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OUR LIST OF 2021’S MOST INFECTIOUS EXTREME METAL SONGS (PART 6): FIAT NOX, THE SILVER, HJELVIK

 MOST INFECTIOUS SONGS-2021  3 Responses »
Jan 122022
 

Welcome to Part 6 of this expanding list. You’ll find the preceding Parts (and an explanation of what this list is all about) through THIS LINK.

All three of the songs featured today were included in my part of the playlist that DGR, Andy Synn, and I put together for a September 2021 guest DJ appearance on Gimme Metal (and speaking of which, we three are doing another guest DJ appearance on January 25th). I included these three songs for a reason — because all three are so damned infectious. They had all gotten stuck firmly in my head by that point, and I was eager to infect other people with them. Obviously, I still am.

FIAT NOX (Germany)

Last year we had the honor of premiering a new EP by this German band (In Contemptuous Defiance) in advance of its October release by Personal Records. In an accompanying review I wrote that this new release “further elevates the place of Fiat Nox as a band capable of creating marvelously dynamic and multi-faceted music that gets the blood racing with its muscular, hard-charging aggression but also creates wholly enthralling atmosphere through its emotionally powerful melodies”. Continue reading »

AN NCS EP PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): ECRYPTUS — “KYR’AM BESKAR”

 Album Reviews, Premieres, SHORT BUT SWEET  2 Responses »
Jan 122022
 

The breathtakingly savage death metal band Ecryptus introduce themselves as “an elite group of assassins from Korriban, now based in Atlanta, Georgia. We dispense galactic death metal inspired by the Dark Side and brutal tales of the Canon Arcane.”

For those who may not be as steeped in the lore of Star Wars as the marauders in Ecryptus, one internet source discloses that Korriban “was the original homeworld of the Sith species and a sacred planet for the Sith Order, housing the tombs for many ancient and powerful Dark Lords of the Sith, and containing immense dark side power.”

And for those who may not speak Mandalorian, the title of Ecryptus‘ new EP — Kyr’am Beskar — means (what else?) “Death Metal” in the tongue of far-flung Mandalore. Continue reading »

KONTACT: “FIRST CONTACT”

 Album Reviews, Exceptions to the Rule, SHORT BUT SWEET  2 Responses »
Jan 122022
 

(We welcome first-time NCS writer Alex Atkinson, who makes his debut with a review of the recently released first EP by the Calgary-based heavy metal band Kontact.)

As our planet continues on its path toward ultimate doom, we must look to the cosmos for relief, enlightenment, and breakneck, extraterrestrial riffing.  Kontact fills the vacuum of space with songs soaked in all the ancient technologies of heavy metal’s heroes while creating a sense of new possibilities that help the surging traditional metal scene remain exciting.  Through the combined forces of Canadian powerhouse Traveler and the downright dirty Blackrat, Kontact has managed to harness their talents to finely (space)craft their debut EP, First Contact.

The album opener, “Ancient Malice”, uses some familiar tropes to build up to an unexpected vocal performance by singer, The Alien.  The vocals sound a bit like Alice Cooper and King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard stopped listening to music once they heard King Diamond’s lamentation, “Melissa”, while creating something stark and original inside that space.  This is what really sets First Contact apart from an overwhelming couple years of excellent heavy metal releases.  Surprising vocal melodies are around every corner on this track, not to mention the remaining four powerhouse songs. Continue reading »

OUR LIST OF 2021’S MOST INFECTIOUS EXTREME METAL SONGS (PART 5): WORM, SUFFERING HOUR, MARE COGNITUM

 MOST INFECTIOUS SONGS-2021  4 Responses »
Jan 112022
 

 

As I’ve remarked before about this series, the songs many of us find highly infectious are not necessaruly truly great artistic achievements, nor is there any necessary connection between an infectious track and a great album. But as it happens, I truly do believe that all three songs I’ve chosen for this Fifth Part of the list are great songs and they come from great albums.

Of course I’m far from alone in thinking these three albums are great ones — all of them achieved high praise when they came out, and made frequent appearances on year-end lists across the interhole, including those at our own dank hole.

WORM (U.S.)

Earlier today we posted a 2021 “List of Lists” that aggregated 97 year-end lists from 26 international critics, magazines, blogs, and other publications. In what was undoubtedly the biggest surprise (except for people who’ve actually heard it), Worm‘s album Foreverglade took the No. 6 spot, and only narrowly missed placing in a very closely packed Top 5 that included much more well-known names. As the person who compiled that list proclaimed, Worm “made funeral death/doom cool again”. Continue reading »

AN NCS INTERVIEW: FELLED

 Interviews  1 Response »
Jan 112022
 

 

(In this new interview Comrade Aleks talked with members of the wonderfully multi-dimensional Oregonian black metal band Felled, whose debut album The Intimate Earth saw the light of day last summer via Transcending Obscurity Records, and which we reviewed here along with a song premiere.)

Transcending Obscurity Records has given a big push to a lot of great extreme metal bands, choosing from among the best of the worldwide underground. Folk / black metal band Felled from Eugene, Oregon is one such band.

Cavan Wagner (guitars, vocals) and Jenn Grunigen (drums, vocals) started as Moss of Moonlight in around 2010 but the project was renamed in 2014, and soon Isamu Sato (bass) and Brighid Wagner (violin, vocals) joined them. Since then only the 2017 demo Bonefire Grit was published until The Intimate Earth full-length album was released in July 2021. It was worth of the wait, with five tracks presenting to listeners the dramas of Nature and the anguish of its witnesses, showing the best of “Cascadian black metal”.

True to tell, I didn’t know this genre name before… well, I knew bands like Agalloch or Wolves in the Throne Room but I didn’t have a clue what “Cascadian BM” was. Thus we got in touch with Cavan Wagner to sort it out, along with other matters, but in the end other members contributed to this interview too. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): DESCENT — “ORDER OF CHAOS”

 Album Reviews, Premieres  1 Response »
Jan 112022
 

 

The Boss HM-2 distortion pedal, and other devices that emulate its effects, are fantastic inventions. Similes for the sound abound, including the ubiquitous references to chainsaws cutting through dense wood. It also brings to mind someone gunning a big V-8 engine (do such things exist any more?) in a vehicle with a severely corroded, smoke-belching muffler, or maybe a junkyard car compactor working at full metal-mangling intensity. The deployment of the tone just makes everything sound more massively crushing.

That brand of distortion has become inseparably linked to old school Swedish death metal in all its gruesome, dragging, and scampering glory. But its uses extend beyond music devoted to death and supernatural horror, and in the case of Australia’s Descent (which features members of Snorlax, Resin Tomb, Feculent, Siberian Hell Sounds, and more) it has become a weapon in the discharge of violent, politically charged fury. In their case it’s also not the only weapon in their arsenal, nor is death metal the only genre ingredient in their music, because black metal and grindcore play prominent roles as well.

Maybe especially for those of who may think chainsaw discordance has worn out its welcome after so many years, Descent‘s new album Order of Chaos is worth your attention. And it definitely demands attention for any fan of metallic extremity who’s looking for a cathartic release through music of pulverizing, neck-ruining power and shuddering ferocity (coupled with effective use of gloom-drenched melody).

The album is set for imminent release on January 14th by Brilliant Emperor Records in cooperation with Redefining Darkness (CD) and Caligari Records (tape), and it’s our privilege to present its full streaming premiere today. Continue reading »

LISTMANIA 2021: TO THE TEETH’S “LIST OF LISTS”

 LISTMANIA 2021  3 Responses »
Jan 112022
 

To the Teeth is the name of a Facebook-based metal blog that began life in May of 2016, and has expanded into a newsletter format. The proprietor, Dutch writer Peter van der Ploeg, regularly posts about new extreme metal songs and full releases, and as the year goes along he adds selected music to a growing Spotify playlist. He also has had a Reddit thread in which he often goes into greater depth about what appears more briefly at To the Teeth on FB.

Peter has posted his own personal 2021 Top 25 list, which you can see HERE, but he again compiled a “List of Lists”, as he has done in past years. To do that he began by assembling a population of 97 year-end lists from 26 international critics, magazines, blogs, and other publications. Those included a lot of “big platform” mainstream publications as well as lists from metal-only outlets such as our own; those 97 also included separate staff lists from some sites (such as our own). These places were the sources of the lists that Peter included in the aggregation process:

Angry Metal Guy, Bandcamp, Banger TV, Consequence of Sound, Cursed, Cvlt Nation, Decibel, Forbes, Heavy Music HQ, Invisible Oranges, Kerrang, Last Rites, Loudwire, Metal Hammer UK, Metal Hammer DE, Metal Insider, Metal Injection, Metal Sucks, Nine Circles, No Clean Singing, PopMatters, Revolver, Rolling Stone, Stereogum, The Quietus, To The Teeth, Toilet Ov Hell, Treble and We Are the Pit

All together, these lists included a total of 656 records. Continue reading »

WIL CIFER’S TOP 10 MOST ANTICIPATED ALBUMS OF 2022

 Forthcoming Albums  No Responses »
Jan 112022
 

(Wil Cifer has decided to share a Top 10 list of expected 2022 heavy albums he’s most looking forward to at this point.)

My ouija board told me Islander wanted anticipated album lists so I began tapping at my keyboard.

A few of these on my list are albums I am giving you the heads-up about. The bulk of these are metal or metal-adjacent artists. There are some mopey depressive rock artists I am looking forward to with equal excitement, as Placebo, The Cure, Tears For Fears, and Morrrissey all have albums pending this year. But the top ten list ranked-off here are the harder varieties I am most anxious for. I have also included how confident I am of their release and my faith in the quality of the pending work. Continue reading »

OUR LIST OF 2021’S MOST INFECTIOUS EXTREME METAL SONGS (PART 4): THUNDERING HOOVES, BLACK ROYAL, BOSS KELOID

 MOST INFECTIOUS SONGS-2021  3 Responses »
Jan 102022
 

 

The theme of this fourth installment of the list is… groove! To be sure, there are other themes and ingredients in today’s trio of tracks, because they are significantly different from each other in just about every other way. But these songs will get you moving, and because they’re all so damned infectious they’ll likely get quickly stuck in your head if you’re encountering them for the first time.

If you’re stumbling into this series for the first time, you’ll find the preceding Parts (and an explanation of what this list is all about) through THIS LINK.

THUNDERING HOOVES (UK)

This is the first of two bands in today’s installment whose 2021 records I paid attention to as a result of my colleague Andy Synn‘s enthusiastic recommendations. In the case of Thundering Hooves‘ debut album Vestiges he praised not only the band’s name but also anointed this precocious duo as “the UK’s answer to Necrophobic“. And yes, that got my attention. He further wrote: Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: ECTOPLASMA — “APALLING ABOMINATION”

 Premieres  No Responses »
Jan 102022
 

 

Anyone already familiar with the Greek death metal band Ectoplasma knows they are capable of inflicting a severe beating while simultaneously leading listeners through realms of grotesque, ghastly, and utterly unearthly terror. But what makes Ectoplasma stand out even more from the pack of current bands who revel in ghoulish vintage death metal is the extent to which they integrate attention-grabbing twists and turns as they drag and rush listeners through their sonic horror-scapes.

That talent has been the cause of us writing about them frequently in the past, including hosting a pair of premieres from their earlier releases, and it’s the cause of us doing that again today. This time we bring you the aptly-named “Appalling Abominations” from their forthcoming fourth album, Inferna Kabbalah, which will be released on January 24th by Memento Mori (CD) and Rotted Life (vinyl and cassette). Continue reading »

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