On November 21, 2009, I made the first post at this blog, which, with tongue partially in cheek, I had decided to name NO CLEAN SINGING. I started it on a lark. I had no training or experience as a music writer. I had only scattered bits of knowledge about the long history of metal, because until recently I had spent my decades of time on earth mainly listening to other kinds of music. What I did have was a burgeoning attraction to heavy music and a lot of curiosity. Back in those early days of the blogging phenomenon, you really didn’t need much more than that to start out. Probably still don’t.

Of course, the intensity of my own interest and the ease of starting up didn’t mean that anyone would pay attention to NCS — and I didn’t expect that or need it. NCS existed as a hobby, for want of a better word, that I hoped would be an enjoyable diversion for me from the grind of daily life. That was the sum total of my motivation. If you had told me back then that I’d still be doing it 10 years later, and that NCS would achieve a certain level of global notoriety, I would have laughed so hard that I’d have been left gasping for air.

On this milestone birthday, I’ve thought about why, unexpectedly, we’re still here, and what has changed from those earliest of days. Continue reading »

UPDATE:  The grinding gears of our horrible machine appear to be rotating again. Thank you for your patience.

For about the last 24 hours our site has been experiencing technical difficulties. For a while, NCS was completely inaccessible. Now, it seems that people are able to reach the main page, but can’t connect to individual articles — which is why there’s no “jump” in what you’re reading now to anything longer. Everything in this post should be view-able on the main page.

I (islander) have a rudimentary understanding of what the problem is (though I hasten to add that I still may not be grasping the issue correctly): It seems that URLs for individual articles at the site are pointing to IP addresses for remote servers that we used to use to help propagate our content around the world and speed up access, but which we’re no longer using (because we thought another service we were using rendered it redundant), rather than to the main dedicated server at our web-host that houses everything connected to the site. The same problem has disabled our access to e-mails sent to NCS (nothing sent to us over the last 24 hours has arrived at the e-mail server provided by our web host).

There is a way to fix these issues, but it’s beyond my own technical skill. We have an IT consultant who has been helping us, and I’m hoping he will figure out the solution soon, and by Monday at the latest.

As I write this, I’m on my way back to Seattle from a two-week vacation, and had plans for us to get back to normal beginning Monday, and to continue with our year-end LISTMANIA series with the continuation of Andy Synn‘s 6-part list that we began on Friday. I still hope that will happen. In the meantime, I’m trying not to let my frustration with our current fucked-up situation eat me up from the inside out, and I hope you’ll be more patient than I’m feeling at the moment.

Measured within the span of a human life, nine years old is still childhood. In metal blog years it’s more like middle age. A few others out there are older than NCS, but not many, and a lot of our former peers have died and turned to dust. Mere stubborn survival continues to be some kind of triumph, and so once again I’m celebrating another milestone: We’re nine years old today, having posted our first article on November 21, 2009.

I continue to be amazed and thankful that we’re still here, that so many good friends are still devoting themselves to writing for NCS on a purely volunteer basis, and that so many readers are still willing to pay attention to what we’re saying and streaming. As usual at this time of year, I want to begin by thanking some of those friends who have been here the longest, keeping the grinding gears of our gruesome machine in motion. Continue reading »

airplane window view (it don’t look flat to me)

The little tracking map on my laptop says the airplane is somewhere over Wisconsin as I start writing this post. Supposedly, said airplane will land in Baltimore 2 house and 17 minutes from now. A few hours after that, I’ll start my Maryland Deathfest 2018 experience with a visit to the pre-fest show. And there will be a steady diet of metal from then through Sunday.

I’m not the only NCS slave who will be at MDF. Andy Synn and DGR will be there, too, along with assorted other miscreants (and a few saints) whom we are proud to call our friends. The likely outcome of this revelry is that the usual volume of NCS posts will dwindle to a trickle until next week… but it won’t disappear. Continue reading »