AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): ALTARS OF THE MOON — “THE COLOSSUS AND THE WIDOW”

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Nov 162023
 

Released in the summer of 2021, Brahmastra was the debut album of Altars of the Moon. It first turned some heads because of the identities of the people who made it: Nathan Verschoor (Uada), Jeff Wilson (Chrome Waves, Deeper Graves, ex-Nachmystium), and Heath Rave (Lotus Thrones, ex-Wolvhammer). It probably turned heads again when it became evident that the music was several big steps away from what might have been expected given the nature of the participants’ main musical endeavors.

Like other collaborations, this one was born in lockdown times, one of covid’s precious few silver linings. As a plague child, some might have expected it would quickly perish, a one-and-done union of talents. But time doesn’t heal all wounds, nor does it always still restless minds or silence voices. As it turns out, Altars of the Moon had something more to say.

And so now we’re on the verge of Disorder Recordings releasing a second Altars of the Moon album, this one named The Colossus and The Widow. The three collaborators came together again by long distance — Rave on vocals, Verschoor on guitars and synths, and Wilson on bass, guitar, and synth — but this time they were joined by another notable name, Alan Cassidy (The Black Dahila Murder), on drums. In addition, the new record features guest appearances on saxophone by Bruce Lamont (Yakuza) and on trumpet by Mac Gollehon (Duran Duran, David Bowie).

We’re now putting the results before you in full, preceded by our own thoughts as usual but also by these from Heath Rave: Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: SKY ISLAND — “FALL INTO DARKNESS”

 Exceptions to the Rule, Premieres  2 Responses »
Nov 062023
 

This is one of those “and now for something completely different” moments at our site, like coming home to find that all your furnishings have been replaced and people you’ve never seen before are there waiting for you. Startling to be sure, but if you don’t immediately exit and slam the door, maybe you discover that the unexpected changes are… to your liking.

Well, maybe you’ve seen or heard one of the participants in Sky Island before. He’s the one sitting behind the drum kit in the video you’re about to see. His name is Ben Fagerness, and he’s been violently hitting things in the Minneapolis death metal band Graveslave for almost a decade, and also in Gloryhole Guillotine.

Some of you might also recognize the other person in the video, Niilo Smith, though his participation in the wide world of metal and rock as a solo creator has been in a very different sector, most likely unknown to the usual visitors at this site. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): AEONIAN SORROW — “KATARA”

 Album Reviews, Exceptions to the Rule, Premieres  1 Response »
Oct 312023
 

In the Pindus mountains of northern Greece there is a pass called Katara. We are told that according to the legend, “Katara got its name from a despot who around 1800 set out from Ioannina to go to Trikala city, but the bad weather in the area made it so difficult for him that he died on the way and he cursed the mountain”.

Many tragic stories have been written about this pass, and the Greek/Finnish doom-metal collective Aeonian Sorrow have now written their own, although their new album Katara, which will be released tomorrow, includes other stories as well — and it is dedicated to the memory of Georgia and Michail, beloved grandparents of the band’s singer Gogo Melone.

The lyric stories included in Katara do vary across the album’s seven substantial songs, all of them heart-felt, but they are stories of deep loss, despair, and anger — heart-breaking and harrowing, as well as heart-felt. Gogo has explained how they all came to be: Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: VOID — “SELF ISOLATION”

 Exceptions to the Rule, Premieres  1 Response »
Oct 132023
 

For people who suffer from paraskevidekatriaphobia today is a very bad day, a Friday the 13th, and one that dawns in the spookiest month of the year. But in the pentagram-loving world of metal, of course, it’s an excellent day to reveal new music, perhaps exceeded only by Samhain itself.

New music is indeed what we have for you today, a song from a new album by the UK avant-garde black metal pioneers Void, whose lineup features members of Dødheimsgard, Atramentum, and Dreams of the Drowned.

The album’s name is Jadjow, and it’s set for release on December 7th by Brucia Records. The song we present today is “Self Isolation“. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD ON A SATURDAY: WAYFARER, ENDOLITH, TROUNCE, KRÂEL, KING KAOS, DOMINION OF SUFFERING, PHOBONOID

 Album Reviews, Exceptions to the Rule, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  1 Response »
Oct 072023
 


Wayfarer – photo by Frank Guerra

Another Bandcamp Friday again overwhelmed the NCS in-box as bands, labels, and PR agents sought to capitalize on Bandcamp’s reduced take from sales. A similar deluge washed through social media, and every other channel where I look for new music.

It really is overwhelming, and probably self-defeating. Ironically, releasing new music on a Bandcamp Friday is probably the best strategy for getting overlooked — drowned in the flood.

It certainly adds to the stresses of creating this weekly column. I fantasize that the point of it is to help guide people toward musical gems, even though in even a normal week I know it’s still a very random process because I can’t listen to everything that might interest me or you. In a week like the last one, the process of sifting becomes an even more ridiculous challenge.

All I can say is that I enjoyed what you’ll find below, and hope that you make some valuable discoveries from it too. (And don’t bash me for overlooking a couple dozen more songs, not to mention complete albums and EPs, that would have been just as worthy of attention.) Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): MY LAMENT — “THE SEASON CAME UNDONE”

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Sep 192023
 

The stories and ideas that inspire the lyrics and music in metal albums are, at least in the minds of most listeners, of secondary importance to an album’s audio sensations, even when those narratives and notions were vital to the people who created the album. The same is true of stories about how an album came to exist at all.

To be honest, many times (most of the time?) a metal album’s conceptual themes just aren’t that novel or compelling, or they’re poorly rendered, especially in the lyrics. Just as often, the events that brought a band together and led to the making of the music, usually involving the surmounting of myriad misfortunes, turn out to be not very interesting, which in many instances might mainly be the fault of how the story is told.

In all these respects, however, the comeback album of the Belgian death/doom band My Lament is an exception to the norm. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD ON A SATURDAY: CELESTE, FUMING MOUTH, URANIUM, TUMANDUUMBAND, MECHINA

 Exceptions to the Rule, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  No Responses »
Sep 092023
 


Celeste

A lot of new music came out over the last week. All I can do today is lightly scratch the surface, like a friendly cat who touches their human companion’s skin with claws that let you know they’re there but without drawing blood — though some of the music here might feel like blood is being shed.

I got a very late start this morning, and so depended on late-breaking alerts from some of my NCS compatriots and a couple of other acquaintances rather than methodically clawing through my immense list of links and letting my own impulses determine the choices.I’ll probably be more self-directed in assembling tomorrow’s blackish column. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD ON A SATURDAY: GRAVESEND, TETRAGRAMMACIDE, DEN SAAKALDTE, KAUNIS KUOLEMATON, :UGN:

 Exceptions to the Rule, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  4 Responses »
Sep 022023
 


Gravesend

A week that ends with a Bandcamp Friday is a terrible week for the NCS in-box. During just the 24 hours of September 1st we received 310 e-mails. The count for the week was significantly more than 1,000.

Such weeks are also terrible for roundups like this one, because so many bands and labels release new music in an effort to capitalize on the attention that Bandcamp Fridays tend to attract — terrible because it results in so much music to choose from.

I sure as hell didn’t read all those 1,000+ e-mails. I did skim the subject lines, skipping over the ones that seemed geared toward selling merch and others that arrived because (annoyingly) we’re somehow on mailing lists for music that has nothing to do with metal, and others which hinted that the metal was of the kind that would hurt my head if I listened to it (e.g., power metal). And eventually I just ran out of time, so I’m sure I overlooked some things that might have been gem-like if I’d discovered them.

But the skimming process still left me with a giant pile of new music I thought might be interesting, and on top of that were other sources of recommendations outside of our e-mails that I pay attention to. Nothing more than instinct and impulse led to finding the following needles in that haystack. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD: ALKALOID, MOROKH, MYRKUR, DOPELORD, DISMAL AURA

 Exceptions to the Rule, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  2 Responses »
Aug 222023
 

A rare day with no premieres on our calendar, which means I had time to whip up a roundup of new songs and videos.

Lots of things to choose from, as usual, and in making those choices I decided to give you a musical carnival ride, one of those things that’s spinning in several directions at once and leaves you stumbling with vertigo by the end.

ALKALOID (Germany)

My comrade DGR alerted us to this first song, which he pithily described as “one of the more batshit songs from Numen,” Numen being the name of Alkaloid‘s new album. Saying that anything on an Alkaloid release is more batshit than others is really saying something, since everything tends to be in the batshit crazy category. But sure enough…. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD ON A SATURDAY: GREAT FALLS, THE KEENING, DIKASTERION, COPROLITH

 Album Reviews, Exceptions to the Rule, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC, SHORT BUT SWEET  3 Responses »
Aug 192023
 

Well, no unforeseeable calamities befell me or our indomitable site in the last 24 hours, and so I’ve probably set a record for us today with the fourth roundup of new music in a row. If you include tomorrow’s Shades of Black column (barring a calamity), that will be five in a row.

The incredible thing is that even with so many daily installments, one after the other, there’s still a big pile of worthy new metal I haven’t managed to feature, and in that respect there’s nothing particularly unusual about the last week. Every week, the flood just keeps surging.

GREAT FALLS (U.S.)

I fibbed a little. Not everything in today’s collection surfaced during the last week. These first two songs, “Trap Feeding” and “Old Words Worn Thin“, are a tad older than that. They’re both from a new album by this devastating Seattle crew that will be out on September 15th through Neurot Recordings. Continue reading »

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