AN NCS PREMIERE: DEAD AND DRIPPING — “MOLECULAR DEGRADATION UPON WARPED ONYX STOVES”

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Jun 302023
 

Since 2016 the one-person New Jersey band Dead and Dripping has lurked in a far subterranean corner of the sonic torture chamber known as “brutal death metal”. Over the course of a pair of demos and a pair of albums, its music has proven to be far more bamboozling than the typical pile-driving thuggery and bullet-spitting mayhem for which the genre is best known. The music has been unusually intricate and technically impressive, though it would be wrong to try to slot it into the “technical death metal” framework, and it has trended in increasingly macabre directions.

All of those qualities stand out in Dead and Dripping‘s new album Blackened Cerebral Rifts, and indeed this new one is even more surreal and schizophrenic than what has come before, even more technically complex, and yet somehow also ruthlessly bludgeoning and gruesome. For those reasons (and others), the vividly colorful and strikingly bizarre cover art by Jason Wayne Barnett is an excellent companion for the music. Not for naught does Transcending Obscurity Records recommend it for fans of Wormed, Demilich, and Defeated Sanity, as well as Suffocation, Mortal Decay, and Wicked Innocence.

Three songs from the album have already premiered, and if you’ve heard those you have a very good idea of what you’ll be getting yourselves into when Transcending Obscurity releases the album on August 11th. But especially if you haven’t heard any of those, and even if you have, the song we’re premiering today is well worth your time. Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: SQUELCH CHAMBER — “THE STEEPLE IS FALLING”

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Jun 302023
 

 

On July 12th the Czech label Owlripper Recordings will release Eater of Self, a new album by Pennsylvania-based Squelch Chamber. In describing it, the label invites you to consider the idea of a sonic blender:

For the forthcoming album, mangle together in a blender reminiscences of the untamed ferocity of Primitive Man, The Body, Ken Mode, Therapy? on their first 2 EPs, Abandon (Sweden), Skinny Puppy, then add dashes of Agoraphobic Nosebleed, Full Of Hell and Fear Of God all on 16rpm, but with added liquids, doom and noise. That’s the Squelch Chamber cocktail as I hear it, so I hope this gets you suitably intrigued for the monolithic album that is to follow…

Well, that got us intrigued, and the album track we’re premiering today followed intrigue with deep-seated disturbances, made even more disturbing by the video that accompanies it. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): GROTESQUERIES — “VILE CREMATORY”

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Jun 292023
 

In their current promo photo the members of Grotesqueries look serious, quiet, maybe a bit withdrawn — but that’s what the neighbors always say about the serial killers who lived down the block after the awful truth comes out. Grotesqueries probably didn’t actually kill anyone in the making of their debut album Vile Crematory, but it sure as hell sounds like they did, and in the most horrible ways you can imagine.

As they did on their debut EP Haunted Mausoleum from last year, this Boston-based quintet devote themselves on the new album to a particular kind of death metal, the kind where almost nothing is clean and almost everything is vile. The kind where the guitars are tuned to sound like manifestations of flesh-eating disease, the vocals are possessed by monstrous horrors, the grooves are calculated to inflict bone-smashing trauma, and the moods are malign, maniacal, and miserable.

But as you’ll also discover for yourselves through our premiere of the album today, on the eve of its release by Caligari Records, Grotesqueries are also very adept at getting the blood of listeners racing, as well as causing it to congeal. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: MACHINATIONS OF FATE — “A SPLIT SECOND OF DIVINITY”

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Jun 282023
 

Kentucky-based Machinations of Fate made their recording debut almost a dozen years ago with their album-length demo Tyrannous Skies. Significant time passed before the band made another release — a self-titled debut album released by Redefining Darkness Records in 2020 that was a re-mixed and re-mastered version of the tracks from the demo that also included re-recorded drum tracks, courtesy of Ash Thomas (Faithxtractor & Shed the Skin). Although the songs weren’t new, they received a very positive reception, which fueled the band’s work on a follow-up album.

That second album, Celestial Prophecies, is now finished and set for release by the same Redefining Darkness Records on July 28th. The label describes it as “first and foremost, fueled by melody, while the rhythms remain aggressive and cutting”, bringing to mind at different times the classic works of Hypocrisy, Dissection, Immortal or Dimmu Borgir, the kind of thing that “will appeal to those metal fans who have been diehards for decades”.

To help pave the way to this eagerly anticipated follow-up album, today we’re bringing you its second single, a song called “A Split Second of Divinity“. Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: RANNOCH — “THREADS”

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Jun 282023
 

Few metal bands have so captivated our attention from their beginning to the present day as the UK prog-death powerhouse Rannoch. They started strong and became even stronger; witnessing the evolution of their ambitions and their skills has been thrilling, and in both respects they reached a high-water mark in the extraordinary achievements of their last album, 2020’s Reflections Upon Darkness.

For precisely those reasons, however, there’s been some frustration among us here that Rannoch still haven’t gotten all the acclaim and attention they deserve. They run rings around bands vastly better-known than they are, but thankfully those injustices don’t seem to have sapped Rannoch’s desire. Instead, they have only driven themselves harder, and their forthcoming third album Conflagrations is abundant proof of that. It is indeed a creative conflagration, and one we hope will propel their name to the scale of attention their talents warrant.

This new album is set for release on July 21st by Willowtip Records, and it’s our privilege now to premiere its second single “Threads“, presented through an attention-riveting video. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: BLACK SORCERY — “GASPING FOR LIGHT UNDER A PETRINE CROSS”

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Jun 272023
 

When we heard the first single from Black Sorcery‘s debut album Deciphering Torment Through Malediction it occurred to us that the album was very well-named. That song, “Erinyes Slough”, is unmistakably hateful, from the caustic lunacy of the shrieked vocals to the gut-plunder inflicted by the bassist and the rude corrosiveness of the brazen and roiling guitars. The snare drum keeps time like a metronome that’s still somehow functioning in the midst of a vicious riot.

In addition to being feral and malign, however, a feeling of torment does come through in the riffing, and about halfway through, the drums break their chains and the song transforms into a searing cataclysm that will swallow you up. There’s still something anguished about that electrifying convulsion, but a kind of medieval grandeur emerges as well. In other words, there are more facets to the track than you might guess at first.

Now we’ve got a second excerpt from this new album in advance of its July 28 release by Eternal Death, and it reinforces the impressions created by that first one — that the band’s fury is white hot, that they’re capable of sounding like they’re in the throes of demonic possession, but that they have an affinity for melody that seems like a time machine spun back to an ancient age. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: DER DÖBERMANN — “BURN YOUR FIRE”

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Jun 272023
 

Here in the U.S. Judge Judy would blanch at the idea: a Russian band naming themselves after a German breed of dog that’s so dangerous many home insurance companies ban them, refusing to insure against liability if they cause injury or damage in homes where they’re kept as pets. Sure, they have a reputation for fearlessness, alertness, loyalty, and intelligence, but look at that album cover.

True enough, this gang from Saint Petersburg chose the name Der Döbermann after deciding to start thrashing together in April 2021, and now they’ve got a debut album to show for their efforts, one with the reassuring title Don’t Be Afraid, You Already Dead. We’ve got a bite of what it offers, and a sign of how it bites, in the song we’re premiering today: “Burn Your Fire“. When you hear it you’ll understand why the band chose the name they did instead of, say, Der Dachshund. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): ANOTHER BLACK AUTUMN — “RESPLENDENT APPARITIONS AT THE DAWN”

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Jun 262023
 

You’re about to hear an album that we hope you’ll find as stunning as we have. “Atmospheric Black Metal” is the simple label, but not an adequate one. It’s inspired and informed by Nature, but anyone who thinks that will lead to an experience of tree-hugging boredom will be shockingly mistaken.

The moods are almost uniformly dark, but the pathways constantly branch and the tonal ingredients, both instrumentally and vocally, are multitudinous. The music fires the senses in harrowing and thrilling ways, and it’s also capable of emotionally felling listeners in a multitude of ways, like trees brought down by both raging chainsaws and old hand axes passed down through generations. It creates sensations of confusion and distress, of chaos and terror, of loneliness and grief, and of haunting ancient mysteries that hide behind the world we see.

The two people responsible for this extraordinary experience are Meghan Wood from Crown of Asteria and Todd Paulson from Canis Dirus. They’ve taken the name Another Black Autumn for this project, and their debut album Resplendent Apparitions at the Dawn is what we’re now presenting in advance of its June 30 release by the always distinctive Fiadh Productions. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): WILT — “HUGINN”

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Jun 232023
 

Today the Canadian atmospheric black metal band Wilt and their label Vendetta Records are releasing a new album named Huginn (though some purists may prefer to label it an EP). It comes as something of a surprise, since it wasn’t preceded by a single or advance publicity, but it is a very welcome surprise.

It’s certainly a welcome development here, as anyone would know who has come across our previous writings about Wilt’s music, including our comments about their 2015 debut album Moving Monoliths or our review of their second album Ruin in 2018. To pick out just a few choice words from the latter:

“[T[he masterful blending of dark metallic melody and dreamlike serenity found on Ruin makes a very good case that this undeniably talented (though underwhelmingly named) Canadian quintet deserve serious consideration as potential heirs to Agalloch’s vacant mantle (pun very much intended). Of course it’s not so much that Wilt sound exactly like Haughm, Dekker, and co., it’s more that the group’s sombre, evocative style examines and explores many of the same musical themes and ideas, although never in exactly the same way”.

Five years on from Ruin, and Agalloch have reassembled themselves, but Wilt have returned as well. These haven’t been five good years for the world at large, and all the dire and dreadful experiences they delivered have influenced what you will hear on Huginn. Here is what Wilt have told us about it: Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): CREPITATION — “MONSTROUS ERUPTION OF IMPETUOUS PREPOSTEROSITY”

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Jun 222023
 

It will come as no great surprise to people who’ve been fans of Crepitation for the last 17+ years to see how preposterously wild the title of their new album is. It is, in fact, Monstrous Eruption of Impetuous Preposterosity. The trip through the new album’s song titles is perhaps an even more gonzo ride. When words recognized by dictionaries and phrases acknowledged by grammarians aren’t up to the task, just scramble the fuck out of them over a high flame and season with gobs of syllables and a heavy salting of hilarity. That’s how you get things like this:

“Vicious Entwattering of Obstinant Nepotistic Shithouses”
“Priapismic Whisking of Mucilaginous Concrete Slurry”
“Devourification of Skewerised Rottiserie Hominids”
“Superkalifragelisticexpibabyshakeus”

Even when you can find the words in dictionaries, Crepitation have a knack for stitching them together in evocatively foul ways. For example, “Methanated Propulsion of Gaseous Levitation“. What better way to name a song that was inspired by the kind of wet farts that provide a queasy recurring lift to your stride? Continue reading »

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