VANHELGA EXPLORES THE ANGUISH OF DAYS LIKE THESE

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May 292020
 

 

Vanhelga are a Swedish band, the brainchild of J. Ottosson (aka “145188”), who from its inception in 2001 until roughly 2013 was the band’s vocalist and sole instrumentalist. Beginning with the release of the 2013 EP Sommar (which followed a pair of albums and a handful of shorter releases), he has been joined by a changing line-up of other musicians.

We’ve been following Vanhelga’s progress since Sommar, taking us through three more albums and further shorter releases, which demonstrated an evolving integration of stylistic ingredients that made the music (which could be simplistically labeled “melancholic black metal”) ever more difficult to pin down in genre terms but continually interesting.

Vanhelga have been at work on a new release, which follows up on their excellent 2018 album Fredagsmys, and today we’re announcing that by the end of June or early July we will be premiering a song from it named “Dagar som denna” — which translates to “days like these”. Continue reading »

COVER YOUR FUCKING MOUTH IF YOU COUGH NCS PLAYLIST III (BY NEILL JAMESON)

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  4 Responses »
May 262020
 

 

(So far, Neill Jameson (Krieg, Poison Blood) has shared with us (here and here) two playlists of musical suggestions to help us get through the current plague time, and today he follows those with a third selection.)

I’ve been a little slower than I wanted to be with this third quarantine playlist, slow to the point where the country decided the virus is like black metal and moved on to grind.  Or something like that, I’m probably mixing my irritations up. But much like your desire to hug all the homies “when this is over” these playlists aren’t going away. Well, after the fourth one it will, but let’s suspend disbelief for a minute because these are TRYING TIMES and my inability to get a haircut makes it illegal for me to be in close proximity to a school. Catch-22 though, there’s no kids in there anyway.

Moving on. I think the format to this is pretty much established, especially since I see a few people biting off it, terminology and all, so let’s get into it. Continue reading »

OVERFLOWING STREAMS (PART 2): SEROCS, STIGMATIZED, SOULROT, TEMPLE NIGHTSIDE, ULCERATE, VALGRIND, ZMEY GORYNICH

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May 232020
 

 

We’re now continuing on with the mega-collection of new songs and videos we began here yesterday, resuming our march through the alphabet beginning with the letter S.

SEROCS (International)

To begin, we’ll throw your brain into a blender set to puree. “Building A Shrine Upon Vanishing Sands” is a brutalizing, electrifying, high-speed carnival ride. The percussive power of the song is punishing, and the vocals (also discharged at high speed) are rabid, while the darting and swirling fretwork is wild and exultant. The guitar soloing is nothing short of spectacular, and propels a song that was already an ecstatic thrill-ride way up into the stratosphere. If the track doesn’t leave you with an ear-to-ear grin, the virus may have mutated and given you facial paralysis. Continue reading »

OVERFLOWING STREAMS (PART 1): CONVOCATION, GRRRMBA, BORU, HEBOÏDOPHRENIE, HYLE, LVA, MANTAR, PULSE, ROPE SECT

 Exceptions to the Rule, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  2 Responses »
May 222020
 

 

Time for me to resort to this format again in an effort to pack in as many new songs and videos as I can — a format that’s short on words (and cover art) and long on sounds. I’ve alphabetized the selections by band name and then divided this mega-roundup into two Parts. Part 2 isn’t quite finished, so you’ll have to tune in here tomorrow to catch the rest.

CONVOCATION (Finland)

We begin with frightening yet enthralling funeral doom that has the gravitational force of a black hole yet also levitates — monstrous groaning and pounding heaviness speared by gleaming shards and surrounded by shimmering effervescence and shuddering feverishness, with a haunting instrumental break and an atmosphere that becomes one of ominous majesty.  The variable vocals (both harsh and clean) are absolutely stunning in their intensity, to the point of being terrifying…. and presented through a video that’s also fascinating. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD: DKHARMAKHAOZ, WĘDROWCY-TUŁACZE-ZBIEGI, SEER, SORGE, SECTARIAN BLOOM, BEDSORE

 Exceptions to the Rule, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  15 Responses »
May 202020
 

 

Maybe it’s the mental discombobulation that comes from being basically stuck at home for two and a half months, but I’ve noticed that I’ve started inserting things into these round-ups that don’t fit in with our usual musical interests and that sometimes violate our general (yet historically porous) rule about singing. I don’t want anyone to worry too much about this drift, because extreme underground sounds are always going to be my lodestar, but in today’s collection I’m once again indulging some musical interests that diverge from main lines of NCS.

And yes, there will again be a lot of singing. But just so you don’t get too freaked-out, I’m bookending the collection with some harsher recommendations.

DKHARMAKHAOZ

I found out about this first song just this morning, thanks to a timely message from Rennie (starkweather), who wrote: “Guitar tone is almost like early Portal, but, the bass has far more clank and clatter and then there are chord choices that are more informed by conventional black metal and folk melodies… vocalist sounds like a deadite.” Which made me lament the fact that I haven’t been clever enough to compare vocalists to deadites before. Continue reading »

THIS AND THAT: AMIENSUS, EZIO BOSSO, POSTVORTA, ASBJORN DAEMONIUM DE NOCTIS

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May 172020
 

 

I spent some time yesterday and more time this morning trying to figure out what to include in this week’s SHADES OF BLACK column. It shouldn’t have been an anxious experience, but it has been, because there is so much I wish I could write about and recommend. Though I know no one will live or die based on the choices I have to make, it’s still painful to leave anything good behind.

At one point I took a break from mentally wrestling with myself over black metal and listened to other things. By pure chance I happened to listen to the first three songs in this collection right in a row, and thought they went together beautifully. I added the fourth one as a wake-up call, and as a transition to whatever I wind up including in SOB.

AMIENSUS

Minnesota’s Amiensus should need no introduction to faithful visitors to our site. We’ve been writing about their music, and occasionally hosting premieres of it, since 2013. Obviously, we are fans, and you should be too. If you happen to be newcomers, you’ll soon have a chance to get on board because Amiensus have a new album named Abreaction that will be released this summer by Transcending Records. Continue reading »

OVERFLOWING STREAMS FOR YOUR SATURDAY: TRIPTYKON, MYSTRAS, SERMENT, DISAVOWED, SEWER TRENCH, GRUZJA, THE MONOLITH DEATHCULT, LORD OF THE LOST, SCARY BUSEY, THREADBARE

 Exceptions to the Rule, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  1 Response »
May 162020
 

 

I hope your weekend is treating you well. Because I didn’t over-do things during my usual Friday night virtual happy hours, I was able to spend some time catching up with new songs and videos this morning, and I picked these to share with you. It’s an eclectic mix, even by the standards that I usually apply to these round-ups in an effort to ensure variety (and to keep our visitors off-balance). Lots of videos in this particular collection, too.

TRIPTYKON (Switzerland)

To lead off, here’s a video of a live performance by Triptykon of “Rex Irae” from Celtic Frost’s Into the Pandemonium. The song is the first movement in the “Requiem” trilogy, which also includes “Grave” (performed for the first time at the same concert where this video was filmed) and “Winter” (which first appeared on Monotheist).

The performance of all three movements of “Requiem” took place at Roadburn 2019, and Triptykon was accompanied by the Metropole Orkest, by Hannes Grossmann on drums, and by vocalist Safa Heraghi. The orchestration was composed by Alkaloid and Dark Fortress frontman Florian “Morean” Maier, working with Tom G. Warrior. Continue reading »

MÉTAL NOIR QUÉBÉCOIS

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  5 Responses »
May 122020
 

 

(At the end of February we published a guest edition of our SHADES OF BLACK column [here] which began as an e-mailed group of recommendations by our valued supporter Speelie. It included music from the Québec black metal scene. Just a few days ago Speelie e-mailed additional recommendations that focused entirely on black metal from Québec, and with our encouragement he turned that into the following post.)

The Métal Noir Québécois guys sure like to keep busy. NCS has posted plenty of news and links about the Quebec scene, including some from me previously. But Quebec continues to take a leading place among the flood of 2020 Black Metal releases.

Forteresse were always the standard bearers for the Métal Noir Québécois movement, but I suspect the band is on hold for the moment. The guys are all involved in other projects right now, and these are starting to see the light. There seems to be an unwritten rule that the cooler the old, colonial-era painting that a Quebec band can find, the better the album it is used for. Guitarist Moribond has a new solo project called Serment, with this amazing cover art: Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD: TABLEAU MORT, SXUPERION, WELL OF NIGHT

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  6 Responses »
May 082020
 

 

I’m hurrying to finish a couple of other NCS posts scheduled for today, but wanted to begin this Friday with something to occupy you while I do that. I’ve picked three new songs that I noticed over the last 12 hours, one of which comes with an intriguing video.

TABLEAU MORT

Within the last two hours London-based Tableau Mort (pictured above) released a professionally filmed video for “Ignorance (Tapestry Sewn Pt. II)“, which premiered at Antichrist Magazine. It follows their very impressive 2019 debut album Stigma Book 1: Mark of Delusion (released by Loud Rage Music), which drew symbolic and thematic influences from Romanian Orthodox Christianity, and embroidered their core framework of black metal with other stylistic ingredients, including Orthodox choral chants. Continue reading »

OVERFLOWING STREAMS (DEATH METAL EDITION): I THE INTRUDER, DEFEATED SANITY, OMNIKINETIC, ABYSSUS, CLAIRVOYANCE, INISANS, SEPULCHRAL FROST, VOIDCEREMONY, PUTRESCINE, LIBERATIA

 Album Reviews, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  4 Responses »
May 072020
 

 

I know I’m damned lucky to still have a job when so many people have been thrown out of work, but the job has been annoyingly intrusive lately. And by “intrusive”, I mean that it unexpectedly interferes with my grand ideas for NCS posts. This post, for example, is grand and gargantuan, but the job that pays me has delayed its appearance and constricted my time to the point that I’ve had to strip away most of the writing I had in mind. I’m cognizant of the likelihood that depriving you of my complete thoughts will cause widespread weeping.

As the title signifies, I decided to make this round-up death-centric — but there are lots of flavors of death metal represented here and different directions being pursued. I might have figured out a good way to order the flow, but didn’t have time to think about that either. So, just be prepared to bounce around.

I THE INTRUDER (Tunisia)

“Check this steamroller. Nasum-like grind with choppy tech riffs to break things up. Complete barbarian war vocals. From Tunisia. What the hell, Omination, Ayyur, and now this….” Continue reading »

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