Islander

AN NCS INTERVIEW: MYSTIC CIRCLE

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Jun 122025
 

(Today we present Comrade Aleks‘ interview of Graf von Beelzebub from the long-running German black metal band Mystic Circle. They have been on a creative hot streak, with a just-released album named Kriegsgötter MMXXV following up 2023’s Erzdämon, and yet another album headed for release this coming Halloween. So, lot’s to talk about.)

Well, it’s a kind of an awkward situation, because the interview with one of the oldest German black metal bands Mystic Circle was initiated due to their new release Kriegsgötter MMXXV, which was scheduled on June 6th by Rock of Angels. Indeed it is a kind of compilation, and the band’s followers find there a lot of well-known covers and other stuff, and the band updated this material and you’ll read about it in the interview below.

But during the interview it was discovered that Graf von Beelzebub (vocals, guitars, bass, keyboards) and A. Blackwar (drums, guitars, keyboards) had prepared new album, Hexenbrand 1486. And we’ve dug out a few facts about it as well. Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: DIGITAL NEGATIVE — “THE BLANKS”

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Jun 112025
 

(written by Islander)

It’s unhealthy to live on red meat and potatoes alone, or so the health experts tell us, and even in the case of the bloody red and fungally infested music that’s often our daily fare around here, it’s sometimes wise to diversify our diet. And so today we present Digital Negative.

That name will already be known to some of our more musically diversified patrons, perhaps especially because the resume of one of its two members (Richard Johnson) includes work with Drugs Of Faith, Agoraphobic Nosebleed, and Enemy Soil. The other member, Daniel Euphrat, has been involved in Person918x, Timmy Sells His Soul, and Bodied. Together they’ve released two EPs and now a third one named Intersect is on the way.

Digital Negative is one of those silver linings on the pandemic cloud. Pre-pandemic, Johnson and Euphrat had begun the process of forming a metal band together, but the covid lockdown threw obstacles in their way and unexpectedly led to a change in musical course, and thus the birth of Digital Negative.

Where their musical explorations have now led them in the case of Intersect is further down a path of indulging electronic and industrial influences while continuing to focus on socio-political and dystopian themes. As you’ll discover from the video premiere for “The Blanks” that we’re hosting today, the new EP’s name is apt. Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: MYR — “BRENNT”

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Jun 112025
 

(written by Islander)

Myr is a new band composed of two experienced Polish musicians who appear here under the names Svartan and TZommer. They are quite forthright in their goals for Myr: to express their passion for the heritage of such Scandinavian black metal bands as Satyricon, Bathory, and Dissection, and to create anthems rooted in those traditions that invoke moods of mysticism, darkness, and the brutal intensity of the Nordic wilderness.

They have set June 20 as the release date their debut album Hellvegen, and to help spread the word we’re hosting the premiere of a video for a song from the album named “Brennt“. Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: WITHOUTMIND — “INTERSTELLAR IMMORALITY”

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Jun 102025
 

(written by Islander)

Hailing from Bogotá, Colombia, the band WithoutMind launched themselves with a first demo in 2008 and followed it with a discography that includes two albums and a handful of splits and EPs. At a high level, their music has combined brutal death metal and grindcore, and their clever lyrics have tended toward the sarcastic and the satirical but with a wide range of themes that touch on more profound subjects as well.

The band’s second album (their latest one) was digitally released in October 2023, bearing the name Interstellar Immorality. It included a whopping 20 tracks, ranging in length from 5 seconds to slightly more than 2 minutes; at 2:04, the title track is the second longest. Lyrically, the band describe it as “a journey through conspiracies and inner reflections, where we ask: what if everything we believe is a farce?”

The album deserved a physical release, and now it will get it, through a June 18 CD co-release by GrimmDistribution and DirtyEar Records. The timing is good, because WithoutMind are gearing up for a series of live performances across Colombian cities in the second half of 2025, with plans to expand to Latin America. And to help spread the word about the album’s physical reissue, today we’re premiering an animated lyric video for its title song, “Interstellar Immorality“. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: SIGORSPÉD — “ECSTATIC TRANCE OF THE WARRIOR”

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Jun 102025
 

(written by Islander)

Yesterday we premiered a song from the forthcoming second album by Azathoth’s Dream, a band that’s part of the “Order of the Broken Sword” circle, and today we’re premiering music from an album (also to be released by Iron Bonehead Productions) by another member of that circle, the black metal band Sigorspéd.

References to musical “circles” sometimes suggest not merely cooperation among musicians, sometimes including interlocking lineups, but also close musical similarities. That, however, is not the case with the Order of the Broken Sword, as a comparison of these two back-to-back song premieres vividly demonstrates. Continue reading »

GRUESOME: “SILENT ECHOES”

 Album Reviews  1 Response »
Jun 102025
 

(Here is Todd Manning‘s review of the tremendous new album by Gruesome, out now on Relapse Records.)

Critics love to beat up on bands that aren’t original enough, but to be fair, most bands try to downplay any obvious influences. Cross-continental death metal masters Gruesome are being very open about their latest album, Silent Echoes, due out on Relapse Records on June 6th. It is supposed to sound like Death’s 1991 masterpiece, Human. But the inspiration for such imitation comes from a very genuine, heartfelt place.

Drummer Gus Rios was mentored by and a close friend of Sean Reinert, the drummer who put such a unique stamp on the aforementioned classic record. Reinert passed away unexpectedly in early 2020, and Silent Echoes is a tribute to him. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: AZATHOTH’S DREAM — “COVEN OF THE ANCIENT BLACK FLAME”

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Jun 092025
 

(written by Islander)

The last time we wrote here about the music of Azathoth’s Dream it caused us to wax poetical:

There is a world of the imagination in which the clock of the seasons has frozen and moves no longer, in which the freezing dark of winter is endless. Technology works no longer, and decay is the order of the day. What human life remains is now huddled around fires, and beyond those shrouds of light terrible predatory things wait in the endless night, inhuman and ascendant.

It is a world of dream, a nightmare for huddled humans but a hideous glory for the dreamer…. Other nightmare dreams of endless night may explain the title of the project’s debut album — Nocturnal Vampyric Bewitchment. But regardless, that title is well chosen because the music is all of those things — deeply nocturnal and viciously vampyric, and yes, also frighteningly bewitching.

And now we have new music from Azathoth’s Dream to consider, and specifically an excerpt named “Coven of the Ancient Black Flame” from the band’s forthcoming second album Solitary Forest Necromancy, which will be released by Iron Bonehead Productions on July 11th. Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: ETERNAL DISSONANCE — “EPHEMERAL GLIMPSE”

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Jun 092025
 

(written by Islander)

In a time when musical dissonance has the upper hand across a wide swath of black and death metal, a band name like Eternal Dissonance would seem to promise more of that — sounds of discord, disharmony, and disorientation.

But the word “dissonance” has other meanings outside the realms of music, signifying states of mental or emotional conflict, or the difficulty of finding a way to live which frees the spirit and transcends all the adversarial forces in life which ceaselessly hinder or halt the pursuit of any such objectives.

And so the name of this Spanish atmospheric black metal band whose music is the subject of today’s premiere may have a different significance than acting as a signpost of cacophonous decibels. You’ll be able to decide that for yourselves when you hear the song “Ephemeral Glimpse“, extracted from the band’s second album Through the Endless (set for release on June 17th by the Darkwoods label). Continue reading »

SHADES OF BLACK: UKHU PACHA, VAITARANA, IANTHIN, SUMERIAN TOMBS, LYUAOIEN, JORDFÄST

 Album Reviews, SHADES OF BLACK, SHORT BUT SWEET  No Responses »
Jun 082025
 

(written by Islander)

Welcome to another Sunday column focused (mainly) on black metal. This one goes pretty deep underground, with music from four debut releases, leavened with songs from two bands whose discography is more extensive.

I’m going to start with reviews of an album and an EP, to make sure I have time to say what I want to say about them, and then turn to a group of individual songs and videos. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD ON A SATURDAY: AMORPHIS, ZATOKREV, BARBAROUS, ACCURSED, NECHT, IN THE COMPANY OF SERPENTS, FER DE LANCE

 Exceptions to the Rule, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  No Responses »
Jun 072025
 


Amorphis – photo by Sam Jamsen

(written by Islander)

This is another Saturday column in which I decided to lure people with a “big name” at the start and then eventually expose people to names they might not know but should.

I could have included an even bigger collection of prominent names, because the past week also brought new music and/or new videos from Opeth, Paradise Lost, Dark Angel, Car Bomb, and Baest, to name a few. You can find those via the hyperlinks I included. But I wanted to have more time for lesser lights. Continue reading »

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