Jan 252019
 

 

At least to my way of thinking, a song can be infectious for different reasons. It might have a melodic hook or a rhythmic pattern that gets stuck in your head. Perhaps a guitar solo calls you back to its siren song. The particular mood or atmosphere of the music might create its own mesmerizing and memorable effect. But particularly in the case of metal, perhaps the most primally appealing quality is the one that wrecks your neck, the one that gets heads banging hard. And that’s the quality that unites the three songs I’m adding to this list today, even though the genre styles are different.

To check out the previous installments of this expanding list, you’ll find them behind this link, and to learn what this series is all about, go here.

LLNN

When I reviewed and premiered Deeds, the 2018 album by this Danish band, I called it “a sonic super-weapon, one that operates on multiple levels, inflicting both psychic and physical trauma on a shattering scale. It fires the imagination on multiple levels as well, bringing to mind terrifying vistas of apocalyptic obliteration as well as unnerving diaphonous visions that gleam with astral light.”

Not surprisingly, given the vast scale of the music and its relentless intensity, the band explained that the overarching theme of Deeds was “about births and downfalls of civilizations in other worlds throughout the universe, from creation to final decay, the depletion of the host….” Continue reading »

Jan 252019
 

 

Much has been written by survivors of near-death experiences. As summarized in The Font of All Human Knowledge, in some instances survivors describe positive sensations of “detachment from the body, feelings of levitation, total serenity, security, warmth, the experience of absolute dissolution, and the presence of a light”. For others, there are “sensations of torment and torture”.

The Italian band He Comes Later explore a particular kind of near-death experience in their debut album, Cognizance (released last October), meticulously following the experience of a tortured protagonist who brings himself to the brink of suicide, and over the brink. Through remarkably evocative and eloquent lyrics, the songs trace the path into oblivion — and out again, with a second chance to go on, no longer despising the gift of life. Continue reading »

Jan 252019
 

 

(We present Andy Synn‘s review of the new album by A Secret Revealed, which will be released by Lifeforce Records on January 25th.)

I’d like to begin this review with a little aside, if I may?

The upcoming launch of the (probably terrible) Lords of Chaos movie has, unsurprisingly, sparked quite a few conversations about whether Black Metal has finally “gone mainstream” or not.

Now while I wouldn’t call it “mainstream” by any means – I fully expect this just to be another example of the popular crowd experiencing a passing fascination with a particular sub-culture, only to quickly move on to the next “in” thing as soon as it appears – I wouldn’t deny that Black Metal, and all its variants, sub-styles, and hybrid offspring, has experienced a definite upswing in exposure and awareness over the past several years.

In some ways this is a good thing. More people are discovering music that would, in other circumstances, have been well outside of their usual comfort zone, and many of these are then diving deeper into the history and importance of the genre (and, in turn, bringing new blood and new voices into it, preventing it from stagnating).

On the other hand, it’s also leading to quite a few people developing a very superficial understanding of what “Black Metal” is, one usually informed only by the most mainstream-friendly examples, causing them to misuse and misapply the term in all sorts of different ways, ranging from the simply misleading, to the downright mind-boggling.

And nowhere is this more obvious, to me at least, than in the liminal space where “Post Metal” meets “Post Black Metal”… which brings us, quite nicely to Sacrifices, the new album from German quintet A Secret Revealed. Continue reading »

Jan 252019
 

 

We have been following the Swedish band Mist of Misery for several years, beginning with a review and full premiere of their second album Absence in 2016, following that with an interview of the band, and writing about their follow-up EPs in 2017, Shackles of Life and Fields of Isolation.

All those releases presented multi-faceted trips of changing moods and varying energies, managed with a sure hand, which created a blend of haunting ambience, symphonic power, and blackened ferocity, while repeatedly displaying the band’s knack for driving home their penetrating and memorable melodies as they moved among changing shades of darkness. But now they’ve completed work on a massive new album that includes songs which are longer, darker, and more atmospheric than on any previous release.

The new album is named Unalterable. It’s nearly two hours long, and will be released as a double-CD by Black Lion Records on April 12th. Today what we have for you is an official video for the first-released song from the album, “Halls of Emptiness“. Continue reading »

Jan 242019
 

 

In this lucky 13th Part of our Most Infectious Song list, I’m doing what I’ve done a few times before — picking tracks from 2018 albums that were widely enjoyed among the ranks of our nefarious writers (and large swaths of our readers). This isn’t always the case, of course, since I’m just as likely to pick songs the other writers might not have even heard before, but that I relish. But not today.

To check out the previous installments of this expanding list, you’ll find them behind this link, and to learn what this series is all about, go here.

RIVERS OF NIHIL

The fact that all (or nearly all) of us were especially high on an album from last year doesn’t necessarily mean that we would all coalesce around the same track from the album from this list. I don’t know for sure, because the rest of our writers don’t all weigh in with their thoughts about what the list should include — not that I would necessarily bow to their wishes anyway. I do pay attention to what our readers have suggested, but there was quite a bit of scatter in their urgings with respect to Rivers of Nihil‘s latest album — which isn’t surprising. Continue reading »

Jan 242019
 

 

Prepare to have your mind blown, because the song we’re about to present really is the kind of extravagantly explosive experience that will leave the most hardened listener pop-eyed, slack-jawed, and wondering “what the hell did I just hear?!?

Prayeggrh” is the name of this song, and it’s one of five (plus a bonus cover of an Arkhon Infaustus track) included on Outpregnate, a new MCD by the Swiss black/death metal band Eggs of Gomorrh, which is set for a March 22 release by the extremist French label Krucyator Productions. The outrageous cover artwork by Daniel “Nekronikon” Corcuera is enough to leave most people pop-eyed and slack-jawed, but it still might not be sufficient warning of the sounds that lie within. Continue reading »

Jan 242019
 

 

I’m not going to pretend that this selection of five new songs is well-rounded, or that it’s going to appeal to a broad range of tastes. To borrow a pungent phrase from my friend Andy’s Altarage review yesterday, some of it probably qualifies as war crimes under the Geneva Convention. The most deviant extremists among you will probably lap up all of it; others may pick and choose, or just run for the hills.

If you’re in the mood to get your neck wrecked and don’t care how filthy you have to get, or how mentally traumatized, you’ll probably be fine. Probably.

SINMARA

If there’s a pinnacle in this post, before the descent into increasingly horrifying, visceral, and viscera-strewn trauma, it’s this new song by Sinmara, who are certainly one of the brightest beacons in the rich star-field of Icelandic black metal. However, to be clear, this isn’t easy listening, even for those whose brains have been thoroughly marinated in the poisonous broth of metallic hostility. Continue reading »

Jan 232019
 

 

On we go into the 12th installment of this list, in which I’ve added three more songs. To check out the previous installments of this expanding list, you’ll find them behind this link, and to learn what this series is all about, go here.

ALKALOID

Well, you had to know there would be an Alkaloid song on this list. We devoted a lot of attention to Liquid Anatomy (and of course so did the rest of metaldom), including Andy’s review of the album and premiere of a song, his subsequent placement of the album on his Critical Top 10 list for all of 2018, and DGR’s positioning of the record at the No. 2 spot on his own year-end Top 50 list, accompanied by an extensive write-up. Continue reading »

Jan 232019
 

 

(Here’s Andy Synn‘s review of the new album by the Spanish extremists Altarage, which will be released on January 25 through Season Of Mist (CD/LP/Digital) and Sentient Ruin (cassette tape).)

It’s weird to think that, sometimes, I forget exactly what albums I’ve reviewed or who I’ve written about here at NCS.

I suppose it shouldn’t be that surprising. After all, although I’m not sure exactly how many articles I write each year I know that it’s a lot… and all alongside the steadily growing demands of my day job and my own band(s).

Case in point, it wasn’t until I did a quick search of the site that I was reminded that I actually wrote about Altarage’s second album, the monstrous Endinghent, in late 2017, describing it as:

“…one of the grimmest, most gruesome albums of the year…”

And while it’s a description I still stand by, all the signs and portents suggest that The Approaching Roar is an even grimmer and more gruesome record yet. Continue reading »

Jan 232019
 

 

The Ides of March is the date set by Alma Mater Records (the label run by Moonspell’s Fernando Ribeiro) for the release of the first album by a quintet of Portuguese extremists who’ve taken the name Okkultist. Entitled Reinventing Evil, it delivers eight onslaughts of rabid death metal brutality, inspired by such progenitors as Master, Abomination, early Morbid Angel, Death, and Dismember — and today it’s our sadistic pleasure to bring you a stream of the album’s title track.

At the front of Okkultist is growler and screamer Beatriz Mariano, surrounded by lead guitarist Leander Sandmeier, rhythm guitarist Moisés Filho, bassist David Justin, and drummer The Lorke. They chose “Reinventing Evil” as the first sign of what the album holds in store because, as Beatriz tells us, “it’s a punch in the face — a small taste of the pain we have ready to bring you!” And yeah, it really is a powerhouse punch in the face. Continue reading »