Sep 032015
 

Black Sabbath-The End tour flyer

 

I’m interrupting the work I’m supposed to be doing for my fucking day job because this seemed like important news:  Black Sabbath have announced that their farewell North American tour, The End, will begin in January in Omaha and end in February at New York City’s Madison Square Garden. The band will do a leg in Australia and New Zealand in April and will be announcing more shows next month.

The lineup will consist of Ozzy Osbourne, Tony Iommi, and Geezer Butler — but not drummer Bill Ward, of course. Here’s the schedule announced today: Continue reading »

Sep 032015
 

Autopsy-After the Cutting

 

I find myself in Alaska this morning, preparing for a day of toil for my fucking day job. This means that posts on our putrid site will be scarce today. I’m also behind (again) in putting together round-ups of news and new music. Before I have to immerse myself in what I’m paid to do, I thought I would at least compile a selection of things I spotted over the last couple of days — and this selection is based principally on the attractiveness of the album art.

AUTOPSY

As announced yesterday, the almighty Autopsy have two new  things headed our way. First, on November 13 Peaceville Records will release a jumbo set entitled After the Cutting that includes four discs “full of classics, new tracks and previously unheard rarities from deep within the band’s own archive”. This special release will also include “an expansive book penned by Dennis Dread recounting the career of the gore legend, featuring unseen photos and exclusive artwork”.

Wes Benscoter again handled the Autopsy artwork for After the Cutting. As you can see, it’s sick. Continue reading »

Aug 272015
 

Mordbrand vidclip

 

One of these days I’ll learn that part-time, half-witted metal bloggers shouldn’t make promises about what they’re going to do. Yesterday I wrote that I would post two round-up’s of new music in an effort to partially catch up on all the new songs that had emerged since the last one I compiled five days earlier, but that obviously didn’t happen.

However, thanks to Austin Weber, we do have two today, with this being the second one. One silver lining to the cloud of my tardiness is that since yesterday I discovered one more item worth recommending to you — and it’s the first one in this post.

MORDBRAND

For those who haven’t religiously followed my scribbling over the last few years, I will confess that I’m a slavish fan of Sweden’s Mordbrand. It’s not that they have any compromising photos of me, it’s because they’ve been so consistently good at what they do. Out of all the outstanding songs they’ve released, perhaps my favorite track is “That Which Crawls” from their 2014 album Imago — and today they released a video for that very song. Continue reading »

Aug 272015
 

Cerebric Turmoil cover

 

(Austin Weber steps up for round-up duty, with new music from four bands.)

While we already shove enough music down your throat on a daily basis to have your anus crying musical notes for a year, I figured I might as well present some more killer metal to up the rectal/ear discomfort of our readers. Below you’ll find a smattering of new songs by groups about to release new material, as well as a heads-up about a new release worth investing time in. A feast for the fetid-minded awaits you. In either a pleasant or unpleasant way. Your choice.

CEREBRIC TURMOIL

Oftentimes promising metal bands I’ve been interested in have sadly bitten the dust before they were able to release a proper album or EP. So often, all we have in memoriam is a brief demo or split material. For a number of years now, it’s looked like that very fate might befall German death metal band Cerebric Turmoil. After a 2006 demo, the band started off at a very high level, releasing a split album with none other then Defeated Sanity, which should give you an idea of their sound and also the quality of their music. In fact, at one point, the band actually had Defeated Sanity’s bass player in their ranks, and they also had famed oddball guitarist Fountainhead (now in Obscura) in their line-up at one point too.

After releasing their split with Defeated Sanity in 2008, the band broke up that same year. And while they re-formed in 2010, a full-length statement was nowhere in sight. Only now in 2015 are the band on the cusp of releasing their very promising debut, Neural Net Meltdown (on November 13th) through Amputated Vein Records. They just released the first song from it called “Grotesque Dreaming”, which I’ve embedded below for you to jam. Continue reading »

Aug 262015
 

Aevangelist-Enthrall To The Void Of Bliss

 

I haven’t been able to pull together a round-up of news and new music in five days, and you know what that means: I’ve got a backlog that’s so big I’ll never catch up. But instead of just uttering a big sigh and looking ahead instead of behind, I decided I should at least pick some of what interested me out of the last five days’ discoveries (in the hope that they will interest you, too).

The entries in this first part of a two-part post are almost all news items — and they include a ton of great cover art — but since this feature is called Seen and HEARD, I’ve tacked on one new song at the end that you can stream right here. Part 2 will be all music.

ÆVANGELIST

This interests me greatly: Through 20 Buck Spin, Ævangelist will release their fourth album on October 9 in the U.S. and October 23 in Europe. A vinyl edition is projected for December. The name of the album is Enthrall To the Void of Bliss. I have to find out who created the cover art, because it’s very good. (UPDATE: I’ve learned that the wonderful art was created by Stephen Wilson [FB page here], and more of his work will appear in the digipak of this album.) Continue reading »

Aug 212015
 

Black Breath-Slaves Beyond Death

 

I’m still trying to catch up on recommending new music I discovered earlier this week. I unloaded a bunch yesterday, I have more today, and I’m hoping to pull together some more this weekend (although I’m leaving town today for a short vacation, and that may interfere with my blog compulsions).

BLACK BREATH

As I reported when I first found out, Seattle’s Black Breath have a new record coming from Southern Lord on September 25. It’s their third, with the title Slaves Beyond Death. Kurt Ballou recorded the album, Brad Boatright mastered it, and Paolo Girardi painted the cover art — and that’s some good help to have.

I thought it would be tough for Black Breath to top their great last album, Sentenced To Life, but based on the title track that premiered at Noisey yesterday I think they just might. Continue reading »

Aug 202015
 

Thy Catafalque- Sgùrr

I haven’t had time to compile a round-up of new music since Monday. I enjoy posting premieres and accompanying reviews when I like the music, and we’ve had a lot of those this week (more are coming later today), but they do tend to cut into the time available to search out other new songs worth recommending. When three or four days pass without a round-up, it’s not possible to cover everything I’d like to cover — too much good music comes out every day. So this is just an initial group of things I’d like to recommend for now; with luck I hope to prepare another round-up for tomorrow.

THY CATAFALQUE

There are few bands whose music I admire as much as Thy Catafalque. Thanks to praise about the band I first read at The Number of the Blog back in early 2011, I discovered the wonders of Thy Catafalque’s discography and began writing about the music, which in turn led me to make the acquaintance of the band’s remarkable mastermind Tamás Kátai. And then later that same year I was simply blown away by the band’s newest album, Rengeteg. I’m terrible at making narrowed lists of things I like, but if I were to attempt to make a list of my 10 favorite metal albums of all time, I know it would be a strong contender. Continue reading »

Aug 192015
 

Swallow the Sun 2015

 

I haven’t taken a poll, but I think most of us here at NCS are long-time fans of Swallow the Sun. And so today’s news about their next album was exciting to see. But I must say that it is also the kind of news that causes some trepidation — because the new album, Songs From the North, is a TRIPLE ALBUM.

It’s due for release in November of this year. For pessimists and cynics, the idea of a triple album will raise the specter of self-indulgence. Only the best single albums are brilliant all the way through; even fewer double albums can make that claim. But three?

With fingers crossed, I present the official statement that appeared on the band’s Facebook page this morning: Continue reading »

Aug 132015
 

Rotting Christ-Lucifer Over Athens

 

I’ve been distracted over the last couple of days by a combination of demands by my fucking day job and time spent with some old friends who decided to escape the furnace that is a Texas summer by visiting Seattle. On top of that, Facebook eliminated my personal profile because it wasn’t under my real legal name, which deep-sixed my friend connections to hundreds of musicians and record labels, whose FB statuses were a constant source of new-music discoveries for me. Put all that together, and the result is that I’m way behind in discovering and writing about new music streams. I’m hoping to re-group in the next day or two, but for now, here are some quick items (the last of which comes to us courtesy of Grant Skelton).

ROTTING CHRIST

As we previously reported, Season of Mist is releasing a double-live album by the almighty Rotting Christ on August 21. Entitled Lucifer Over Athens, it was recorded in Athens in December 2013, and it’s the band’s first-ever live album.

Yesterday, SoM premiered a full stream of the new album, which you can check out below. It’s available for pre-order at this location. Continue reading »

Aug 112015
 

Insomnium-Omnium Gatherum split

 

In preparing these round-ups of new songs I usually try to include music from more obscure underground bands in addition to names most of us would recognize. But I didn’t have much time yesterday to wade through the interhole in search of new things, and by chance two of the new songs I heard come from some of the bigger names; the third one has been out for a month, but there’s a reason I’m including it now. And by chance, catchy melody is the common theme for these songs (which is a big reason these three bands are so well-known).

OMNIUM GATHERUM

It’s been over two years since Finland’s Omnium Gatherum released their last album, Beyond. On August 9 they began a North America tour headlined by fellow Finnish melodeath stalwarts Insomnium — who are mounting the tour without growler/bassist Niilo Sevanen, replacing him for this tour with Mike Bear (Artisan, ex-Prototype) from the U.S. And to coincide with the tour, Omnium Gatherum and Insomnium are releasing a 7″ vinyl split, featuring artwork by Olli-Pekka Lappalainen. Continue reading »