Islander

AN NCS PREMIERE: MIRROR NEURON — “INTERIOR SEMIOTICS”

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Nov 192024
 

(written by Islander)

As a band name, Mirror Neuron is an intriguing choice, and so is the artwork on this Toronto duo’s spectacular debut album, Great Content.

A “mirror neuron” is an actual thing, present in the brains of humans, primate species, and birds. According to The Font of All Human Knowledge: “A mirror neuron is a neuron that fires both when an animal acts and when the animal observes the same action performed by another. Thus, the neuron ‘mirrors’ the behavior of the other, as though the observer were itself acting.” Its function has been the subject of much speculation, which you can read about via that link above.

As for the cover art, it’s a painting by Justyna Koziczak (used with her permission) called “Dante and Virgil in 4th circle of hell” (that’s the circle for the greedy).

But the intrigues don’t stop there. Consider the way the Mirror Neuron duo have characterized the music on their album: Continue reading »

DJEVEL: “NATT TIL ENDE”

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Nov 192024
 

(Today we welcome to NCS a Croatian metal writer currently based in Oslo, Norway, who goes by the name Chile. He brings us the following review of the new album by the Norwegian black metal band Djevel, just released by Aftermath Music.)

Yes, talk about being on a roll. While some bands would take their sweet time to release an album or two, Norwegian forces of otherworldly nature and all things black in the form of Djevel, have come back to us with their ninth album in just fifteen years of existence. Some would raise an eyebrow or two to this prolific manner in this day and age, but we are raising our glasses and horns to another devilish masterpiece.

Appropriately titled Natt til ende (Night to the End) and released in the middle of the dark November by Aftermath Music, the album packs a punch so fierce that the fury unleashed can be felt up to high heavens, which makes even more sense when we heed the words of T. Ciekals, the creative force behind Djevel: Continue reading »

AN NCS INTERVIEW: BARATHRUM

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Nov 192024
 

(In this brief interview Demonos Sova, a co-founding member of the long-running Finnish black metal band Barathrum, answered questions posed by our Comrade Aleks about their new album Überkill.)

One of the oldest Finnish black metal entities Barathrum is here again, and as you saw in our Shades of Black department, Demonos Sova and his circle have not returned empty-handed.

The new album Überkill is out thanks to Hammer of Hate, and it’s easy to predict what you’ll get from it – a portion of concentrated black metal nihilism with savage heavy metal touches. So I welcome you to take a short quest to the Mountain of Bones to fulfill symbolic Ritual Murder through the Dark Sorceress’ Black Magic Rites and accept the Death by Steel for Überkill’s sake. Continue reading »

THE MOST INFECTIOUS EXTREME METAL SONGS OF 2024: OUR ANNUAL APPEAL TO READERS FOR HELP!

 MOST INFECTIOUS SONGS-2024  16 Responses »
Nov 182024
 

You might not have noticed, but our annual LISTMANIA extravaganza at NCS has begun, as evidenced by this post from last week. But we didn’t really give this project a proper introduction, so we’re doing that now. For those of you new to the orgy, our LISTMANIA blockbuster comes in four parts:

First, like that post linked above, we re-print assorted lists of the year’s best albums, leeched from other big web sites and magazines. Second, we will provide a post in which our readers can share their lists of the 2024 albums and shorter releases they enjoyed the most (we’ll be asking for those on December 2nd, so get ready). Third, we will post the year-end lists of our own staff and assorted guest writers, and that will begin whenever Andy Synn gets his week-long series of lists ready, since that’s how we always begin.

And fourth, I’ll again roll out my list of the year’s Most Infectious Extreme Metal Songs — though it’s a tradition I failed to honor last year. That list is the subject of this request for help. Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: LES CHANTS DU HASARD — “PARMI LES POUSSIÈRES”

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Nov 182024
 

Short-hand descriptions of Les Chants Du Hasard have included references to the project as a “French Blackened Orchestral/Operatic Ensemble” and to the music (even more succinctly) as “extreme opera”. Over the course of four albums, the most recent of which was released this past June, the project’s principal protagonist Hazard has found frequently eye-popping and unconventional methods of expressing extreme emotions such as anger, violence, darkness, and despair, with the goal of thoroughly submerging the listener in them.

Hazard has described the latest album, Livre Quart, in these words:

“I created LES CHANTS DU HASARD following a vision of a crawling and ugly opera, in which some light could be found, the same way that [French poet Charles] Baudelaire found beauty in ugliness. This idea has been with me on a daily basis since 2016, when I decided to give it a try and began composing Livre Premier. Livre Quart is the closest I’ve come to realizing this vision.”

As a reminder of what the album brings us, and hopefully to open new ears to its daunting phenomena, today we premiere a video for the record’s opening piece, “Parmi Les Poussières“. Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: KILLING SPREE — “ALL THESE BELLS AND WHISTLES”

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Nov 182024
 

(written by Islander)

As a musical instrument the saxophone seems to live in a walled garden. Probably no other instrument is more uniquely associated with jazz. Other instruments used in jazz ensembles have regular roles in other musical genres, but the saxophone? Not so much.

And so when people hear a saxophone, it’s hard not to think of jazz, even when the performer isn’t doing jazz riffs or jazzy noodling. But of course a lot of the time that’s what the performer really is doing, even in a different musical setting, such as metal and rock, where some bands (especially the proggier ones) have brought in guest sax performers to add a little unconventional spice.

Of course a few bands in rock and metal have a saxophonist as a regular member of their lineup — but it’s a tiny percentage. And maybe that’s because of the “walled garden” effect: It’s hard not to think of jazz when you hear the instrument, and the number of ardent metal fans who also like jazz (and vice-versa) probably isn’t a huge contingent (mind you, this is a wild guess).

And that brings us to Killing Spree, a French drum-and-saxophone duo who’ve applied a battering ram to the confines of that walled garden. Continue reading »

SHADES OF BLACK: AHAMKARA, AN AXIS OF PERDITION, SJÁLFSMORÐ AF GÁLEYSI, TODESTRIEB, NOITASAPATTI

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Nov 172024
 

I have to be brief today, because I’m compelled to leave home soon for a few hours. An appointment you really don’t want to hear about, and one I’ll be attending masked, in an effort not to infect people around me with my shitty cold. So, without further ado….

AHAMKARA (UK/U.S.)

I think most NCS visitors know by now that we don’t report “the news”, i.e., announcements of new bands or records, if there’s no music streaming. There’s too many such announcements and too few of us. If there’s no music available yet, we just wait until there is, and then see if we think it’s worth recommending.

But there are exceptions to every rule, and I’m beginning with one. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD ON A SATURDAY: MANTAR, SAVAGE LANDS, FRONTIERER, ASS TO MOUTH, ROTTEN SOUND, RITUAL FOG, SKAPHOS, THE SWORD, SOLIPSISM, PLAGUEFEVER

 Exceptions to the Rule, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  No Responses »
Nov 162024
 


Mantar photo by Sonja Schuringa/Chantik Photography

I have my second miserable cold in two months, and how are you doing? I’ve been focusing on music that I thought would help blast the snot out of my head. I’ve included a lot of that below. I can’t tell that I’ve really come un-clogged, but it has made me feel better in other ways, including providing catharsis for being so pissed off that the virus has hit me again so quickly.

As you can see, I had time enough to do lots of listening and watching yesterday and this morning. As usual, the music from the 10 bands featured below isn’t all I heard and liked, but I had to draw the line somewhere. I moved some of my choices to tomorrow’s SHADES OF BLACK column, and others I hope I’ll get too somewhere down the road. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: A DEAD POEM — “IN FORGOTTEN DIMENSIONS”

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Nov 152024
 

(written by Islander)

Some people are still alive who remember a time in the early ’90s (because they witnessed it) when the now well-defined genres of extreme metal weren’t so sharply separated, when there was a commingling of styles such as gothic doom, black metal, and melodeath. Others who weren’t contemporaneous witnesses have experienced those moments by listening to such records as Paradise Lost‘s Gothic, Katatonia‘s Dance of December Souls, or Rotting Christ‘s A Dead Poem.

It is no coincidence that the Brazilian duo of Marlon Combat and Carlos Misanthropic chose A Dead Poem as the name of their band, because their aim was to grasp and revive the intertwined aesthetics of doom and black metal manifested by records such as those.

Their first efforts in that direction were captured in their Absence of Life EP self-released last year (and then released in a limited CD edition early his year by Cold Art Industry Records). That caught the attention of the eclectic Personal Records, which is now primed to release A Dead Poem‘s debut album Abstract Existence on December 13th.

Some of the songs from the album have already surfaced (and opened lots of eyes and ears), and today we’re bringing you another one, a stunner of a song named “In Forgotten Dimensions“. Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: HOSTILIA — “POWER OUT”

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Nov 152024
 

(written by Islander)

We have a hell of a good story to share with you, one that’s probably well-known in the environs of Gothenburg, Sweden, but probably less well-known elsewhere, including here in North America. It’s the kind of story which reminds us that some of today’s best-known and most influential metal bands first seized attention decades ago as teenagers.

And, in addition to a hell of a good story, we’re also sharing one hell of a good song and video that features the young Gothenburg-based thrashers Hostilia.

First, here’s the story: Continue reading »

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