AN NCS PREMIERE: BRUTTA — “DEVON”

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Jun 032022
 

 

Imagine a maniacal murderer trapped within Dartmoor Prison in Devon, England. Fueled by unquenchable rage, he hammers at the walls that confine him, and the more he does so the more he longs to hurt, to teach the monstrosity of pain, to kill and kill again.

That vicious sociopath who is trying to escape the hell around him, and to bring hell to the outside world, is the first-person protagonist in the song we’re bringing you today from the self-titled debut album by the part-Brazilian, part-British band Brutta — and the song is just as viscerally violent and frightening as the lyrics. It’s also so physically compulsive that it’s likely to pump your head like a fully-fueled piston. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): CRISIS BENOIT — “EL CULTO DE LA MUERTE”

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Jun 032022
 

To be clear, we are not experts in Italian culture. Having said that, we must still express our surprise in discovering a trio of Italian death/grind punks whose lyrical themes are connected to pro wrestling, who hide their faces with masks connected to the Mexican lucha libre tradition, and who use stage names for themselves connected to the same tradition: El Terrible (drum/vocals), El Canibal (guitars), and Aidu Ientus (bass).

The connections of Crisis Benoit to the world of wrestling don’t stop there. They wrote the entrance theme for the Maltese pro wrestler Gianni Valletta (All Japan Pro Wrestling), for the Italian hardcore tag-team Urban Guerrilla, and for the Mexican extreme wrestling federation Zona23, and they collaborated with “Rise Underground Pro Wrestling” for a music/deathmatch show in Leeds (UK).

Is your curiosity piqued? Would you like to discover how these musical luchadors translate their inspirations into sound? Well, you should be, because their debut album El Culto De La Muerte is a hellish, harrowing, and often haunting experience, and one that turns out to be so musically multi-faceted that it keeps you on the edge of your seat from start to finish. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): BURIED REALM — “BURIED REALM”

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Jun 022022
 

 

Colorado-based Buried Realm has returned to the fray with a self-titled third album that’s just as much of an eye-popping attack as the Pär Olofsson artwork that blazes off its cover. That shouldn’t come as a huge surprise for those who experienced the band’s startling debut album The Ichor Carcinoma (2017) or the very impressive sophomore full-length Embodiment of the Divine (2020), but even if you know those records, this one is still a spectacularly head-spinning and electrifying jolt to the system.

Once again, the band’s alter ego Josh Dummer has enlisted an impressive array of iconic names as guests to add their own fireworks to a show that’s already loaded with fireworks. Those names by themselves (which we’ll come to eventually) would be sufficient enticement for any newcomers to give Buried Realm a chance, but they really are just bit players (albeit famous ones). It’s Dummer‘s songwriting and performances that carry the main weight here, and he carries it easily — as you’ll discover through our premiere stream of the entire action-packed record on the eve of its release. Continue reading »

AN NCS EP PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): SACRILEGIOUS CROWN — “FORBIDDEN VESTIGES OF VENERATION”

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Jun 012022
 

Life is fear. Of course it’s other things too, but fear is inescapable. It always lurks, and sometimes dominates. Every living thing is prey, even if sometimes also predator, and that condition is rooted in our genes. How else could it be, when death eventually comes for all?

Music can channel fear, just as life is haunted by it, and sometimes it dives into esoteric dimensions where fear might be extinguished, because what causes it may be illuminated and embraced.

Well, these are obviously heavy thoughts, but what spawned them today is the hideous hypnosis created by a new EP named Forbidden Vestiges of Veneration from the Italian one-man raw black metal band Sacrilegious Crown, which is set for a June 3 release by Xenoglossy Productions. As the label describes, this new work is a concept release “about forbidden and forgotten religious cults, their mysticism blending occultism and religion with rituals involving hypnosis and underground processions”. Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: MANOS SIX AND THE MUDDY DEVIL — “THE DEVIL WILL TAKE ME BY THE HAND”

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Jun 012022
 

 

As we all well know, the Devil is a central figure in the sprawling musical narratives of extreme metal, sometimes as a central figure and sometimes as the diabolical Muse who fuels the inspirations and philosophies of the artists. But of course the Devil is present across a wide span of other musical genres, from old-time gospel music to blues, country music, and much, much more. What Lucifer represents are ideas and feelings that know no bounds.

The Devil is certainly a powerful presence in the music of Manos Six and the Muddy Devil, and so even though that music is far, far beyond the soundscapes to which we usually devote our attention at this site, it is a kindred spirit to much of what occupies our attentions. The music is also captivating, which made it even easier for us to agree to the premiere we’re hosting right now. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: ATARAXY — “VISIONS OF ABSENCE”

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May 312022
 

The music of Ataraxy has become a confluence of heart-rending and hideous poetry, and violent, pulse-pounding turmoil. It brings together the soul-splintering downfalls of doom and the electrifying ravages of death metal, and shrouds those striking unions in an atmosphere that isn’t of this world, but seems instead to radiate from spectral realms that lie on the other side of death.

Even from their beginnings, Ataraxy have been very good, but the old cliche that “This is their best work yet!” is inarguably true in the case of this Spanish band’s newest album The Last Mirror, which will be co-released by Me Saco Un Ojo and Dark Descent Records. The songwriting here is both more refined and more unsettling — more elaborate, more prone to the creation of startling contrasts, and even more effective in drawing the listener down haunted and harrowing pathways of heartbreak, horror, and rampant savagery.

Everyone who has been paying attention already got a vivid sign of Ataraxy‘s multi-faceted achievements on this new album through the advent of its stunning first single, “Decline“, and today we bring you another sign via our premiere of “Visions of Absence“. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: SERPENT ASCENDING — “HYPERBOREAN FOLKLORE”

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May 302022
 

Serpent Ascending‘s new album Hyperborean Folklore is one in which a questing wanderer may travel far in the company of an unusually gifted guide and find wonders galore, both on the surface of the path and far below it.

The music is the work of a sole adventurer, the Finnish musician and vocalist Jarno Nurmi, who was once a member of Slugathor, Nerlich, and Desecresy. Because it is a solo work, the inspirations, the words, and the music are all inter-connected in ways that are rare for a full band, and here they all come together in truly extravagant and fascinating ways. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): THRALL — “SCHISMS”

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May 242022
 

 

A dozen years have passed since the release of Thrall‘s debut album, Away From the Haunts of Men. Two more albums and an EP followed in relatively quick succession from this Australian band, but then came a near-seven-year interval that left a gap in new recordings, a gap that’s about to be filled in eye-opening fashion. The pandemic brought doom to millions, but renewed life to Thrall, and now their new album Schisms is ready for release.

The band’s founder Tøm Vøid has been its only steadfast member, with the recording line-up in constant flux from release to release. The new album features a big array of contributors around the founder, including current or former members of Gatecreeper, Noose Rot, Mar Mortuum, Myotragus, Cult of the Night, Ruins, and Dead River Runs Dry.

What has this collective accomplished on Schisms? There have been a couple of early clues via the release of the songs “Tyrant” and “Hollow”, but now’s the day when all will be revealed in full. Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: INNER DECAY — “INCUBI ET SUCCUBI”

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May 202022
 

In the lore of demonology incubi are male demons believed to engage in sexual intercourse with sleeping women, and succubi are female demons believed to have sexual intercourse with sleeping men. In both cases, these nightmare couplings rarely have a good end. And thus the song that the Chicago-based death metal band Inner Decay have named for these demon spirits is itself a seductive horror.

“Incubi et Succubi” is the second track to be revealed so far from Enter the Void, Inner Decay‘s forthcoming second album, which will be released by the Romanian label Pest Records. It’s the exhilarating follow-up to the band’s 2018 full-length debut, Souls of War, and finds founding guitarist Tomasz Bielski and vocalist Silvestre Flores in harness with a slightly revised but still formidable line-up around them. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: V.E.G.A.S. — “RESOLVE”

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May 192022
 

 

Somewhere among the philosophies of the band V.E.G.A.S., if they were ever to set them out in a complete manifesto, would likely be the maxim “familiarity breeds contempt”. That may explain why the membership and location of the band’s members (or perhaps just one member) are so obscure. I would like to think they really are based in Belize, as their Bandcamp page states, but that’s probably just a way of saying “where we are doesn’t matter in the slightest”.

The conviction that “familiarity breeds contempt” would also provide a partial explanation for the band’s morphing music. It resists mundane classification, and it changes enough that the chance to get thrown off-balance is one reason why some of us leap at their new releases. I don’t mean to suggest that they sound like a different band from release to release — there are definite through-lines to be sure (the words “rage” and “riot” come to mind) — but you still get the impression of a band who have no static “blueprint” and willfully refuse to be pinned down. Continue reading »

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