Islander

AN NCS PREMIERE: SELTAR — “AURORA”

 Premieres  No Responses »
Aug 182021
 

 

The gorgeous cover art created by Taya Rostovtseva for the debut album by the U.S.-based atmospheric black metal band Seltar is evocative of the music itself, and of its inspirations. As Seltar’s sole member Invierno explains:

“Shimmering lights silhouette the dense trees, obscuring the landscape. In solitude, the body rests vacant as time evaporates into the ether. A cosmic ancestral energy perfuses the spirit inciting it to depart the physical realm. This intangible power emanating with the accumulated wisdom from distant eras hearkens the lifeforce towards a transdimensional journey to experience worlds beyond. The ego is abandoned. Gazing upon its exhausted earthly chassis, the spirit is enchanted into an ancient passage to attain fathomless vision. Autoscopia is a series of hymns to detach from this dimension and travel to a spectral plane.”

Combining with the artwork and Invierno’s words, we have the premiere of a song from Autoscopia named “Aurora” which provides a further powerful insight into the journey encompassed by the album — which will be jointly released on October 1st by Casus Belli Musica and Beverina Productions. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): WRATH DIVISION — “BARBED WIRE VEINS”

 Album Reviews, Premieres  No Responses »
Aug 182021
 

 

The three members of the Polish war metal band Wrath Division identify themselves by latitude and longitude coordinates rather than names. Finding nothing about the significance of these coordinates in the promotional materials for the band’s debut album, Barbed Wire Veins, we resorted to Google maps, and made these chilling discoveries:

Vocalist: 7°41’22″N 59°57’0″W — the site in Guayana of the 1978 Jonestown mass murder-suicide that killed over 900 men, women, and children
Guitarist/bassist: 34°24’N 132°27’E — the approximate location of the 1945 atomic bomb detonation above Hiroshima, Japan
Drummer/vocalist: 44°6’23″N 19°17’49″E — the town of Srebrenica in Bosnia and Herzegovina, site of the genocidal slaughter of more than 8,000 Bosniak Muslim men and boys during the Bosnian War

And if those examples of humanity’s capacity for self-destruction aren’t grim enough for you, wait ’til you hear the album.

You won’t have to wait long, because we have a stream of all 10 tracks today, just days away from its August 21 release by Godz Ov War Productions and Left Hand Sounds. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: XENOSIS — “PROPHETIC BLIGHT”

 Premieres  2 Responses »
Aug 172021
 

 

The Connecticut-based death metal band Xenosis released their third album Devour and Birth in early 2018. Since then, the band has changed, with a revised lineup that now includes second guitarist Keith Benway as well as new bassist and backing vocalist Craig Breitsprecher (of Fires in the Distance), as well as guitarist Kenny Bullard, vocalist Sal Bova, and drummer Gary Marotta (Archaic Decapitator). And with these new members on board, the band’s music has changed as well.

These changes are reflected in the latest Xenosis album, Paralled Existence, which is set for release on October 1st. It would go too far to say that Xenosis have radically transformed themselves — their backbone is still made of a particularly head-spinning brand of technical death metal. But the changes are nonetheless apparent, with greater roles for progressive-metal excursions and groove. We have a prime example in the song we’re premiering today, “Prophetic Blight“. Continue reading »

AN NCS EP PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): SACRIFIXION — “SHOWER ME IN DEATH”

 Premieres  No Responses »
Aug 172021
 

 

On their debut EP Shower Me In Death, the German band Sacrifixion have embraced a formulation of death metal that’s rough and raw, hideous and horrifying, maniacal and marauding. They strike with evil intent and visceral, primeval power, managing to seem right on the edge of out-of-control mayhem but also triggering convulsive head movement, while simultaneously giving their songs a creepy, supernatural aura.

With four tracks that rush by in about 13 eviscerating and neck-ruining minutes, Sacrifixion have put their stakes in the ground in vivid fashion, with decapitated heads on top. It’s a hell of a start, and leaves us hungry for their full-length, which is already in the works. And thus we’re sadistically happy to present a full stream of the EP in advance of its August 20 release on 7″ vinyl by Hells Headbangers. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: SENTIERO DEI PRINCIPI — “RINASCONO LE TAMERICI”

 Premieres  3 Responses »
Aug 162021
 

 

Today we premiere a song from Lustmord, the debut album of Sentiero Dei Principi, the solo work of Nicola Redavid from Bari, Italy, in advance of its October 1 release by Esercito della Chiesa Dorata. But before we turn to the music, we want to share information about the concepts that underlie the album, because it will shed further light on the sensations of the music itself, and on Nicola Redavid‘s characterization of the style as “romantic black metal”.

The album’s title is a German word meaning “lust murder”. As described by Sentiero Dei Principi, it is a theme “that brings to mind scenes of violence but which at the same time contains a less raw and more psychological meaning, useful for what is the vision of childhood (where love is not necessarily understood as a relationship between lovers but also as a “child/parent” relationship), which is hit by events and traumas that lead to a sort of ‘death of love’. The traumas of childhood then have repercussions on development and adulthood, becoming partly responsible for crimes such as lust murders”. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: PAYDRETZ — “SOUS LE BANNIÈRE BLANCHE”

 Premieres  No Responses »
Aug 162021
 

 

Those of you who are already familiar with the releases of the distinctive French label Antiq Records know that the bands who gather beneath its banner have an affinity for tales and tunes of bygone ages and old instruments, often melded together with the ravaging power and intensity of metal. And to that congregation of talents Antiq has added Paydretz, a French black/folk metal project featuring members of Véhémence, Himinbjorg, Hanternoz, Grylle, Belenos, and Wÿntër Ärvn.

Paydretz’s striking debut album is entitled Chroniques de l’Insurrection, set for release on October 8th. It’s a 14-track musical narrative of “the War in the Vendée” that took place in France between 1793 and 1796. This was a counter-revolution, an uprising among the French peasantry and a few royalist noblemen in the Vendée region during the Revolution’s reign of terror in Paris. It achieved a series of military victories before the counter-revolution was finally (and brutally) suppressed.

The song we’re presenting today, “Sous le Bannière Blanche“, is the sixth track in this opus. Its title refers to the white royal flag, as opposed to the Revolution’s tri-color flags of blue, white, and red. Later on in history and on the album (to borrow Antiq’s words), “defeats and fatigue of the wartime made the peasants weary of the situation and they abandoned the uprising (around 1800 and the arrival of Napoléon), so this is quite the rising of power of the album, and afterwards it declines to more bitter rage and discouraged feelings”. Continue reading »

SHADES OF BLACK: FIAT NOX, ANIMA MORTUUM, GLORIAM, FERETRAL, ONOK, VIXENTA

 Album Reviews, SHADES OF BLACK, SHORT BUT SWEET  3 Responses »
Aug 152021
 

 

For today’s black metal column I’ve included reviews of two EPs, a pair of new videos, and just a sampling of tracks from two recently released albums that I want to recommend even though I don’t have enough time to give them proper reviews. Hope you find something to like.

FIAT NOX (Germany)

I decided to begin today’s collection with a song that will get your pulse racing. Part of that effect derives from the hammering propulsive drive, the wild and sinister fieriness of the riffing, and the scalding savagery of the vocal tirades. But the song is also a thriller because of its dynamism — from the skull-popping beats and infectious yells to the bubbling bass solo and the sweeping melodic blaze behind it. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD ON A SATURDAY: CARCASS, CADAVER, CALLUS, SUN OF THE SUNS, STORMGREY, SHADECROWN, SOMBRE FIGURES, THOMAS BEL, ZORNHEYM

 Album Reviews, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  No Responses »
Aug 142021
 

 

Upon awakening this morning I gave some passing though to concentrating on one or two albums and trying to write something that might pass for a review or two. As you can see, the thought didn’t last long, and I instead dove back into the giant list of new songs and videos that had become the source of the giant two-part roundup I compiled yesterday. And that led to this further compilation… though it does include one album review after all.

CARCASS (UK)

“I’d describe this album as dad rock.” So says Jeff Walker about the new Carcass album, Torn Arteries. The song that premiered (here) at Rolling Stone along with an excellent animated video (created by created by the inimitable Costin Chioreanu), an extensive history of the band, and a very enjoyable interview of Walker, is definitely more of a rocking song than most others in Carcass‘ storied discography, but the song’s rapidly chugging riff, worming leads, squirming solo, and booming drums do get their hooks in the head. Moreover, Walker’s vocals are damned nasty, and there’s a devilish atmosphere surrounding the song as well. I like it! Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD (PART 2): LLNN, ROTHADÁS, SEPULTURA, SKEPTICISM, SUL AD ASTRAL, SWELLING REPULSION, UNTAMED LAND, THE ZENITH PASSAGE

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  2 Responses »
Aug 132021
 

 

This is Part 2 of a mountainous round-up of new songs and videos that surfaced during the last week. If you haven’t perused Part 1, it’s here. Before cutting these 16 offerings into two pieces I arranged them in alphabetical order by band name, and so here we have L – Z. Musically, this one might be even more wide-ranging than what you’ll find in Part 1.

LLNN (Denmark)

“Although the song begins with spacey ambience, it quickly falls forward into a mighty chug that’s then handed off to vocalist-guitarist Christian Bonnesen‘s stone-scraping howls. It only gets heavier from there, as avalanching bass rumbles and violent drums bash the groove into the ground with the force of King Kong punching the earth.”

That’s what Revolver’s Eli Enis wrote in introducing the premiere of this next song two days ago, presented through a video that depicts an entity from beyond our solar system swallowing our planet whole. And it is indeed a humongously heavy track, and a creepy one. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD (PART 1): ALDA, ARAN, CHROME WAVES, CULT BURIAL, EUCHARIST, FAMISHGOD, KAECK, KORPIKLAANI

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  No Responses »
Aug 132021
 

 

It’s a rare day when I have no premieres to write for our site, and no posts to edit and format from any of our other writers either. So I spent the extra time listening to more than the usual number of new songs and videos released this week, and found a whopping 16 of them I wanted to recommend.

Rather than put them all in a single post, which might have been like hitting you in the mouth with a bag of nails, I’ve divided them into two parts, arranged alphabetically from the beginning of Part 1 to the end of Part 2 — beginning with A and finishing with Z.

ALDA (US)

It’s been a long wait for something new from this very talented Washington State black metal band, but now they’re back with a new album named A Distant Fire, and a first advance track from the album that’s a sure sign the wait has been worthwhile. Continue reading »

 Older Entries  Newer Entries