AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): LATE NIGHT VENTURE — “V: BONES OF THE EXTINCT”

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Mar 152023
 

On March 17th, the Danish post-metal band Late Night Venture will release their new album V: Bones Of The Extinct via Trepanation Recordings and Vinyltroll Records, and today we present it in its entirety, along with many words of introduction.

But before we get to our own words, we want to share what the labels and the band themselves tell us about the album’s conception, because it adds useful insights into the multi-faceted power of the music. For example, this:

“‘Bones Of The Extinct’ is a text excerpt capable of containing all the album’s songs, which individually are images of unforeseen occurrences with irreversible consequences. The lyrics cast their gaze upon the world and can be characterized as grounded doomsday stories about conditions, which more or less concern all beings on the planet. This gaze is directed towards mankind and its nature, all our efforts in this world – and the consequences of our urge.” Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: GRAUGEIST — “FORWARD THE DOOM”

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Mar 152023
 

Graugeist is the solo project of Sarghas from the southwestern German state of Saarland, a musician and vocalist who is also a member of Immorior, Nýr Gata, and Stardust. Graugeist is the new name of a project originally called Mirai. Under the Mirai name Sarghas released a four-song debut EP entitled Makkura in 2020. Under the new name, Graugeist will release a debut album named Heaven Denies near the end of April through Void Wanderer Productions and Kvlt and Kaos Productions.

That Makkura EP (here) is startling to hear. With hyper-voltage power it combines electrifying riffing that’s both scathing and sweeping, thunderous rhythmic momentum, the kind of torrential screaming that puts the hair up on the back of your neck, and monstrous roaring — but part of what makes it startling is that Mirai brought into play a kind of elaborate elegance in the guitar- and keyboard-work.

The music was thus simultaneously a breathtaking maelstrom with a lot of visceral punch and a near-theatrical pageant, interweaving glorious and enthralling melodies that sometimes seemed connected to traditions of many centuries past. The sound was raw and scorching, and the vocals were also relentlessly incinerating, but the music also rang almost clear at vital moments, and the intricacy of the songcraft made every song an eye-opening trip.

That experience would be enough to kindle anticipation and intrigue for the debut full-length of Graugeist, and we have the first sign of Heaven Denies in the song from the album we’re premiering today — “Forward the Doom“. Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: CUTTERRED FLESH — “THE SYMPTOMS OF PARASITE”

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Mar 142023
 

Two years ago Transcending Obscurity Records released the humorously named Sharing Is Caring, the fifth album by the Czech brutal death metal band Cutterred Flesh. We got the opportunity to premiere a very interesting video for the absolutely bludgeoning and eviscerating song “Good Boy” (again proving that these dudes have a twisted sense of humor). That song alone, and the album even more so, demonstrated the band’s capacity for inflicting bombastic, mind-mauling, and terrifically brutalizing punishment, while also throwing in unexpected changes that keep listeners perched on their toes.

Now Cutterred Flesh are returning with new music via the same Transcending Obscurity label, and once again we have the chance to reveal a new song and a lyric video from a forthcoming release. This one is named “Symptoms of Parasite“. As usual, we want to give you a little preview of what’s about to happen to you. But where to start? The bamboozling animated video or the bamboozling brutality of the music? Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: NADSAT — “MAKE MY DAY”

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Mar 142023
 

We’re going to “cut to the chase” on the video we’re premiering today, and then tell you who’s behind what will happen to you when you press “play”.

The experience doesn’t last long — just a bit more than two minutes — but long enough to feel like your bones have been bruised or broken and your mind mauled by a collision of bleakness and rage. It’s just two men doing this work, a drummer who assaults the kit like it needs killing and a guitarist/vocalist who both adds to the physical trauma and sears the senses with the screams of his instruments (including the larynx). Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: UNPURE — “SMALL CROOKED BONES”

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Mar 132023
 

After a silence spanning nearly 20 years, Unpure are returning with a new album named Prophecies Ablaze, which will be released at the end of March by Invictus Productions and The Ajna Offensive.

Twenty years (or nearly so) is a long time, and even Unpure‘s last album (2004’s World Collapse) thus pre-dates the start of our site. From time to time we do divert from focusing on new music in order to dig back into histories we missed before our current interests in metal took root, but I don’t remember ever exploring Unpure‘s discography as it grew from 1993 through that last album. And so I’ve come to Prophecies Ablaze with no expectations.

That’s probably just as well, since the Unpure that recorded the album now includes two new guitarists, Watain‘s Pelle Forsberg and Degial‘s Hampus Eriksson, as well as erstwhile Degial drummer Emil Svensson (who apparently joined the band in 2019), with only vocalist/bassist Kolgrim remaining from all the earlier days. So it could be considered a re-start in more ways than one. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: SERPENT OF OLD — “IDIOSYNCRASY”

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Mar 132023
 

Today we have an example of music that seems to arrive straight out of the sky without much warning, something that dazzles and destroys with such devastating heaviness and mind-bending but unnerving inventiveness that it’s startling to realize it’s a band’s debut effort. But that indeed is what we have — two songs from Ensemble Under The Dark Sun, the first full-length by the Turkish quintet Serpent of Old.

We don’t yet know very much about the band’s background, though it appears  they share members with the technical death/thrash band Archaic Vanity (who have one 2020 EP to their name). But the music tells us enough to pay very close attention as we wait for the album’s release by Transcending Obscurity Records. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: THYSIA — “COMMUNICATING HALLS OF THE NETHERWORLD”

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Mar 102023
 

The PR material for Thysia‘s debut album Islands in Cosmic Darkness punch lots of buttons. It informs us that the band-members’ collective experience includes participation in Haemophagus, Messa, Undead Creep, Assumption, and Nox Interitus. It makes stylistic comparisons to Craft, Varathron, Mayhem, Celtic Frost, Tangorodrim, and early Rotting Christ. It further suggests that the album will appeal to fans of Negative Plane, Malokarpatan, Cultes des Ghoules, and Funereal Presence. And thereby it creates very high expectations.

The band’s name is an ancient Greek term that refers to “ritual sacrifice,” and lyrical references in the new album are also rooted in Greek mythology. That also creates expectations — as does the album title — of ancient, supernatural, and bloody connections.

But the true proof, of course, is in the music that this Italian collective have created, and as of today we have two audio signs of the new album in advance of its April 7 release by Chaos Records — the first single “Psallo“ and the song we’re presenting today, “Communicating Halls of the Netherworld“. Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: DIMENTIANON — “BLACK ANGEL”

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Mar 102023
 

A complete biography of the NY band Dimentianon would consume many chapters, and probably test the patience of most readers. The thumbnail sketch is that the band was born in 1995 under the name The Forgotten and then changed to Dimentianon seven years later after releasing a pair of demos, a debut album, and a split. In the ensuing years Dimentianon experienced numerous lineup changes, participated in many shows with numerous household names in the metalverse, and released four more albums, most recently the 2021 “comeback” album Dreaming Yuggoth, which emerged after an 11-year gap.

Fortunately, the lineup has remained stable since then, resulting in a new album set for co-release this year on April 14th by Symbol of Domination (Moldova), Paragon Records (US), and Pest Records (Romania). Entitled Chapter VI: Burning Rebirth, it’s an hour-long work that again features founding member and vocalist M, drummer and cellist Matt Hass, keyboardist and additional vocalist Don Zaros (Evoken), and guitarist/bassist Joe Fogarazzo (who also performs church organ on the record).

Once more, Dimentianon have interwoven ingredients from black, death, and doom metal, but the eclecticism of the stylistic alchemy doesn’t end there, as you’ll discover from the song “Black Angel” that we’re premiering today through a lyric video. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: AETHERIUS OBSCURITAS — “CLOAK OF WOLVES”

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Mar 092023
 

This year the Hungarian black metal band Aetherius Obscuritas celebrate their 21st year of existence by releasing their ninth album overall. Bearing the name A sors szürke pora (“The Grey Dust of Predestination”), it will hit the streets on April 15th through the cooperation of Ukraine-based GrimmDistribution and the U.S. label Paragon Records.

The last time we spoke of this veteran band was in 2020, when they released Mártír, the immediate predecessor to A sors szürke pora. We wrote then:

The Hungarian black metal band Aetherius Obscuritas are certainly capable of mounting musical assaults of cut-throat savagery and spine-tingling wildness, but what makes their new album Mártír stand out from the barbaric pack is, for want of a better word, their adventurousness. The compositions are elaborate and multi-faceted, and the results can seem like musical potions that produce enthralling as well as electrifying effects.

We’ve repeated that little summary because you’ll find some of those same adjectives in our following descriptions of two songs from the new album, one of which we’re happily premiering today — “Cloak of Wolves“. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: DERHEAD — “THIS CHAOS IS FOR YOU ONLY”

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Mar 092023
 

Undoubtedly, many of you visiting this page will already be familiar with the avant-garde Italian black metal project Derhead, thanks to the increasingly distinctive music captured on a pair of demos and a pair of EPs that have seen release since 2016 (though the project’s existence can be traced back to 2001). But for those who may be newcomers, we’ll disclose that Derhead is the solo work of multi-instrumentalist and vocalist Giorgio Barroccu from Genoa, who is also the founder and co-owner of Brucia Records.

At last, Derhead will be releasing a debut album this month. Entitled The Grey Zone Phobia, it’s a 37-minute opus set for release by the same Brucia Records on March 30th. When you hear it, you’ll discover that Derhead‘s interests have continued to evolve. The label’s preview reports that this time the music has been “contaminated by an incredibly heterogeneous range of sounds spacing from Doom / Gothic Metal to what Satyricon released during the Rebel Extravaganza era.” We’ll also share Derhead‘s summing up of the album’s thematic conceptions: Continue reading »

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