. That obviously didn’t happen. Rather than wait until next Sunday, I’ve decided to do it now — and to double-down by making this a multi-part post. I’m not saying how many other parts there will be or when the rest of them will appear this week — because I’m desperately trying to remember the lesson that part-time, half-witted metal bloggers should never reveal plans that may fall apart immediately.

In this first part, I’m focusing on six individual songs and videos that have appeared recently. I’ll get to some EPs and full album releases in the next part. But first, a trailer for a highly anticipated new album…

NEUROSIS

This first item is kind of outside the bounds of what Shades of Black usually focuses on, but I got so excited about it that I didn’t want to delay spreading the word until our next Seen and Heard round-up. It’s a video trailer for the new eleventh album by the mighty Neurosis. It’s name is Fires Within Fires and it will be released on September 23 by Neurot Recordings. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: COMA CLUSTER VOID — “IRON EMPRESS”

Premieres 8 Responses »

Aug 012016

(Austin Weber arranged, and now introduces, our premiere of a song from the debut album by the multinational band Coma Cluster Void.)

While 2016 has been an exceptionally good year for quality metal releases so far, there’s one album I’ve been anxiously awaiting above almost all else, Coma Cluster Void’s debut full-length, Mind Cemeteries. Some of you may be familiar with the group from when we premiered the album’s title track here at NCS last year. Others still may have noticed that our esteemed editor placed the album on a list of his most anticipated 2016 releases back in January at NCS. It seems things have come full circle, as we get to debut another song by the band! The one we are premiering today is a ferocious ode to chaos and bleakness entitled “Iron Empress”.

From what the band told me, the song title is a reference to the foreboding being that adorns the cover art of the album, the Iron Empress on the cover standing in as a metaphor for the album’s concept and themes. Coma Cluster Void members John Strieder and Mike DiSalvo explained a bit about this in the following statement: Continue reading »

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