(written by Islander)
Between signing off on yesterday’s roundup and starting this one, various events conspired to prevent me from making this one as substantial as yesterday’s. One of them involved a surfeit of gin, another a forgetfulness about something I agreed to do today with my spouse; possibly the two are connected.
A rash of new musical discoveries over the last 24 hours was also a contributing factor. They complicated the making of choices at a time when time has become short.
Well, enough about all that, I’d better get started or this collection will turn out to be even briefer than brief. Be forewarned: Nothing in here today resembles conventional black metal, or even black metal at all in some cases.
CAGED BASTARD (Tunisia)
“Gaze into the Void of Madness” is this Tunisian one-man band’s latest release, a single song but it’s 20 minutes, 20 seconds long. The name of the song functions as an invitation to listeners, and shapeshifting aural madness is indeed what awaits us.
The song sets a grisly hook right away with the menacing pulse of a heavy, warbling refrain, futuristic but also malignant, eventually joined by shrill sensations that create a harrowing harmony. It’s all undergirded by thudding blows and thrilling snare-fills, and fronted by crackling snarls.
Caged Bastard turns up the intensity and the fear factor in different ways, letting the drums go wild and drenching the listener in humongous low-end convulsions and siren-like pulsations — but then suddenly swerves, drumless, into dismally moaning guitar arpeggios and absolutely horrifying abyssal words.
Eventually, enormous sonic boulders begin falling, vicious snarls strain at their chains, and the abrasive riffing returns with febrile throbs, bringing madness to that grieving interlude melody. And again, Caged Bastard torques the intensity, creating an even more harrowing storm, but then pivots again, slowing and heavily heaving but also bringing in feverish riffage, creating accursed visions of primitive monstrosity and sizzling poison (or ants swarming in the blood), but likely causing heads to rhythmically move too.
With about four minutes left, the song turns a corner into a different (and again drumless) nightmare. Eerie and voidlike are the surrounding ambient sensations, though there’s a distant, chilling pulse out there too; horribly crocodilian are the voices that torture our ears with gaping jaws.
I recommend these nightmares to you, but I also recommend you don’t listen to it just before trying to slumber. It definitely will disturb any attempts to rest. I’ll also share some of Caged Bastard‘s words about the inspiration of the song:
A 20-minute descent into inherited madness, coded obedience, and the illusion of free will. This one-track EP stands as a ritual of observation, of those who walk pre-written paths with inherited gestures and borrowed voices. Every breath, every movement, echoes scripts carved in ancestral silence….
[T]his piece was born from alienation, from a refusal to merge with the collective trance. It is not a cry for belonging. It is a lens. A gaze.
https://cagedbastard.bandcamp.com/album/gaze-into-the-void-of-madness
https://www.facebook.com/cagedbastard
OBŠAR (Slovakia)
V rabstvi merzotnyka is the name of this unorthodox Slovakian band’s new EP. They explain:
“Merzotnyk” – a slimy and poisonous serpent has awakened from a long slumber!
It spits venom on everyone and everything, poisoning people’s minds.
“Merzotnyk” is a liar, a charlatan, an obscurantist, and his goal is to lead humanity to ruin.
We live in an era full of Merzotnyks, we are their slaves – we live “In the slavery of the Merzotnyk”!
Four songs long, the EP is a twisting and turning adventure. The ridiculously infectious opener “Sucha rokyta” makes me think of a hybrid of ’80s New Wave and malicious black/death that mauls, sizzles, and inflicts punishing body blows. The sprightly dancing keys sound jubilant; the ugly-as-hell vocals sound demonic; the scampering and bouncing drums will make you… want to bounce. A symphonic layer also appears, and at the end, you get strident singing as a closing twist.
From there, across the next three songs, Obšar continue integrating floor-bouncing grooves, head-slugging jolts, vocals which sound like monstrous and maniacal creatures being strangled (but still furious), and a changing array of electronics.
“Sľipa vira” is menacing and classically symphonic but also futuristic, and wailing female vocals add a forlorn accent. “Falošnŷj prorok” creates sensations of frightening celestial sweep and towering but ominous magnificence, but Obšar are still determined to make your head and feet bounce, and this time the darting keys sound devilishly sinister (there’s more singing too, which wordlessly climbs higher and higher, with spine-tingling consequences).
The symphonic overlays in the closer “Plamiň rozumu” are dark and oppressive, a heavy shadow of doom, or the gaze of Sauron. The darting keys are frantic in a way that signals insanity and fear; even the bounding grooves are frantic. Not sure if there are vocals in this one, or simply the sound of horns, but either way they bring sorrow beneath the shadows.
https://obshar.bandcamp.com/album/v-rabstvi-merzotnyka-ep-2025
https://www.facebook.com/obsharband
SANGUISUGABOGG (U.S.)
The last two songs and videos in this collection are among the new musical discoveries over the last 24 hours. They would have made more sense in yesterday’s collection since they’re outside most people’s conception of black or blackened metal, but I didn’t get to them soon enough… and I don’t want to wait another week to help spread the word about them.
The first one is “Abhorrent Contraception” by Sanguisugabogg and their guest Josh Welshman from Defeated Sanity, presented in a video directed by Errick Easterday that depicts scenes of a seemingly blissful white suburban family circa the ’50s that unravels in increasingly horrifying ways (we get to see the band performing as well).
As for the song, it’s monstrous — monstrously bludgeoning and monstrously ugly — but also a channel of frantically sizzling and freakishly swirling serial-killer madness. Devin Swank‘s raw, howls and gurgling gutturals add their own monstrous presence, and the bass sounds like bubbling lava way down below.
When the song slows, all those ingredients are still there, but somehow even more horrific. When it speeds up, it transforms into an even more ruthless sonic pile-driver and an even more sadistic mutilation machine.
A crushing and creepy experience, made even more creepy by a spoken-word recital, but a big head-mover too.
The song is from a new Sanguisugabogg album entitled Hideous Aftermath, set for release by Century Media on October 10th (damn that’s a long way off!). It was produced by Kurt Ballou. Other guest appearances on the album include Dylan Walker (Full of Hell), Travis Ryan (Cattle Decapitation), Damonteal Harris (PeelingFlesh), and Todd Jones.
https://sanguisugabogg.lnk.to/HideousAftermathID
https://sanguisugabogg.bandcamp.com/album/hideous-aftermath-24-bit-hd-audio
https://www.facebook.com/sanguisugabogg/
IGORRR (France)
For me, the prospect of new Igorrr music is always tantalizing, perhaps best summed up as “expect the unexpected.” The final song in today’s collection is itself tantalizing, and its progressions unexpected. Beyond all the sounds, the stunning (and stunningly horrific) video directed by Dehn Sora for “Infestis” is fully half the reason for this choice.
The other half, of course, is what Igorrr and their guests get up to. Early on, after a futuristic ambient opening, the percussionists take center-stage, creating tribal grooves which the stringed instruments then also take up to create a head-hammering lurch. The riffing also swarms and swirls around those humongous neck-wrecking grooves, and the roaring, snarling, and shrieking vocals seem like kindred spirits for those maniac strings.
The beat goes on, the pulsations even more crazed, and then we get chanting choral voices that add an exotic and infernal element to the proceedings. And there’s more, but I’ll let you detect the rest for yourselves.
The credits for the song listed at YouTube are extensive (a couple dozen performers, including the choir). “Infestis” is part of a new Igorrr album named Amen. Metal Blade will release it on September 19th.
http://www.metalblade.com/igorrr
https://igorrr.bigcartel.com/
https://www.facebook.com/IgorrrBarrroque/