Islander, Author at NO CLEAN SINGING

Islander

SEEN AND HEARD: MORDBRAND, SLIDHR, PLAGUE RIDER

Jul 162015

I’ve spent so much time since last weekend writing my own reviews (which isn’t a weekly occurrence) and scribbling words to accompany premieres that I’m afraid I’ve fallen down on the job of rounding up new music to throw your way. Because the never-ending flood of new metal doesn’t pause for me, I’m now very far behind, with a list of new tracks that would stretch from here to that distant planet NASA finally caught on film this week.

Okay, that last part may have been a slight exaggeration, but it really is a long list. Rather than throw up my hands in despair, I decided to make a start and at least feature new songs from three bands this morning. They’re all really worth hearing.

MORDBRAND

I think I’ve written about every release that Sweden’s Mordbrand have ever delivered, and not just because the band’s name means “arson”. The main reason is because they’re all so very good. The latest offering is a song named “Order of the Formless”, which appears on a split with the band Rite that’s been expected for a long time and is finally being released this month by Doomentia Records. Continue reading »

AN INTERVIEW WITH MOREAN — PART 3: ALKALOID

Interviews 3 Responses »

Jul 162015

Photos accompanying this interview by Christian Martin Weiss

(Andy Synn had the chance to interview the Dutch artist Morean about the three bands in which he is currently involved — Dark Fortress, Noneuclid, and Alkaloid. We’ve divided the interview into three parts, which will appear on three successive days. Today’s focus is Alkaloid. Check out Part 1 here and Part 2 here.)

All jokes aside, all three of the bands discussed in this interview have a certain “Progressive” edge to them (though I’m trying not to over-use that word if at all possible) – Dark Fortress are a Black Metal band, and Noneuclid tend (at least in my mind) towards the Thrash-y end of the Metal spectrum. However your latest band, Alkaloid, is probably the most Progressive AND the most Death Metal focussed group of the lot. Was this something you were always aiming for?

M: You put your finger right on it. Not everyone in Dark Fortress and Noneuclid is equally into Death Metal and shred orgies. And despite all the artistic freedom we take in those bands, there were quite some things Alkaloid wanted to do that would never have fit with the other bands, and I think the same is true for Obscura. So we wanted to give it one last shot to start something fresh from the beginning, where we have complete freedom to do what we want without having to fit our ideas into 10 or 20 year old band concepts – even if they’re our own. In my own artistic development, I feel that with Alkaloid many things that have been growing in the other bands finally are falling into place. And the personnel in Alkaloid [Linus Klausenitzer, Danny Tunker, Hannes Grossmann, Christian Münzner] are very inspiring, there are very few limits to how far the composers in the band can go. It’ll be exciting to see where this band will end up going in the future. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: DISPLAY OF DECAY — “CREATED TO KILL”

Premieres 5 Responses »

Jul 152015

Almost exactly one year ago we premiered the title track from a new EP — Outbreak of Infection — by Display of Decay from Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. Since then the band have completed work on a new album (their second full-length) entitled Dust of Existence, and today we’ve got for you the first single from the record, a head-wrecker named “Created To Kill“.

You can’t accuse the band of false advertising, that’s for sure — the song’s title is a completely accurate description of the music. It’s a title that’s also linked to the song’s lyrics, which are based on events from 19th-century Europe, with references to the origination of Frankenstein’s monster and attempts at resurrecting the dead. As a whole, the album continues the narrative begun in Outbreak of Infection, relating the aftermath of a devastating virus that has annihilated humankind. Continue reading »

AN NCS INTERVIEW: POHJOINEN

Interviews 3 Responses »

Jul 152015

(Our Russian friend Comrade Aleks has been a busy man, and we’ve got a string of new interviews from him that we’re posting from now to the end of this week — beginning with this conversation with Finland’s Pohjoinen.)

Pohjoinen means “North”, but this Finnish band doesn’t play black or death metal, as they follow the path of authentic doom. Pohjoinen are Kimmo (bass, vocals), R (drums), and Tumppi (guitars, vocals); this power-trio chooses an old school approach, preferring a groovy and heavy sound with melodic vocals and Finnish lyrics. I like bands who keep their national identity, so I was really glad to find Pohjoinen, and this telepathic interview with the band’s collective mind is a result of this discovery.

******

Hail mates! How are you there? First, Pohjoinen’s self-titled LP was released two months ago. How did you come to it? What was your road to this record?

Hail you, hail to all! We have been together for 2 years with this line-up, and the record has been slowly manifesting itself through that time. Our bass player Kimmo recorded it at our rehearsal place in the spring of last year, and he also did the mixing/mastering. Some songs were older than that — from a previous incarnation of the band. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: UNBREAKABLE HATRED — “RUINS”

Premieres 5 Responses »

Jul 152015

Unique Leader Records has a well-demonstrated taste for bands who join death metal ferocity to head-spinning complexity and technical flair, and this past spring they added another eye-opening group to their growing roster — Unbreakable Hatred from Quebec City. The band’s second album Ruins is now projected for release in August, and we’re about to give you a glimpse of the carnage within as we premiere the album’s title track.

Unbreakable Hatred is a power trio consisting of guitarist Philippe Drouin, his brother Dominic on drums, and vocalist/bassist Simon B. Lapointe. The band’s debut album Total Chaos was released in 2011, and they’ve drawn praise from an impressive collection of other musicians:

“Unbreakable Hatred is one of Canada’s premier death metal acts; this trio of power lays waste to the listeners’ ear drums on every level and then some!” – Terrance Hobbs, Suffocation

“Unbreakable Hatred blew us away each night with their energy and ripping songs; it was a total pleasure to have them on our tour and the best is most certainly to come – Ferocious!” — Jason Netherton, Misery Index

“Unbreakable Hatred from Quebec are definitly one of the new bands out there to be recognized! Once again proving that Quebec musicians are on top of their Game! ” — Flo Mounier, Cryptopsy

“Great musicians, brutally heavy and very strong live, definitely a band to watch out for.” — Bobby Koelble, Death

AN INTERVIEW WITH MOREAN — PART 2: NONEUCLID

Interviews 4 Responses »

Jul 152015

(Andy Synn had the chance to interview the Dutch artist Morean about the three bands in which he is currently involved — Dark Fortress, Noneuclid, and Alkaloid. We’ve divided the interview into three parts, which will appear on three successive days. Today’s focus is Noneuclid. Check out Part 1 here and Part 3 here.)

Moving on to talk about your work in Noneuclid, which also includes your Dark Fortress band-mates Seraph and V. Santura, along with Linus from Obscura/Alkaloid, and recently departed vocalist Bruce. For those unfamiliar with the band, can you give us some background on the group?

M: We started as a group of friends playing covers together once a year. I had just graduated from the conservatory and was looking for an outlet for my metal-related ideas, and we had way too much fun playing together, so after a while we decided to make Noneuclid a more permanent outfit. That was back in 2004. I set out to write the first album with just the wish in mind to have a few songs to play; little did we suspect they’d be perceived as being this unusual. To us, it was just metal to begin with, but then things went off on a pretty wild tangent with everything that ensued in the years after. Continue reading »

AUSTIN WEBER’S BEST OF 2015 SO FAR: PRIME CUTS FROM THE UNDERGROUND OF THE UNDERGROUND (PART 1)

Album Reviews, Listmania, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC 1 Response »

Jul 152015

(In this multi-part post, Austin Weber brings us his recommendations for some of the best albums released during the first half of the year.)

We are gathered here today, to become willing devotees to the aural alchemism presented below in various forms. While the words per band write-up may be sparse due to a lack of time, the music speaks volumes in terms of creativity; and in terms of literal volume as well!

I figured now would be a good time to post about a bunch of killer releases I’ve failed to find time to write about. And not just because I found them to be decent or somewhat enjoyable, but because these are some of the best of this year that you within our beloved metal community need to know about. They range across such genres as tech-meth, R&B-infused grindcore, Nu-core wave of heavy 2 the core metal, Classical punk-bop, Blackened post-folk, SludgEDM, Southern Acoustic DJENT, and Rollercoaster deathpolka (a curious after-writing search led me to find out that someone has a band named deathpolka, bitching!).

Expect several more installments of this 2015 “best of” feature coming soon. I hope. Maybe?

Okazaki Fragments

First on today’s list of recommendations is Abandoned, the headspinning debut by the Canadian death machine known as Okazaki Fragments. This Calgary-based group’s moniker, in a nutshell, can be boiled down to the growth process of new DNA. As an analogy for what their music has in store, it’s a damn fitting name for the unique music they’ve created. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: GURTHANG AND BEYOND LIFE — “MELODIES OF SORROW”

Premieres 1 Response »

Jul 142015

In this post we bring you the full streaming premiere of Melodies of Sorrow, a new split release by the Polish bands Gurthang and Beyond Life that is being released today by Denver-based Cimmerian Shade Recordings. Gurthang contributes three songs to the split, and four come from Beyond Life. Together, they create a dark and disorienting listening experience, filled with dread and despair — but it’s also fascinating.

GURTHANG

Gurthang has been a prolific project since its creation by vocalist/multi-instrumentalist A.Z.V. in 2010, with a number of short releases and four full-length albums to its credit, including this year’s appearance of the latest album, I Will Not Serve. The songs on Melodies of Sorrow were recorded by A.Z.V. in 2013. Continue reading »

ALDA: A PREMIERE OF “THE CLEARCUT” AND A REVIEW OF “PASSAGE”

Album Reviews, Premieres 13 Responses »

Jul 142015

More than four years have passed since Alda’s release of their last album Tahoma. For those (like me) who greatly admired that album, it has been difficult to be patient while waiting for something new. At last, Alda have completed a new album. The name is Passage, it will be released by the end of this month via Bindrune/Eihwaz Recordings, and it’s wonderful.

For those of you are as impatient as I’ve been, you can skip straight to the bottom of this post and listen to our premiere of the album’s first track, “The Clearcut“. For those whose patience hasn’t been completely exhausted, you can first read the following thoughts about the album as a whole — or perhaps listen and then read.

I suppose it has become prosaic to say that an album is a journey, but Passage really is one. The long songs flow into each other almost seamlessly, and although the individual tracks can be heard and appreciated on their own, moving through the entire album in a single sitting is to be caught up and carried away (and sometimes to be carried deep into your own mind, as the music fires your imagination). You get the sense that there are stories in these songs, though the vocals are sparse and often wordless, and the narrative is one that’s dramatic and powerful. Continue reading »

LEPERKAHN CHECKS IN: DEATHWHITE, BLEED THE PIGS, CULT LEADER

Exceptions to the Rule, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC 2 Responses »

Jul 142015

(Our friend Leperkahn has been slaving away at college for, like, forever. But he has surfaced again with some musical recommendations.)

Hey friends. I truly can’t remember the last time I wrote something here. I feel a bit of shame about this, but you know what, there’s no time like the present, and now I’m breaking my silence. I’m gonna string together some short pieces on stuff you might want to check out based on my most recent download history. A good deal of it breaks our Golden Rule here at NCS, but frankly we’ve broken that rule so frequently in the past couple years that it’s really only become a guideline at best. We’ll start with a band I found just tonight.

Deathwhite

I had absolutely no idea these dudes existed prior to listening to a promo of their new EP Solitude Martyr (out August 14th according to their Bandcamp page) that Clawhammer PR sent over to me. I tend to look at a good deal of the promos that brush through my email inbox (*hint hint*), though obviously I haven’t done a great job of translating that to writing about them (looking to change that sense of lethargy that’s become such a comfortable crutch). Continue reading »

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