Islander

AN NCS PREMIERE: ELUSIVE GOD — “KOB”

 Exceptions to the Rule, Premieres  No Responses »
Apr 112025
 

(written by Islander)

Pay no attention to the name of our site. We don’t really mean it. Well, honestly we mostly do mean it, but not all the time. Some of the time we hear singing that just makes us shake our heads in wonder and are helpless to bar the door against it. Today is one of those times. (So, for those few snarks who can’t resist yelling, “But there’s clean singing in this song!”, just choke that down or you’ll prove you’ve never been here before.)

What we have for you today is the premiere of a song named “Kob” off the thrilling new album Ambis by the Croatian epic doom band Elusive God, which will be released on May 9th by the always-interesting Personal Records. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: CRIMSON CROWN — “BURN THE CHAINS WITH UNHOLY FIRE”

 Premieres  No Responses »
Apr 112025
 

(written by Islander)

We’ve had a few occasions in previous years to froth at the mouth about the extravagant music of the Russian black metal band Malist, on one occasion summing it up as “…blazing and boisterous… thrusting and thunderous… moody, melancholy, and mysterious at times, but mainly explosive and exhilarating (and highly addictive)…”

Now we learn that the Russian musician behind Malist, Nick Kholodov (Ovfrost), has a new project named Crimson Crown and a debut album for the project entitled Vae Victis that will be out next month. Like Malist, Crimson Crown is devoted to black metal, but there must be differences, mustn’t there? Else why create a new project? Well, let’s find out together as we listen to a song from Val Victis named “Burn the Chains With Unholy Fire“. Continue reading »

BUTCHERBIRD: “DROUGHT/DELUGE”

 Album Reviews, SHORT BUT SWEET  No Responses »
Apr 112025
 


Artwork by šaška

(On May 30th Drowning Sea God Records will digitally release the debut EP from the London-based metallic hardcore band ButcherBird. Wil Cifer has had a chance to hear it, and sent in the following positive review.)

I’m always up for checking out a hardcore band that is willing to venture off the beaten path. So here we are with ButcherBird, a hardcore band from London that has a metallic groove to their feedback-squealing attack.

The angry shout of the vocals is the most straightforward thing about the overall sound this band is throwing at you. They do use breakdowns, but these cropped up in less expected places. There is a more rock n roll vibe underlying the whiplash of angular riffs, making them more of Rollins Band than Full of Hell when it comes to the sonic scope these guys have crafted. Unwieldy sections of choruses collide to create a celebratory ambience. They are not fueled by a singular mood, but express a wide range of varied emotions with little pretense. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: ANCESTOR OF KAOS — “ETERNAL NIGHT”

 Premieres  No Responses »
Apr 102025
 

(written by Islander)

The marauding black/thrashers Ancestor of Kaos have followed a long and winding road, a twisting and turning path that now leads to the April 18 release of their new album Animal Ritual by Horror Pain Gore Death Productions.

They began as a black metal band formed in Havana, Cuba in 2005 under the name Ancestor. Under that name they released a first demo, a split, and two albums. In 2013 the band moved to the U.S following an invitation to play at South by Southwest that same year. Initially they were based in Miami and were active on stage, opening for such bands as Deicide, Acheron, and Goatwhore, among others.

We’re told that from 2015 until 2020 the band went into a brief hiatus where they changed their name to Ancestor of Kaos. In 2022, after resuming activity, they released their Ancestor of Kaos album, which consisted of new versions of old songs, re-recorded in Las Vegas, Nevada. And then, in 2024 (with a renewed lineup) they began releasing singles that would lead to the discharge of this new album. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: KA’APER — “EYES OF KA’APER”

 Premieres  No Responses »
Apr 102025
 

(written by Islander)

Today we encounter once again the term “dark metal“, which is how two labels are describing a debut album they’re releasing from the Cypriot band Ka’aper. It is one of the most amorphous genre descriptions you can find in the realms of metal, most often used (it seems) when none of the other more established and more descriptive labels fit very well, even the multiply-hyphenated ones.

What it means in the case of Ka’aper and their first full-length While Flows The Nile is a subject we’ll explore today through our premiere of a song from the album named “Eyes Of Ka’aper“. But first, a bit of background about what has motivated the band. Continue reading »

AN NCS INTERVIEW: CONSUMPTION

 Interviews  No Responses »
Apr 102025
 

(Here we present Zoltar’s interview with the ever-busy Håkan Stuvemark, the focus being on his death metal band Consumption, whose latest album Catharsis was released in January by Dusktone.)

Hard to say when the disease started spreading but most extreme metal historians (if there’s such a thing) would probably agree that General Surgery, Dead Infection, and/or Pathologist were the first ‘official’ Carcass clones, as early as 1988. And it somehow never stopped since then: Haemorrhage, Necrony, Golem, early Exhumed, Butcher ABC, etc. The list goes on and on and never ceased to grow. Yet, from time to time and despite the heavy competition, somebody decides to pick up the gauntlet and run with it, reaching for the extra yard, today’s case pick being Consumption.

Just like the ‘fake’ band The County Medical Examiners vowed in the ’00s to record the sequel to Symphonies Of Sickness but never got the time nor the will to record, Håkan Stuvemark from Wombbath decided instead to raid that even better guarded citadel known as Necroticism. And it looks like he’s having a blast doing so, as although he’s got his fingers in so many pies at the same time, he still did find the time to record three albums of pure Necroticism-worship over the course of five albums, the latest being the just-released Catharsis on Dusktone.

Yet based on what he’s telling us, there is more here to be found than ‘just’ extremely well-made fanart. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): SONUM — “THE OBSCURE LIGHT AWAITS”

 Album Reviews, Premieres  No Responses »
Apr 092025
 

(written by Islander)

Those of us who first came across the Italian death metal band Sonum through their 2021 EP Divide et Impera encountered a head-spinning array of wild musical adventures, a free-wheeling experimentation in which death metal was only one of many stylistic twists and turns. They followed that with their somewhat less genre-bending but still multi-faceted 2022 debut album Visceral Void Entropy, and now they’re returning again with their new full-length The Obscure Light Awaits, set for release on April 11th by the Dusktone label.

Since their last album, Sonum‘s lineup has dropped from five members to three, and by some measures their music has become more streamlined as well, certainly more carefully structured and cohesive.

But let us quickly banish any thought that Sonum have become “conventional”, in any sense of the word. This is an ingeniously elaborate and thoroughly dazzling album of progressive and atmospheric death metal (though its varying moods are quite dark), and heads that lean into it won’t stop spinning until it’s over — as you will learn for yourselves through our premiere today. Continue reading »

AN NCS INTERVIEW: MORBIFIC

 Interviews  No Responses »
Apr 092025
 

(On April 21st a group of labels will release a new album by the Finnish death metal band Morbific, and that induced our contributor Zoltar to reach out for an interview, which now follows.)

Samples of forgotten horror flicks, a crude-as-fuck production, distorted bass breaks one hasn’t heard since Impetigo‘s debut album back in 1990, dual vocals and lyrics about mutilating a corpse or draining into a tub various secretions of a putrefied body… You can’t really blame Finnish youngsters Morbific for beating around the (dead) bush can you?

Various splits and an EP plus three albums, including the soon-to-be-released Bloom Of The Abnormal Flesh, in, the trio stick to what they do best: old-school, primitive, and ghastly death metal, yet surprisingly catchy thanks to its underlining groove and straight-to-the-point attitude. Next to other rather ‘new’ European acts like Stockholm’s Repuked or Copenhagen’s Undergang, their undeniable faith in a certain deeply underground and untouched-by-modernism definition of what death metal stands for is undeniable.

And yes, based on their bass player and vocalist Jusa‘s not quite extensive answers, they don’t seem to give a fuck about anything, but it’s probably because at the end of the day, it’s just all about playing freakin’ death metal and celebrating gore, nothing less nothing more. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): FINAL DOSE — “UNDER THE ETERNAL SHADOW”

 Album Reviews, Premieres  No Responses »
Apr 082025
 

(written by Islander)

Like other genres of extreme metal, a good case can be made that black metal in its earliest stages evolved from punk rock. But black metal continued to evolve in ways that essentially left punk behind. Some bands did not completely cut the tie, but many did, and so the fundamental tropes of subversive “second wave” black metal as they took shape in the early ’90s, and which persist to this day, bear little resemblance to where things started.

Yet in more recent times, maybe most notably over the last decade I’d say, we’ve seen a new emergence of punk influence in black metal, not really a rolling back of the clock to the earliest days but a hybridization of punk, hardcore, or crust and second wave Scandinavian black metal.

Many bands have embraced that hybrid form, and Final Dose from the UK are one of them, and one of the best. But they have also evolved, bringing other stylistic ingredients into their mix besides those two main ones in order to better express the emotional torrents that fuel their work.

The results are vividly on display in their viscerally powerful new album Under The Eternal Shadow, which we’re premiering and reviewing today in advance of its release on April 11th by Wolves of Hades. Continue reading »

AN NCS INTERVIEW: PYRE

 Exceptions to the Rule  No Responses »
Apr 082025
 

(Today we share Comrade Aleks‘ interview with Dmitry “Dym Nox”, the drummer, bassist, and vocalist of the Russian death metal band Pyre, whose latest album has been out for a couple of months on the Osmose label.)

Pyre is probably the most powerful and recognized Russian death metal band, and the release of their third album Where Obscurity Sways at the end of January on Osmose Productions was an event.

The previous album Chained to Ossuaries was recorded five years ago by Dmitry “Dym Nox” (drums, bass, vocals), Roman Rotten (guitars), and Fred Obsinner (guitars). It was a strange experience for the band: Pyre were then on a tight deadline, there were problems with the drummer, and they, as never before, wrote and recorded all the material in a year, and it was immediately released. And Dmitry considers Where Obscurity Sways as a spontaneous continuation of its predecessor, but on a different level both in general and in production.

According to him, the band is currently euphoric about the result, especially since the new material was recorded with drummer Oleg “Malleus”, with whom Pyre had been playing together for a long time and testing out ideas. The result is impressive. I interviewed Dmitry for the Dark City magazine, and as soon as the current issue is released, I’d like to share this interview with you.

Continue reading »

 Older Entries  Newer Entries