(written by Islander)
I have mixed feelings about the Fourth of July, probably a result of living through wars in Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan in which U.S. government officials wrapped themselves in the flag, exalted themselves with military fly-overs, and belched “patriotic” rhetoric while lying to citizens and sending their children overseas to be maimed and die, and using the flag and that same distorted rhetoric in many other contexts to cudgel their political opponents and try to silence dissent.
The feelings are even more mixed on this 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, as we see the legacy stained by a megalomaniacal old man with the moral compass of a snake who has attempted to co-opt the anniversary and turn it into a celebration of himself. He rages, foments rage, and has prepared for the arrival of this milestone anniversary with a daily dose of hatred, division, and dementia. He maliciously erodes our democracy instead of protecting it, “seeing it as a hindrance to his lust for untrammeled power and cash grabs” [as one writer put it today].
On the other hand, I still revere the revolutionary ideals set forth in the Declaration, respect the best parts of the country’s history in which people sought to make them a reality, and hope for better days ahead. I also enjoy fireworks and parades and eating and drinking to excess with family and friends. If you have such plans today, I hope you have an abundance of fun (and I hope you wake up tomorrow with all 10 fingers still intact).
But I know you didn’t come here to read about my mixed feelings concerning the Fourth. As you’ll easily guess, I don’t have mixed feelings about the new songs and videos I’ve collected for today’s roundup, but recommend them whole-heartedly. (Heyo! How’s that for a transition?)
“The Avenue in the Rain” (1917) by American painter Childe Hassam
Speaking of abundance, the last week brought an enormous number of new singles and complete releases that I thought would be worth checking out. As usual, I only had time enough to skim the surface of the tide, and even less time than usual because of a different kind of birthday celebration last night that kept me awake way past my bedtime.
My spouse and I have spent July 3rd that way, in company with one of my oldest friends whose birthday it was, for more than 20 years. As usual, it has again made this July 4th roundup smaller than I would have preferred. With one exception, I dealt with the compressed time by defaulting to singles, and to bands whose past music had already impressed me.
SNĚT’ (Czechia)
Let’s begin with some hard-charging, volatile, and virally infectious death metal, shall we? Those are traits already well-evidenced by the Czech band Sněť, whose previous music I’ve recommended frequently (I’ve also put their songs on two different annual lists of Most Infectious Extreme Metal Songs here at NCS).
This new song from Sněť, which arrived just yesterday with a fun-as-hell video of the band performing, is “Kladivo ve tmě“, which I think means “Hammer in the dark”. It begins with a bit of eldritch ambient creepiness (though you can already hear some vigorous hammering behind that), and then Sněť give it the gas, with drums really hammering, the bass bubbling like magma, and the guitars maniacally roiling, viciously ripping, and insidiously slithering.
The abyss-dwelling vocals have their own eldritch quality, and the solos create their own atmosphere of creepiness as the notes strangely pulsate and squirm, but even then your skull will rattle from the hammering.
https://darkdescentrecords.bandcamp.com/album/v-ba-in-ch-v-dom
https://mesacounojo.bandcamp.com/album/v-ba-in-ch-v-dom
https://www.facebook.com/snet6666/
GREH (Germany)
Now I’ll turn to another band we’ve previously put a spotlight on, specifically by premiering their debut album Dysphoric Devotion last year. The song below, “Frozen Dystopia“, is the second single from Greh’s second album, The Tyranny of Expectations.
This is a very scary and unearthly piece of music, perhaps first and foremost because of the unhinged, sanity-shredding quality of the vocals, which range from fanatical yells to strangled screams, ravenous howls, cavernous growls, and distorted spoken words.
But beyond the vocals, the music is also frightening. Chill winds swirl; dismal notes ring; a humongous bass heaves and throbs; and the riffing also brutishly jolts and slowly oozes musical ichor.
The song’s ringing melody morphs in ways that make it even more disturbing and desolate (but it perversely gets stuck in the head too), and even the persistently exhilarating drumwork can’t overcome all the encroaching musical darkness, which begins to swarm as well as peal like pleading voices, and to tower like some majestic horror. At the end, it sounds like a militaristic march, or maybe the final beats of a heart.
Greh’s new album is projected for release sometime next year. I assume (and hope) that we’ll get another single or two before then.
https://links.feiyr.com/x/frozen-dystopia
https://grehmetal.bandcamp.com/track/frozen-dystopia
https://www.facebook.com/BandGreh
GOMMA (ڨمَّةْ) (Tunisia)
Here’s yet another band whose music I’ve previously recommended, specifically their second album Wailing and Madness (نواح و جنون), which was independently released in November 2025 and was then re-released on March 6th of this year by Hypnotic Dirge Records, which is how I spotted it (I then reviewed it here).
The same Hypnotic Dirge spread the word last week about a new Gomma single named “Experiment 4.4“. The label explained that while Gomma has been a solo project founded by Gh’ramm in 2024, this new song is “the first track created by Armai’kh, the second persona residing alongside Gh’ramm within the same vessel.” And further:
“Through unorthodox sound design and organic textures, Gomma (ڨمَّةْ) proves that there are still artists willing to forgo genre tropes and craft music unburdened by expectation. On Experment 4.4, everyday objects become instruments, the steady ticking of a clock drives percussion, a cooking pot serves as a drum, and a bowl of water provides rhythmic depth. The result is a boundary-pushing piece that bridges Black Metal with experimental Arabic folk.”
The title of the song is understandable, because it adventurously brings together musical ingredients that you wouldn’t think are compatible with each other. But this isn’t a jarring bolting together of disparate pieces, but more like the weaving together of threads of different weights, colors, and textures to create a fascinating tapestry (or more like a flying carpet).
The experience includes a woozily meandering and warmly humming bass; bursts of clattering and crashing discordance; exotically dancing and seductively swirling North African melodies expressed in different instrumental voices; vivid percussive rhythms; a gripping bass solo; an array of vocals that veer from ghastly death growls to cutting black-metal screams and ardent chants; and stringed instruments that swarm, swirl, throb, seem to miserably wail, and to become mysterious and mesmerizing.
The central exotic folk melody and all its variations (which make the moods both jubilant and sinister) holds everything together, providing the central thread in an ever-changing musical weave, and the drumming (again using a variety of instruments) is a marvel all by itself.
https://hypnoticdirgerecords.bandcamp.com/album/experiment-44
http://www.facebook.com/hypnoticdirgerecords
SHABTI (U.S.)
I haven’t written about Shabti before today, but I still had reason to expect their new music would be worthwhile based on the previous output of the band’s members. Those members are drummer Ray Capizzo (Falls Of Rauros, Obsidian Tongue, Panopticon-live), vocalist/guitarist Rob Cook (Worm Altar), and bassist Brendan Hayter (Obsidian Tongue, Fires In The Distance).
The song below, “Rise Of The Shabti“, is the first single off the band’s forthcoming third album, Haze, Cacophony, And White Light. Here’s a comment from Rob Cook about the track:
The lyrics of the song follow the journey of the last remnants of humanity as they abandon Earth in search of new habitation, supported by and ultimately succeeded by physical artificial intelligence, which is all that is left to carry their legacy. The Shabti – funerary figures that perform manual labor for the pharaohs – represent these constructs, while also having inspired the name of the band back in 2008.
When you hear “Rise Of The Shabti“, you’ll understand why I put it here, right after that Gomma song above. Its melodies are also exotic for Western ears, drawing upon Middle Eastern or North African traditions (I’m no expert!). But the song is also a very heavy-hitter, armored with big slugging grooves, and it’s accented by electrifying drum progressions, dynamic changes in tempo and mood, and doses of both frenetic, fleet fingered fretwork and engrossing prog-metal excursions.
The vocal department opens up abyssal domains with low-frequency grunts and malicious growls — as brutish as the rest of the music is elaborate and head-spinning. Lots of exciting twists and turns here, but like Gomma’s song, this one holds together very well, and its infectiousness is undeniable.
Haze, Cacophony, And White Light will be released digitally and on tape by Contemn Light on August 21st.
https://contemnlight.bandcamp.com/album/haze-cacophony-and-white-light
https://www.facebook.com/metalshabti
HOLY DEATH (U.S.)
Here’s yet another band (from California) whose music I’ve done my best to spread around over the last 6+ years here, including with a bunch of enthusiastic premieres. I had an extra reason to check out this newest Holy Death single, because it includes a guest appearance by Brian Ortiz of Tzompantli and Xibalba.
When Holy Death play “Only God Forgives” in a live setting, it’s all too easy to imagine the heavy bruising and bloody carnage that will ensue in the pit, especially in the song’s later phases.
In its opening phase, the music thunders, pounds like a sledgehammer, blasts like automatic weaponry, and scampers like a herd of punks, while the riffing viciously churns and maniacally screams. Not to be outdone by this savagery, the vocals are rabid and ravenous.
You can see the breakdown coming from a mile away, but when it hits it’s still a bridge-collapsing experience — and a harrowing experience too, thanks to a searing and desolate melody that flows through it and truly monstrous vocals.
When the drums punch the accelerator again, the guitars convulse and the bass feels like an earthquake. The band also find enough time before the end to deliver a closing segment that won’t just bend necks but rhythmically double-over entire bodies. These people still know how to crush.
https://holydeathdoom.bandcamp.com/track/only-god-forgives-feat-tzompantli
http://www.facebook.com/holydeathdoom
CARCERAL (Brazil)
Way up at the top I mentioned there was one exception to my defaulting today to bands whose past music I’ve enjoyed, and Carceral is that exception. I was induced to check out their music by some of the most humble and kind e-mails I’ve received from a band in quite some time, and by the intriguing description of their music as a combination of “death/thrash metal riffing and lead work with the brevity, density, and violent pacing of grindcore-inspired song structures”.
What I can share now are two singles from Carceral’s forthcoming debut album, Descending Reprisal, which features stunning cover artwork by Russian artist Artem Demura. The two songs have their own eye-catching artwork, and both were presented with very cool videos.
The first of these is “Hypnomachia” (with artwork by Danilo Ferreira). The second single is “Archaic Law” (with artwork by Rodrigo Salvatierra), which is the album’s opening track. As forecast, they’re both brief, each of them hovering right around the 1:30 mark, but Carceral pack a hell of a lot into those 90 or so seconds.
“Hypnomachia” delivers full-throttle drumming, plundering bass-lines, technically impressive acrobatic riffing, and a delirious but remarkably fluid guitar solo that’s genuinely eye-popping. The solo occupies most of the song’s duration, but could easily have gone on even longer without tempting anyone to turn away.
“Archaic Law” begins in a very different way, much slower, much darker, with orchestral instrumentation led by an oboe (I think?) that sets the stage in shadows. But after that, the galloping begins and the riffing urgently throbs — though the mood is still distressing. The guitars also desperately swirl and dart, creating a bridge to another amazing guitar solo. This one is also a dextrous jaw-dropper, but its melody sounds otherworldly.
Carceral could have taken the ideas and ingredients within these songs and run with them a lot longer. Honestly, it’s a little frustrating that they didn’t, but small gems can be as engrossing as bigger ones, and these are definitely gems. How this will work in an album that includes 24 short tracks remains to be seen, but I’m very interested to find out.
And yes, Descending Reprisal includes 24 tracks! It’s scheduled for digital release on July 15th on Bandcamp and on many streaming platforms.
https://carceral.bandcamp.com
https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61590497948517