Islander

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): EGGS OF GOMORRH — “WOMBSPREADER”

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Jun 082022
 

The new album by Eggs of Gomorrh is lyrically devoted to a general disgust for humanity (or at least the Christ-worshiping segments of it) and to blasphemous occult visions of sadistic punishment and merciless retribution — scenes of mutilation, degradation, inhuman monstrosity, ruinous violence, and sexual perversion, all of it frothing in oceans of blood and semen. They revel in the foul riot of their words, and the music within Wombspreader is a fucking riot too, carrying the band to new heights of terrorizing excess.

But this should come as no surprise. Over the course of their 2016 debut album (Rot Prophet), a 2019 EP (Outpregnate), and a 2019 split with the Turkish blasphemers Sarinvomit (Encomium of Depraved Instincts), these Swiss fiends have already established a reputation for delivering astonishingly savage forms of jet-speed sonic annihilation with impressive technical skill — and slipping in some grooves and eerie melody in the midst of their slaughtering tirades.

As you’ll discover from our premiere of their forthcoming second album on the Godz Ov War label, all these qualities are again explosively displayed Continue reading »

A 30TH ANNIVERSARY INTERVIEW: FUNERAL

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Jun 082022
 

 

(We present Karina Noctum‘s interview of Anders Eek, co-founder and drummer of the Norwegian band Funeral, on the occasion of the band’s 30th anniversary concert in Oslo in April 2022. The interview is accompanied and followed by a selection of the many wonderful photos of the event made by Andrea Chirulescu.)

On the 12th of April, the Norwegian doom metal band Funeral marked their 30th anniversary with a special concert in the 18th-century Jakob Culture Church in Oslo. The mournful atmosphere of the music befitted the surroundings perfectly, making the concert unforgettable. I took the opportunity to interview Anders Eek (drums) and asked about the band’s early days, as well as the anniversary concert and what’s to come for the band in the future. Continue reading »

EXOCRINE: “THE HYBRID SUNS”

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Jun 082022
 

(On June 17th Unique Leader Records will unleash a new album by the French technical death metal band Exocrine, and in advance of that we present DGR‘s extensive review.)

French tech-death group Exocrine‘s 2020 release Maelstrom landed pretty hard with me here at the site. Up to that point the group’s albums had always been a particular highlight of the given year of their release but Maelstrom really felt like the stars aligning for them. Their combination of head-spinning songwriting and sheer musical heft mixed well with the group’s experimentation throughout the album with varying synth lines, clean backing vocals, occasional brass and trumpet section solos for scene-setting, and atmospheric works, which oftentimes was more excessive than necessary.

It all worked for Maelstrom though, and made that album into an adventure, more than just the latest headspinner from a group known for making headspinners. Once you reached “Wall Of Water” on that album, you’d essentially reached the top of the roller-coaster and were now ready to accelerate downhill into whatever Exocrine had in store for you. That’s why the announcement of the group’s newest album, The Hybrid Suns – nearly two years later – was an exciting one. Continue reading »

ØLGOD: “ØLGOD”

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Jun 072022
 

(Our riff-loving dope/doom maven fetusghost has returned to NCS with the following lively review of a new album by Germany’s Ølgod, which was released in late May.)

Kiel, Germany puts THC in the water. What other explanation could there be for such great dope-loving doom calling the city home? Ok, fine, maybe a sample size of two is too small, but Earthbong (more on them in a moment) and Ølgod traffic in the sort of resinous riffage that stoners love, and aside from unchill war-themed black metal from Endstille, I can’t name any other bands from Kiel. So it’s decided! “Kiel: Get High-drated” will be the new city motto. That one is on the house, City Council.

Ølgod‘s sound is appropriately rock ‘n’ roll, loud and loose, like a practice-space jam with a bit more post-production polish. If you love loud, slow riffs and plodding, heavy drums, and German dudes yelling at you, you’ll have a fine time here. This is where the underground thrives. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): ABOVE & BELOW — “SUFFER DECAY ALONE”

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Jun 072022
 

Some dreams take a long time gestating before they come screaming into the world. Many others die in the womb. Suffer Decay Alone is a dream realized, but it did take a long time for that to happen.

We’ve written often over the years about the Ohio band Plaguewielder, whose fantastic latest album Covenant Death we had the privilege of premiering here last year. What we didn’t know until more recently was that Plaguewielder‘s primary member Bryce Seditz has harbored a desire to make industrial music ever since the first time he listened to NIN‘s 1994 album The Downward Spiral. It took the covid quarantine to begin making that dream a reality.

Above & Below is the name Seditz chose for this plague-spawned project, and Suffer Decay Alone is the title he gave to its first fruits, an album that will be released on June 10th by Jeff Wilson‘s Disorder Recordings. The title has meaning, a sign of the times in which the music was made. It reflects some of the overarching moods of the music as well, but anyone familiar with Seditz‘s work in Plaguewielder could have already guessed that despite a change in genre-style this would be confrontational music with a raw and intense core — and so it is.

By the same token, anyone familiar with Covenant Death might also guess (correctly) that although Suffer Decay Alone is frequently dark as midnight, it isn’t a monotone, either emotionally or in its sonic textures. Continue reading »

GONZO’S HEAVY ROUNDUP, MAY 2022

 Album Reviews  5 Responses »
Jun 072022
 


Nechochwen

(With another month now in the history books, we welcome back Gonzo, who again has recommendations for you of wide-ranging albums released in the preceding month – somewhat delayed only because our editor completely lost track of time while at Maryland Deathfest.)

When doing the legwork that goes into these monthly columns, there are some months when I have to reach deep into the metal underbelly to extract whatever hidden gems I stumble across, and there are others where the onslaught of new releases just looks downright overwhelming and perhaps menacing.

May turned out to be the latter. I actually had to trim this one down from what I had originally planned out, if for no other reason than the fact that I’m disappearing into the mountains for most of the weekend without many plans to be in front of a computer. Fuck that nonsense, I say. I get enough of that during my 9-5 job, and any excuse to hit the road for an escape is a good one.

Read on and prepare to abuse your eardrums with the best of what I stumbled into through May. Continue reading »

AN NCS INTERVIEW: SEPULCHRAL CURSE

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Jun 072022
 

 

(We present Comrade Aleks‘ interview of Kari Kankaanpää, vocalist of the Finnish death metal band Sepulchral Curse, whose most recent record Deathbed Sessions was jointly released last month by Personal Records, Transylvanian Recordings, and Lycanthropic Chants.)

There are three Finnish bands which are tightly entwined with each other. So guitarist Aleksi Luukka plays in death-doom band Solothus, the doom/black band Yawning Void, and the death metal act Sepulchral Curse. And I can tell you the same about vocalist Kari Kankaanpää who roars in the same three bands. Previously, Yawning Void’s drummer Tommi Ilmanen performed his duties in Sepulchral Curse too, and now his place is occupied by Johannes Rantala, who was noticed in Yawning Void as well.

It looks like a death metal focused Santa Barbara, but things are easier indeed, and though we did interviews with all three bands previously, now it’s Sepulchral Curse’s turn again because they have a new EP and took part in one compilation which we need to discuss too. Kari Kankaanpää is here to tell everything. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: THE WORLD WITHOUT US — “WEEDS”

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Jun 062022
 

It’s fair to say that in recent years Pennsylvania has proven itself to be a hotbed of progressive death metal, with bands such as Rivers of Nihil, Black Crown Initiate, Alustrium, and Burial In The Sky all seizing international attention. In that environment, it would take something special for another similarly ambitious group to see their own star rise, but The World Without Us definitely bring something special to the firmament.

Building on their 2019 EP Incarnate, the band are now approaching the July 8 release date of their second EP, Body Forth, and the four songs it includes merit the eye-popping cover art by Magic the Gathering artist Poison Project that you see above. One of those songs, “Eden“, is already out in the world, and today we have the pleasure of presenting a second one — “Weeds“. Lest you misconceive the title as a message about dope, here’s how the band’s vocalist Mario Paulo Canavarro describes its meaning: Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: LACABRA — “FRACTURED”

 Premieres  4 Responses »
Jun 062022
 

The metal band Lacabra from the Pacific Northwest brings together the talents of Lance Neatherlin (Lead Vocals), Eric Snyder (Guitar), Eric Weber (Bass/Vocals), Michael Anthony (Guitar), and Ryan Yancey (Drums/Vocals). All of them have been tried and tested in other bands, but it’s fair to say that in Lacabra they’ve caught lightning in a bottle. We’ve got electrifying proof of that in the single “Fractured” that we’re premiering today through a powerful video.

Lyrically, the song foretells a nightmarish future in which humankind’s own technological innovations become the agent of its downfall. That grim conception is captured in the animated segments of the video (created by Maria Nicheva-Wicklund of Bulgaria), which were inspired by Netherlin‘s “disdain for technology and how it makes us desensitized and numb to events that should cripple the human heart”, and by his attraction to the work of Lotte Reiniger, a German film director and the foremost pioneer of silhouette animation.

The video also captures the intensity of Lacabra‘s own live performances, and pairs extremely well with the turbocharged power and captivating dynamism of the song. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: VIDRES A LA SANG — “SALVEU-ME ELS ULLS”

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Jun 062022
 

 

Heads will spin, nerves will twitch, and jaws will drop. Those are among our predictions for listener reactions to Fragments de l’esdevenir, the new album by the Catalonian band Vidres A La Sang, their fifth full-length since 2004 and their first one in four years. It’s an unusual and thoroughly fascinating piece of musical alchemy, one that’s intricate and technically impressive, experimental and progressive, both bewildering and mesmerizing, and yet also fiery and ferocious in ways that will appeal to fans of death and black metal. Anyone who attempts to fashion a genre label for it will do so at their peril.

Much more could be said (and undoubtedly will be said) about Fragments de l’esdevenir, because it’s so multi-faceted and adventurous in its songwriting and so dazzling in its execution, one of those albums whose music demands close attention because it’s elaborate and ever-changing, but somehow also hits at a reflexive level, compulsively provoking movement and changing moods at the same time as it’s challenging your higher mental faculties to keep up with what’s happening.

The song we’re premiering today is a great example of what we’re struggling to say about the album experience — not that our struggles will cease, because we will forge ahead with some further linguistic exercises by way of introducing you to the marvels of “Salveu-me els ulls“. Continue reading »

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