UNDERGROUND METAL FOR THE TRVE CURMUDGEON: WHAT’S NEW FOR 2012

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  3 Responses »
Jan 302012
 

 

(NCS guest contributor SurgicalBrute keeping it real with a collection of alerts about forthcoming releases from four underground bands — Maveth (Finland), Ketzer (Germany), Witchrist (NZ), and Anhedonist (Seattle) — plus examples of music from the featured bands.)

Another year is done, and everyone’s “best of” opinion has been given. So what’s a metalhead to do? Well, you forget about everything you got in 2011 and start looking forward to 2012.

A few big names are already being thrown around, some of whom are personal favorites (Desaster, Evoken, fucking Asphyx) and some of whom are enjoyed by the wider community (Meshuggah, Testament, Neurosis). So, with another potentially strong year ahead of us, here’s a few more bands to keep your eye on

MAVETH

Unholy blackened death, Maveth is composed of 3/5 of Finnish death metal band Cryptborn (one of my personal Best of 2011 picks). Mixing killer blast beats with some surprisingly melodic riffs, they never really let one style dominate, equally taking the best from both genres. Maveth’s first full length has yet to receive a release date.  (Maveth music right after the jump . . .) Continue reading »

AUTOPSY UPDATE

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  3 Responses »
Jan 272012
 

Yes, we approve this cover art for Autopsy’s next album of body parts. Mind you, no one sought our approval, but we grant it willingly, because this cover by Matt Cavotta includes all the food groups: bat wings, vulture heads, horns, tusks, a snake head, a sickle, a hatchet, a scorpion’s tail, a rib cage dripping with gore, and blood. But best of all, it includes the name AUTOPSY.

All Tomorrow’s Funerals is a collection of all of Autopsy’s past EPs in re-mastered form, plus four brand new songs — the first new Autopsy music since 2011’s wonderful album, The Macabre Eternal. Peaceville Records will be releasing it on February 28, which sounds like something of an oxymoron, because this album will certainly bring no one any peace.

One of the four new tracks, “Mauled To Death”, was included in unmastered form as a Decibel magazine Flexi disk not long ago, and it’s available for streaming on a SoundCloud player that we’ve embedded after the jump, just because even a news item like this one should not be allowed to appear at NCS without some kind of grisly music to accompany it. And believe me, this is grisly death metal straight from the crypt, crawling along at a lurching pace, surrounded by an air of lowering doom.

The track list for All Tomorrow’s Funerals is also after the jump. Continue reading »

NEW MUSIC FROM PELICAN

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  7 Responses »
Jan 272012
 

The last release from Chicago’s Pelican came almost two years ago — What We All Come To Need. Word of new music has been circulating for a while, and today we can hear it.

Pelican’s new EP is called Ataraxia/Taraxis, and it will be released by Southern Lord on April 10. But Pelican has established a Bandcamp page that’s now streaming one of the EP’s four songs — “Lathe Biosas”.  On top of that, you can download that track for free by visiting Spin.com or via the Pelican Bandcamp site here.

The band characterizes the new EP as an “experiment” — the first release that they built “by recording in multiple studios (often not with one another) and compiling the results”. Most of the recording was done by the talented Sanford Parker, and he also handled the mixing.

After the jump, you can listen to the new song, “Lathe Biosas”. I’m writing about this and including the song stream for the usual and obvious reason — because I like it very much, and because I’ve become a fan of this band after seeing them live in Seattle for the first time last year. The song is a sweet jam of ringing, chiming, hammering, crushing music. Check it after the jump and let us know what you think. Continue reading »

A BYZANTINE UPDATE (AND IT’S A BIG ONE)

 Metal News  20 Responses »
Jan 272012
 

“Byzantine is one of the most original, most kick-ass, most awesome metal bands in the last 10 years and SHAME ON YOU IF YOU DON’T KNOW WHO THEY ARE.  No one else has yet reproduced their combination of Bay Area thrash metal, death metal, Meshuggah math-metal stylings, jazz fusion, and the grooves and melodic nature of the post-thrash movement and made it all work so seamlessly and so well.”

That’s how NCS writer TheMadIsraeli began his retrospective on Byzantine’s discography at this site last August, a look-back that included downloads of the band’s three albums (with permission). In that same post, we reported that Byzantine had re-formed (minus Tony Rohrbough) and was working on new music.

Yesterday, we received the official announcement of Byzantine’s resurrection, almost four years to the day since their last album, Oblivion Beckons, was released — and it’s a complete reunion of all original members: Chris (“OJ”) Ojeda (vocals, rhythm guitar), Tony Rohrbough (lead guitar); Michael (“Skip”) Cromer (bass), and Matt Wolfe (drums). Here’s the statement from Chris Ojeda:

“We’ve all kept in contact through the past few years and have worked on each other’s projects as well. With our guitarist Tony moving back to WV from NC, we decided it would be a perfect opportunity to hang out again and jam. Before we knew it, we were tossing around riffs and song ideas and realized we had what seemed to be the foundation for a pretty kick ass Byzantine album.”

This is a band who were ahead of their time, and the time is certainly right for their reappearance. But they’re looking for help from fans. Continue reading »

SWALLOW THE SUN: FULL ALBUM STREAM

 Metal News  3 Responses »
Jan 262012
 

Our Finnish friend fireangel — one of the two creators of the very informative and entertaining Finland-based blog called Night Elves — alerted me to this juicy bit of news: the new album by Swallow the Sun, Emerald Forest and the Blackbird, is now streaming in full at the Finland-based INFERNO site.

And, in an interesting twist, guitarist Juha Raivio provided quotes from Twin Peaks to accompany each song. Do you remember Twin Peaks?

The album is scheduled for release in Finland on February 1, and it’s being offered for pre-order here.  I haven’t had a chance to listen to this album stream yet since I’ve got to do some actual paying work at the moment, but I’m going to listen as soon as I can — as you should, too.

HOUR OF PENANCE UPDATE

 Metal News  16 Responses »
Jan 262012
 


In our last post, DemiGodRaven caught us up on news items from the last few days that I missed, but this item, to which DGR also alerted me, deserves its own special mention.

In the realm of Italian death metal, 2011 was the year of Fleshgod Apocalypse, the year when that band made a huge breakthrough and established themselves as a true force on the international scene. I have a feeling that 2012 will be the year of their fellow Romans in Hour of Penance. Yesterday, HoP announced details about their fifth album.

It will be called Sedition and will be released on March 27 in North America, April 2 in the U.K., and April 6 in mainland Europe via Prosthetic Records. As Fleshgod Apocalypse did with Agony, Hour of Penance will be following the release of Sedition with a North American tour — their first. They will be in fine company on that tour: The Black Dahlia Murder, Nile, and Skeletonwitch.

The cover art also made its first appearance. As you can see, it kills. The artist is Gyula Havancsak, a new name to me but one I suspect we’ll be seeing more of in the future.

This last HoP album, Paradogma, was one of my favorites of 2010. Based on what Hour of Penance showed on that album, Sedition should qualify as one of this year’s must-listen releases for death metal fans.

What? You haven’t heard Paradogma? For shame! Here’s a track, which made our list of 2010’s Most Infectious Extreme Metal Songs: Continue reading »

INTO THE PIT: NEWS YOU MIGHT HAVE MISSED

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  4 Responses »
Jan 262012
 

(DemiGodRaven helps catch us up on metal news.)

Hey folks, I’ve planted my ass in the underworld for a brief period of time in order to round up all the smaller (and maybe not so small) news stories that may have fallen through the cracks in one way or another. Some of them are simple things like album streams, others are album teasers, there’s some tour news, and hey, occasionally you’ll even get a free song or two, ya hear? Also, if you aren’t reading this in a 50’s news reporters voice after seeing the picture of the hat above YOU ARE DOING IT WRONG. First up is a pretty simple album stream, and then we’ll go on from there.

Lamb of God’s latest album Resolution saw release recently, and so they decided to run a full album stream over at AOL Music to give people a chance to get in a good listen before they decide whether to buy or not. I’ve enjoyed this release much more than Wrath, but it is still largely iterative on the sound that they started building in Sacrament.

It’s a good listen all the way through, but I can imagine it would be pretty dull if you picked a random song instead of the five or six really great ones. In other words, this is not an album built for Ipod shuffle like Amon Amarth’s stuff usually is (for example), so you’ll have to be in a really Lamb of God mood in order to really get into this one.

Also, they used the shotgun blast sample again. The same one they used on Sacrament. I was just waiting for the GOD-DAMN before it. Full review incoming soon. In the meantime, while you wait for me to validate your opinion and tell you how awesome of a metal listener you are, you can stream that fucker over here. Continue reading »

BARREN EARTH: “THE DEVIL’S RESOLVE”

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  1 Response »
Jan 252012
 

The Curse of the Red River, the 2010 debut album from Finland’s Barren Earth, made quite the splash. That didn’t come as a huge shock, given that the band’s line-up is a collection of veterans of the Finnish metal wars, including vocalist Mikko Kotamäki (Swallow the Sun), Olli-Pekka Laine on bass (Ex-Amorphis, Mannhai), drummer Marko Tarvonen (Moonsorrow)
, and Kreator guitarist Sami Ylisirniö.

On March 13, Peaceville Records will release the band’s second album, The Devil’s Resolve, in North America. It was mixed by Dan Swanö (Opeth/Katatonia) at Unisound in Sweden, it features cover art by Paul Romano (whose work graces the covers of albums by Mastodon and a jillion other metal bands), and it includes guest vocals by Mathias Lillmåns (Finntroll) and . . . bagpipes! (courtesy of Jaakko Lemmetty from Korpiklaani).  (Nice timing, given our piece on bagpipe metal earlier today.)

So far so good — but there’s more. According to a press release, the music on the new album will cross through a variety of musical landscapes, ranging from brutal death metal to progressive and acoustic passages and sweeping melodies. You can get a taste of this via a montage of the album’s songs that Peaceville is now streaming on SoundCloud (and that we’re streaming right after the jump). And in exchange for your e-mail address, you can get a free download of a track from the album called “The Rains Begin”. Continue reading »

TOOL vs. INTRONAUT: A SHOW REPORT WITH A SICK VIDEO

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  5 Responses »
Jan 252012
 

(NCS writer BadWolf provides a report on last night’s Tool/Intronaut concert in Toledo and a video of dueling drummers.)

A little informality for you today.

So last night, my GF, Queen of Noise, some friends, and I saw Tool in my hometown of Toledo, Ohio.

What is Tool doing playing in my bullshit city? I haven’t the foggiest, but Good Morning America informed me a few weeks ago that the venue, the Huntington Center, is the 8th most profitable stadium venue in the USA. Who knew?

So the opening band was some pretty sick The Sword/Kyuss-style super-heavy biker-metal band. Nothing too original, but pretty cool—too bad their name was incomprehensible. I think it was Ram-Knight? Anyway, I expect to hear more about them soon.

Intronaut opened and played a strong set with “The Literal Black Cloud” from Prehistoricisms and then every good song from Valley of Smoke in a row. Sick. The crowd seemed to really dig them, which is strange considering that Tool’s fanbase is notoriously picky (according to anecdote, they nearly boo’ed Meshuggah off the stage multiples times, and Meshuggah is basically Tool with lower guitars and growling…). Good for them, I hope this opens doors for the boys in Intronaut. Continue reading »

TOURISM

 Metal News  3 Responses »
Jan 222012
 

I’ve been catching up on metal news today and came across news of three upcoming U.S. tours that are . . . newsworthy, to say the least.

I’m guessing this first one will be old news to many of you, since it surfaced on Friday, but it has sure produced some tumescence in your humble editor’s loins today. Behemoth, Watain, The Devil’s Blood, and In Solitude will be hitting the road for The Decibel Magazine Tour, a 26-date trail of wreckage across the U.S. starting in April. It will be the first Behemoth tour for Nergal since being diagnosed with and beating leukemia. That’s a cool tour flyer by Justin Bartlett up there, too.

More details, including tour dates, venues and ticket info, will be announced at www.decibelmagazinetour.com on January 24th.

But that’s just for starters. Mastodon’s Troy Sanders recently confirmed that his band plus Opeth and Ghost will be embarking on a North American tour of their own. During a recent interview at a Belgian radio station, Sanders stated: “We go to Australia to take part in the Soundwave Festival, which is going to be lovely, take a short break. Do a North American tour with Opeth and Ghost. And then take another break and come back over here for the European festival season.”

I have a feeling a few people will buy tickets for that tour. No further details are available at this time. (found this news via Loudwire)

And that’s not all. Would you believe a 30-date tour of the U.S. this summer by Agalloch?!? Continue reading »

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