SEEN AND HEARD ON A SATURDAY: ADVERSARIAL, ARROGANZ, BLACK TOTEM, CULT LEADER, DEAD FLESH, HENRY KANE, LILJEVARS BRANN, OU, SIG:AR:TYR, TÝR, ULTIO, VULGARIS

It’s the 30th day of March, and 30 is about the number of new songs and videos I checked out in anticipation of this roundup, all of them having surfaced during the past week. I settled on an even dozen to share with you, and you probably won’t like all of them, even if you’re tenacious enough to go through all 12.

Why? Because your range of heavy metallic interests is probably narrower than mine (most people’s are), and the big herd below ranges pretty far and wide. On the other hand, the breadth of the range means you’ll probably find something to like.

Because there’s so much to get through, I dispensed with uploading and re-sizing all the cover art and tried to limit myself (with varying degrees of success) to more pithy expressions than usual. I also alphabetized the selections by band name.

P.S. There will be more recommendations tomorrow, Easter Sunday notwithstanding. In fact, the Easter observance just makes me more eager to char the day black.

 

ADVERSARIAL (Canada)

It’s been a long damned wait for more Adversarial music, close to 9 years since their last album, but at last they have a new one on the way, and the first single from it is how we begin today’s roundup.

Propelled by the sharp, super-fast rattle of the snare drum and thunderous bass-lines, “Merging Within the Destroyer” submerges the listener in dense, swarming and wailing riffage that sounds diseased and distraught as well as deranged. Abyssal gutturals and hideous howls regurgitate the words, and the recurrence of shrill, screaming solos top up the fuel in the madness.

The name of Adversarial‘s new album is Solitude with the Eternal…, and it will be released by Dark Descent on May 31st.

https://darkdescentrecords.bandcamp.com/album/solitude-with-the-eternal
https://www.facebook.com/AdversarialOfficial

 

 

ARROGANZ (Germany)

Arroganz describe the next song, “Dungeon Soul“, as one that “shows our love for bands like Asphyx and bands like Wolfbrigade at the same time – combined with some slow thrash metal riffs and an epic bass solo at the end”.

And that’s a pretty good preview of what’s about to happen. The bass makes its big presence known throughout the song, along with rabid vocals, clobbering drumwork, riffs that sometimes feel like a sewing machine stitching our skins or jackhammers busting up concrete, and leads that miserably squirm. That bass solo also sounds like misery. Good video too.

“Dungeon Soul” is off an Arroganz album named Quintessenz that will be released by Supreme Chaos Records on May 24th.

https://scr-arroganz.bandcamp.com/album/quintessenz
https://www.facebook.com/arroganzgermany

 

 

BLACK TOTEM (Finland)

At first I didn’t think I was going to like this next song, “Sacrifice Tonite“, what with the singing and all, but it grew on me the more I listened.

The death/rocking music is sinister and spooky, the grooves are muscle-moving, and the vocals turn out to be the biggest hook, and are just raw and ragged enough to appeal to a lover of ugly sounds like me. The deep chanting and high wailing near the end work very well too, as does the quivering solo in the finale.

The song is the title track from Black Totem‘s new album III: Sacrifice Tonite. It will be released in June by Svart Records.

https://orcd.co/iiisacrificetonite
https://www.svartrecords.com/en/product/black-totem-iii:-sacrifice-tonite-lp/12379
https://www.facebook.com/BlackTotem666/

 

 

CULT LEADER (U.S.)

Coupled with its scary video, this next song delivers spiders and skulls; thoroughly mangling guitars and bludgeoning drums; crucifixes and knives; slashing chords and furious screams; hooded figures wielding scythes and digging hands; pestilent pulsating leads and screeching feedback; plus bursts of jackhammer groove and moments of awful oppression.

“Learn to Love It” is a stand-alone single, released by Deathwish. It was recorded during the same studio session as “Ataraxis” and “Long Shadows” from Cult Leader‘s split with END in 2022.

https://dthw.sh/learntoloveit
https://cultleadermusic.bandcamp.com/album/learn-to-love-it
https://www.facebook.com/CultLeaderMusic/

 

 

DEAD FLESH (UK)

Here I am blasting my trumpet for Dead Flesh again, just two weeks after doing it the first time.

Please set aside whatever prejudices you may hold against deathcore (I hold a few of my own), and prepare for a song that’s meaner than a junkyard dog and blacker than a vat of pitch. The clanging riffs feel like being beaten with big tire irons; the blizzard-like riffs feel like acid on the boil; the throat-ruining screams are as frighteningly crazed as anything else you’re likely to hear; and the gargantuan growls are monstrous. Megaton bombs also go off, in case your internal organs haven’t already been liquefied by everything else.

And once again, Dead Flesh have presented the song through a video that ratchets up the intensity of music that’s already damned intense and ruthlessly destructive.

The song is from this band’s debut EP Dehumanise, set for release on April 28th.

https://deadflesh.bandcamp.com/music
https://www.facebook.com/DeadFleshUK

 

 

HENRY KANE (Sweden)

Selfmadegod Records has published a YouTube stream for a Henry Kane song called “Numb“, which I promptly checked out.

The song is a very dark one, but often frighteningly majestic in its towering scale, and equally obliterating. The vocals are raw and unhinged, and the brightness of the rapidly whirling leads seizes attention just as much as the catastrophic upheavals and detonations in the low end. The song also inflicts brutish pile-driving grooves and explodes in percussive blasting — a few more ingredients as if more were needed to take your breath away.

I have a vague recollection that this song appeared on a Transcending Obscurity Records label sampler back in early 2022, but it’s not there any more so I don’t know. It will be included on Henry Kane‘s third album Circle Of Pain, which Selfmadegod has set for release on May 17th.

https://www.facebook.com/HenryKaneGrind
https://www.facebook.com/Selfmadegod/

 

 

LILJEVARS BRANN (Germany)

The next song is “Dansa Mej Brodar I Fyre“, the first single from the debut album of this German duo. The name of the album is Helja Kor, and it will be released by Octopus Rising (a sub-label of Argonauta Records). I found it utterly captivating, as well as very distressing.

It includes elegant but deeply dolorous folk instrumentals that seem rooted in a very distant age, and haunting singing backed by haunted gasps. But it also includes abrasive riffs and slowly moaning melodies (which sound in part like an old fiddle) that carry the melody forward, matched with tormented snarls, fracturing screams, and tortured singing.

It’s a long song, and moves through different phases, some delicate and beautifully somber but mysterious, where falsetto vocals play a key role (along with keys), and others more searing and wrenching, but no less ancient and supernatural in their atmosphere.

I wish I had a list of all the instruments used in the song.

https://ingrv.es/dansa-mej-brodar-i-stz-w
https://www.facebook.com/liljevarsbrannofficial/

 

 

OU (China)

Next up is a song named “淨化 Purge”, which is presented through a video. It juxtaposes several contrasting features, but I confess that the juxtaposition which made the biggest impact on me was witnessing the band’s guest (and NCS favorite) Devin Townsend screaming his lungs out in Chinese while Lynn Wu sings.

His appearance isn’t shocking, because the song favorably reminds me of music he might have made at one point. Other juxtapositions include thudding, syncopated, djent-like grooves and expanses of shimmering cosmic synths; lively and inventive percussive acrobatics courtesy of drummer Anthony Vanacore and swirling keys; and Wu‘s drifting and high-flying vocals which merge into the synths. But it’s the tandem of vocals in the final minute that are most arresting.

The song is from an album named 蘇醒II: Frailty that will be released on April 26th via InsideOutMusic.

https://ou.lnk.to/II-Frailty
https://www.facebook.com/ou.theband

 

 

SIG:AR:TYR (Canada)

The next song I selected is “Ascending the Stellar Throne” from a forthcoming album named Citadel of Stars, so it’s not much of a leap to expect music of celestial sweep and grandeur — and that’s what you get.

The drumming and bass-work in the song give it a vibrant, head-moving pulse, as do rapidly rippling and dancing keys. There’s soloing ahead that’s gloriously fret-melting, as well as blast-beat drums, and the vocals are strangled acidic snarls, but it’s the vast sweep and symphonic scale of the surrounding sounds that constantly manifests the constellations.

The album will be released by Hammerheart Records on May 31st.

https://sigartyr.lnk.to/citadelofstars
https://sigartyr.bandcamp.com/album/citadel-of-stars
http://www.sigartyr.com
https://www.facebook.com/SIGARTYR

 

 

TÝR (Faroe Islands)

Two bands back to back with Tyr in their name. Just a coincidence.

Here’s how the band describes the music in “Dragons Never Die“:

“The song starts with a long harmonic crescendo on drums and guitar reminiscent of classical Deep Purple, then shifts an eastern inspired melodic journey back in time with wordless singalong parts, going into a rhythmically simple and stomping verse about a gold-grabbing dragon and a protagonist set on defeating it. It’s a fast and riveting chorus. The metal story progresses and culminates into a face melting solo. With the last chorus, the protagonist finds that becoming rich beyond measure just makes him the next dragon.”

I admit the song is cheesy, but it’s still glorious, as is the setting in the video — and about as close to power metal as I’ll ever get.

“Dragons Never Die” is from a new album named Battle Ballads, set for release on April 12th via Metal Blade Records.

https://www.metalblade.com/tyr/
https://www.facebook.com/tyrband

 

 

ULTIO (Italy)

Time to turn in a very different direction from that last song.

“The Grey Inferno” is breathtaking but very distressing. The drumming sounds like a combination of helicopter rotors going full speed and a high-caliber machine-gun blasting for all its worth. The riffing has a dense, searing sound, and other grand, horn-like tones elevate with them, collectively creating sensations of pain and turmoil on a magnificent scale, along with shattering vocals that are even more agonized and a gigantic rumbling bass that sounds like the crushing of rock.

By the end, the music sounds like the wailing of an emergency siren during a terrible catastrophe in progress.

The song is from an EP named Cor, the second EP from this solo black metal project of Giorgio Barroccu, and it will be released by Brucia Records on May 23rd.

https://bruciarecords.bandcamp.com/album/cor

 

 

VULGARIS (UK)

And finally, we close with a new song from the UK band Vulgaris and their forthcoming Promethean second album Seat Of The Fire, which is described as an amalgam of “black, sludge and thrash metal, among other styles, and contains influences from the likes of Regarde Les Hommes Tomber, Gojira and Sylosis“.

“Siege” is guaranteed to turn the ignition in your body and get the motor running hot and fast. The riffing pumps like fully fueled pistons as the drums batter and tumble, but the guitars also slowly ring like eerie chimes, slither like fiery serpents, and convulse in bouts of broiling madness. The panther-like snarls and bear-like roars are a different kind of (very vicious) madness.

But the song also segues into slower and more dismal and dissonant territory, allowing the metal-mangling bass to step forward. Those dismal clanging tones build feelings of tension and despair, putting nerves on edge and eventually dragging the listener into a pit of pain.

Seat Of The Fire is set for release on May 24th. It’s available for pre-order now.

https://vulgaris2017.bandcamp.com/album/seat-of-the-fire
https://www.facebook.com/VBANDUK