VIRAL RAGE (WITH ABORTED, NAGLFAR, ENDLESS FORMS MOST GRUESOME, AND NOCTURNAL DAMNATION)

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  9 Responses »
Mar 072020
 

 

Greetings from Coronavirus Central, USA (aka Seattle, Washington, and nearby communities, including the top-secret metallic island from which I administer the globe-spanning depredations of NCS). Things are weird here.

I know you’ll rejoice to learn that I have no flu-like symptoms, just the usual cat allergies. Others are not so lucky. According to the latest reports, there are more than 102 confirmed cases of COVID-19 in Washington, 71 of those in the county that includes Seattle, and 16 deaths in Washington, all but two of those in the Seattle area.

Area health care providers are reporting shortages of needed supplies, including masks for healthcare workers. Despite promises by the federal government, there still aren’t enough test kits available to help figure out how many people with symptoms actually have coronavirus. And good luck trying to find hand sanitizer. At least we can still pee on our hands as a reminder to stop touching our faces all the damned time. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD: ULCERATE, NOMAD, LIKE RATS, HOT GRAVES, BOMBS OF HADES, CHURCH OF DISGUST, HOLY DEATH

 Album Reviews, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC, SHORT BUT SWEET  3 Responses »
Mar 022020
 

 

At the risk of overloading our readers with new music in light of what we’ve already sent your way over the weekend and this morning (a risk that obviously means nothing to us), here’s a carefully curated collection of chaos to begin the new week. If death metal is your meat and potatoes, this will explode your gastrointestinal tract.

ULCERATE

It didn’t take long for a new Ulcerate song to cause a flurry of comments within our internal NCS group. Not long after the title track to the band’s new album surfaced this morning, my colleagues uttered such exclamations and opinions as “tasty”, “oh shit”, “this is probably the cleanest and least reliant they’ve been on recorded-in-a-cave-next-door style mixing they’ve had yet”, “it’s DEFINITELY more melodic, and the production is warmer, but those are GOOD things”, and “it’s a natural progression from what they were doing on Shrines of Paralysis“. Continue reading »

OVERFLOWING STREAMS: ABYSMAL DAWN, BONES, FLESHGOD APOCALYPSE, IGORRR, IKU-TURSO, INCEPTION OF FALL, NITE, NYREDOLK, SYMBOLIK, TYRANT OF DEATH, VELNIAS

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  4 Responses »
Feb 272020
 

 

Once gain I’m resorting to the round-up format I use when I’ve run out of time to provide my own scintillating commentary about each of the new songs and videos I’ve chosen to throw your way. For the most part, you’ll just have to listen and then imagine how eloquent and evocative I would have been.

In compiling today’s large selection, which is presented in alphabetical order, I had assistance from my colleague DGR. In fact, he recommended six of the 11 items you’ll find here.

 

ABYSMAL DAWN

This new Abysmal Dawn track, “The Path Of The Totalitarian“, is the second single from the band’s new album Phylogenesis, out April 17th on Season Of Mist. Continue reading »

OVERFLOWING STREAMS: WOLFHEART, WARDRUNA, DEVANGELIC, ON THORNS I LAY, TETHRA, BLAZE OF SORROW, DÄMMERFARBEN, EXHORDER, TRIBE OF PAZUZU, TURMION KÄTILÖT

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  4 Responses »
Feb 222020
 

 

I’m about to drive to Portland with friends to take in a mainly acoustic show by Austin Lunn (Panopticon), Aerial Ruin, and Mike Scheidt of Yob. That means I probably won’t have a SHADES OF BLACK column on Sunday, though I’ve already written a premiere for that day, so we won’t leave you completely lonesome tomorrow. As for today, I’ve resorted to the “Overflowing Streams” format because there are SO MANY new songs and videos I’ve been enjoying that I didn’t want to cut the list back, and don’t have time to write about them.

Almost everything here surfaced over the last 48 hours. Perhaps needless to say, there’s a lot of variety on offer. I don’t expect anyone (but me) to get a kick out of all this, but hopefully you’ll find at least one or two things to like. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD (PART 2): WHITE NIGHTS, ФИЛАНТРОПЪ, NYRST

 Exceptions to the Rule, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  1 Response »
Feb 202020
 

 

Did you enjoy the musical chocolates in Part 1 of today’s round-up? I hope you did, and Ii hope you’ll like what’s next, which continues following the theme of diversity that was evident in the first installment.

WHITE NIGHTS

One look at the cover art (above) for White Nights‘ debut EP, Into the Lap of the Ancient Mother, gave me an inkling that it wasn’t going to be the kind of music I usually expect from Iron Bonehead Productions — and it isn’t. Actually, there are two different covers, one for the CD edition and one for the vinyl edition. Here’s the other one: Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD (PART 1): DESTROYED IN SECONDS, HEAD OF THE DEMON, KORGONTHURUS

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  3 Responses »
Feb 202020
 

 

Imagine that you like chocolates (might not take any imagination). Imagine finding yourself in a giant chocolate store that’s offering free samples of hundreds of confections. No way you can try everything, and your stomach would explode even if you could. And then some friends walk in who’ve already tried a lot of what’s on offer and point out the really good stuff. Problem solved!

That’s kind of how today’s two-part round-up came together. Enjoy all the chocolates!

DESTROYED IN SECONDS

Here’s a band that most of the core group of hooligans at NCS really like, I think due in part to the band’s performance at Maryland Deathfest 2018, which most of us got to see. I received or saw messages from a lot of them soon after Destroyed In Seconds previewed the title track from their new album Divide and Devour, which they’re releasing on April 24th. It kicks a lot of ass. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD: ABORTED, MEDICO PESTE, NECK OF THE WOODS, CÉNOTAPHE, GRAFSTROEM, IDOLOS

 Album Reviews, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC, SHORT BUT SWEET  7 Responses »
Feb 182020
 

 

I’m scurrying this morning, so I’ll dispense with introductory comments and get right to the music I’ve chosen for this round-up — but did you see Mitchell Nolte‘s fantabulous artwork on the cover of Aborted’s new three-track EP? Of course you did — how could you miss it? The EP is called La Grande Mascarade [sic], with a release date of April 17th.

MEDICO PESTE

I’ve previously spilled some demented words here about the truly demented first song and video (“God Knows Why“) presented in advance of the release of Medico Peste‘s new album, ב :The Black Bile. Now I can’t resist crowing again about this Polish black metal band because another song from the album has escaped out into the world. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEART ON A SATURDAY: BENEATH THE MASSACRE, AHNA, THOKKIAN VORTEX, MEGATHERIUM, THE OUTSIDER, DAMIAN MASTER

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  7 Responses »
Feb 152020
 

 

Six songs and videos yesterday, tracks from six more bands today. If I can manage six more tomorrow, we’ll have a sequence that marks that bestial number so near and dear to the hearts of metal fans. It’s good to have goals.

BENEATH THE MASSACRE

My, my, has it really been eight years since the last Beneath the Massacre album? Such a lot has happened in the world at large and in the narrower world of extreme metal in all those years. What has this Montréal band been up to in the meantime, and more importantly, what has happened to their musical proclivities? We are learning the answers now, as the clock ticks down to the release of their new album Fearmonger on February 28th, almost exactly eight years after Incongruous. Continue reading »

A VALENTINE’S DAY MASSACRE: PERCHTA, HELFRÓ, ULVER, PHOBOS MONOLITH, ISHVARA, VMTHANAACHTH

 Exceptions to the Rule, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  No Responses »
Feb 142020
 

 

On Valentine’s Day 2011 (here) I provided a 600-word history of the holiday going back to the Roman celebration of Lupercalia, interspersed with efforts to explain why Valentine’s Day is metal. Re-reading it this morning, I nearly passed out from the tedium.

On Valentine’s Day 2012 (here) I posted an NCS “lonely hearts” column in which I answered a variety of e-mails from women offering to video-chat with me (soapy and fresh out of the shower), people trying to sell me products that would give me “robust bone-ons”, others who wanted to have my children (I proposed to send ampules of love juice and suggested names for the kiddos), and a few broken-hearted people looking for help (I told them to just go ahead and kill themselves). The Comments were funnier than what I wrote. I’m more grown-up than that now (yeah, right).

As far as I can tell, I haven’t made an effort since then to organize any kind of holiday-related theme for the music I’ve posted on Valentine’s Day, though I’ve usually make some kind of (usually snarky) comment about the day, typically related to how commercialized the holiday is. In case you were wondering, this year the National Retail Federation reports that those celebrating Valentine’s Day in the U.S. plan to spend a record average of $196.31, up 21 percent over last year’s previous record of $161.96, and that total spending is expected to total $27.4 billion, up 32 percent from last year’s record of $20.7 billion.

Isn’t that heart-warming? Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD: HEAVEN SHALL BURN, BLACK ROYAL, REGARDE LES HOMMES TOMBER, SKAM, KALLOMÄKI

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  7 Responses »
Feb 122020
 

 

One week has passed since I posted the last of these round-ups, and dozens of new songs have emerged since then that I’d happily throw your way, in addition to the many dozens I haven’t foisted upon you from preceding weeks. However, it turns out that I had overlooked new tracks from some of my favorite bands, discovering those only two days ago. I can’t resist including them here, along with a few newer discoveries.

HEAVEN SHALL BURN

We seem to have fallen off the radar screen of Century Media, because we haven’t received a single press release about the new album by Heaven Shall Burn, whose many previous releases we’ve covered with religious fervor. Even worse, none of my NCS compatriots breathed a word to me about the fact that three songs from the new album have debuted for public consumption. I had to find out about them yesterday via a YouTube side-bar. What is the world coming to? Well, I know it’s going to shit, I just didn’t know it was this shitty. Continue reading »

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