Islander

AN NCS PREMIERE: LOATHER — “MORTUARY”

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May 312023
 

Eis is the name of the debut album by the Austrian band Loather that’s coming our way in June via Vendetta Records. After a roughly four-year gap in Loather‘s releases (which of course included the pandemic disruptions as well as lineup changes), it follows an initial demo and two EPs, the last one being 2019’s Haganvelt.

It has never been easy to craft a succinct genre description for Loather’s music, but the task is even more difficult in the case of Eis. We’ve seen the phrase “blackened narcotic metal” applied to their past works. Elements of black metal and doom play roles in Eis, and Loather indeed prove themselves quite capable of casting narcotic spells.

But the genre ingredients one might identify don’t really operate as very useful signposts for what the album provides listeners in Loather‘s dark renderings of stress and sorrow, of angst and anger, of power and poignance. The music itself provides the best guide, and so it’s fortunate that we have a part of Eis for you today in our premiere of the song “Mortuary“. Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: IKU-TURSO — “AT THE CRACK OF DAWN”

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May 312023
 

(In this feature Hope Gould provides the introduction to our premiere of a lyric video for a song from the forthcoming vinyl and tape release of the latest album by Finland’s Iku-Turso.)

It’s no secret that Finland has mastered the art of melody. The country has long been considered a “satisfaction guaranteed” label for riff-seekers, so it comes to little surprise that Finnish black metal band Iku-Turso tread this path with black devotion. Infusing their melodies with the cold northern spirit of days gone by, Iku-Turso’s 2022 full-length, Into Dawnless Realms, has all the makings of a lost second-wave gem. It built upon the band’s five-year path of Finnish melodic mastery while tapping directly into the golden era of ’90s Norway; buzzsaw guitars, spellbinding synth, and vocalist Lafjawijn’s timeless creaky rasp are gateways to the oft-forsaken past.

We previously shared some words about the band’s 2021 EP At The Crack Of Dawn, whose title track has since been re-recorded in English for last year’s aforementioned full-length, Into Dawnless Realms. To hallmark today’s long-awaited vinyl release of Into Dawnless Realms on Wolfspell Records, NCS is premiering Iku-Turso’s lyric video for “At The Crack of Dawn.” Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: BLACK EUCHARIST — “ZIZIPHUS PALIURUS”

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May 302023
 

In all of their outward manifestations, including their corpse-painted visages and torch-wielding promo photos, the U.S. band Black Eucharist (who were once known as Black Ejaculate) defiantly brandish the familiar trappings of blasphemous black metal. Their music is lyrically venomous, vile, and fueled by a hateful scorn for the Nazarene and all things associated with him, and violent-demon rage comes through in the music as well.

But if you aren’t familiar with the band, their music is much more multi-faceted than those outward trappings might suggest, and they’ve proven that in spades on their debut album Inn of the Vaticide, which is now set for international release on June 23rd by Stygian Black Hand. In some respects it’s primitive and bestial, but in so many other ways it’s elaborate and genuinely head-spinning.

To back up that assertion, we’ve got a song from the new album named “Ziziphus Paliurus” to share with you today. Before we get to that, however, it’s worth pausing to reflect on the album’s first single, “Deflowering Jerusalem“. Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: STAGWOUNDER — “DER MODER HEILIGSTER RECHTE”

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May 302023
 

About 18 months ago we had the chance to premiere a fascinating song off the then-forthcoming sophomore album The Shrouded Muse of the World’s Lament by the German black/doom metal band Stagwounder, which was released by Crawling Chaos Records. The album itself was equally fascinating, and not only because of the music. Its conceptual underpinning was a series of aphorisms drawn from a work called Pessimistenbrevier by the 19th-century German philosopher Julius Bahnsen, and we delved into it in some detail in that premiere feature.

We won’t repeat that discussion here, though it’s still worth exploring if you managed to overlook the album. What we’re doing now is to provide a very good reason to track down the album if you’re late to the party, and to give even fans who know the album well an opportunity to revisit part of it in a special way, thanks to a video of Stagwounder performing the song “Der Moder heiligster Rechte” in an unusual live setting. Continue reading »

SHORT BUT SWEET: OMNIUM GATHERUM — “SLASHER”

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May 302023
 

(What you will find below is NCS writer DGR‘s review of a new EP by Finland’s Omnium Gatherum, which will be released on June 2nd by Century Media Records.)

There’s always a fair share of carny/used-car-salesman when it comes to catching someone’s eye with a new release, and especially when it comes to an EP, so if you had told us ages ago that Finland’s Omnium Gatherum were going to put out an EP that included a cover of the song “Maniac”, we probably would have assumed that’s what was going on. However, in 2021 Omnium Gatherum would put out Origin, which was a release so bathed in musical neon and earworm synth lines that it makes perfect sense for them to cover a song like “Maniac” – if anything it’s perfectly in line with what the band are up to these days.

That forthcoming EP, Slasher, consists of the new title song, the aforementioned attention grabber of a cover, and then two songs that were taken from the Origin recording sessions, roughly translating to the simple conclusion that if you loved Origin, you’re going to like Slasher because it is quite simply more Origin.

If you’ve enjoyed Omnium Gatherum throughout the years, and especially as they’ve embraced their campier side post-The Burning Cold, you’re also going to dig hard into the Slasher EP because even with an eighteen-minute run time, Omnium Gatherum still find a way to create some absolutely lush music with plenty of hair-blowing-in-the-wind-esque guitar and keyboard soloing to justify its time with you. Continue reading »

NORTHWEST TERROR FEST 2023 – POSTSCRIPT

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May 292023
 

I made a post here on Saturday to remind NCS visitors that we had shut down for the weekend due to three of us working on the fifth edition of Northwest Terror Fest in Seattle. In that post I included photos from some of the bands whose sets I was able to catch, at least partially, on the fest’s first two days. I thought, to round things off, I would include photos I took on the third and final day in this fest (because of running around and occasionally getting of my feet, I wasn’t able to see the whole lineup).

But before getting to that, I’ll share something I wrote on my personal FB page yesterday, after all of us volunteers had finished loading our backlines and other supplies out of the festival venues and returning them to storage until the next time, and after many of us had then converged again for some weary celebration and melancholy good-byes: Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: COFFIN MULCH — “FALL OF GAIA”

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May 292023
 

I discovered the news about the debut album of Coffin Mulch in an unusual way, before receiving any press release or other promotional material about it. I was listening to another band’s new song on YouTube, and after it finished YouTube served up a new Coffin Mulch song, the first single off that debut album. I almost never pay attention when YouTube does this, but instead hunt down the next song on my listening list. But this time I decided to see what “Into the Blood” was all about — mainly because of the fantastically bizarre cover art in the clip — and received further confirmation that sometimes poor impulse control is a good thing.

As I wrote here at the time, the gritty whir of the chainsaw riffage in “Into the Blood” hooked me immediately, as did the song’s opening rhythmic thump. The vocalist’s high rabid howls, the livid snap of the snare, and the heavy slug of the bass added to the song’s marauding appeal. When the pace slows, it becomes a gruesome slog-and-stomp, though the throat-ruining vocals sound even more unhinged. And speaking of unhinged, when the band start to cavort and chug again, there’s a brief burst of soloing that’s exactly that.

By coincidence, it wasn’t too much longer before we were asked to host the next song premiere from this new Coffin Mulch album (Spectral Intercession). Having heard “Into the Blood“, it took me about a nanosecond to say Yes! Sometimes the stars line up very nicely, don’t they? Continue reading »

SHORT BUT SWEET: ORPHEUS OMEGA — “PORTRAITS”

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May 292023
 

(In the following review DGR catches up with the latest release by the Australian band Orpheus Omega, an EP that surfaced last month.)

Even though we’ve often dwelled within the realms of the dark and heavy – our site background having been a giant pile of skulls for over a decade now – we’re not above and beyond traipsing into the ligher side of metal from time to time. We’ve featured a-plenty of clean singing over the years, usually when used effectively and not just as ‘product’ to provide a radio-worth chorus, and yes, there are a few of us in this burnt-out shell of a building that like them some good ol’ fashioned melodeath keyboard cheese.

When a band buys wholly into that sort of bullshit, it’s difficult to not cheer along, and Australia’s Orpheus Omega have proudly flown that flag for some years now, fully ensconced in the ‘no, this is what we make’ mentality with full admiration for the era of early-aughts melodeath when the synth work became especially prominent and was a constant traveling companion of whomever decided to kick out the next guitar solo.

Orpheus Omega are just that sort of band, and while their 2019 album Wear Your Sins didn’t quite gel with us as well as we would’ve liked, 2015’s Partum Vita Mortem was a near-perfectly constructed one of those sorts of albums, with plenty of glory-flag waving and power-choruses to turn any listener into a massive dork. Obviously, time doesn’t stand still for anyone and the group have evolved since then but thas one of a handful of things that made the April release of their new EP Portraits interesting. Continue reading »

WEEKEND UPDATE: NORTHWEST TERROR FEST

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May 272023
 

Northwest Terror Fest is about to begin its third and final day/night in Seattle today. As I mentioned last Monday, No Clean Singing is a principal sponsor of the fest, and DGR, Andy Synn, and myself (islander) have all been working the event on-site since the final preparations began at the venues on Wednesday.

So, no roundup of new songs and videos at NCS today, and no Shades of Black tomorrow.

I should mention that the first two days of the festival were fantastic. I can’t claim to be objective, but I caught bits and pieces of most of the bands who played, and they all kicked ass. So did the festival and venue staffs and crew. Continue reading »

SHORT BUT SWEET: VIRULENT GENESIS — “INTRODUCTION TO MISRULE”

 Album Reviews, SHORT BUT SWEET  2 Responses »
May 262023
 

(Not long ago DGR stumbled across the debut EP of Wyoming-based Virulent Genesis, which was released earlier this month, and it struck a nerve, leading to the review you’ll find below.)

Wyoming’s Virulent Genesis arriveD to us by way of AN internet spelunking trip, part of a collection of ‘oh, that looks interesting’ captured in the great maw that is the review backlog. We could wish to provide a much better origin story, like them crashing into our burnt-out shell of an office by way of meteor, or somehow them fixing the goddamned elevator and finding their way into the lobby, but that isn’t the case.

Sometimes, the stars align just right and you get a wild hair to write about an upstart death metal group based out of Wyoming. That’s the case here with Virulent Genesis‘ first release Introduction To Misrule. Continue reading »

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