AN NCS PREMIERE: GVORN — “DEMONS IN ME LAUGH”

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Apr 012022
 

 

The Russian band Gvorn have made their home in the towering black castle of death-doom. They have become very comfortable there, confidently settling into a place that harbors discomfort and downfall.

The first single from their debut album Keeper of Grief showed just how comfortable and self-assured they have become. “Sounds From the Crypt” rings and rumbles, like the sounds of eerie celestial bells chiming and swirling over a monstrously heavy machine crossing a landscape of skulls. Commanding roars utter dismal proclamations from a deep abyss as the rhythm section slowly stomps and crushes and the chords wail and moan.

Agony spreads from the music like viscous leaking blood, but the band also create visions of cold, imperious cruelty and of soaring but chilling splendor and lonely grief. In its closing minutes, accompanied by the sharp crack of the snare, it becomes vast and utterly spellbinding. Continue reading »

SEER: OUR PREMIERE OF “LUNAR GATEWAYS” AND OUR REVIEW OF THE “VOL. 7” EP

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Mar 312022
 

We’ve been closely following the expansive musical odyssey of Vancouver-based Seer from their first release in 2015, writing about that first EP and everything that has followed since then. It’s been a fascinating trip, because the band’s sound has continually evolved and because even the tracks on a single release have never all sounded the same.

From the start Seer have followed a naming convention for their releases, beginning with Vol. 1 and continuing through Vol. 6, which was the title of their last full-length in 2019. Since then the band have released a pair of singles, and now they’re combining those singles along with a brand new song in a new EP entitled Vol. 7, which will be released on April 15th by Hidden Tribe. What we have for you today is the premiere of that brand new song, “Lunar Gateways“. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: HASEROT — “INCANTATIONS AT DUSK”

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Mar 302022
 

The Houston death metal band Haserot named themselves after an ominous statue seated on a marble gravestone in Cleveland’s Lakeview Cemetery; perched on the tomb of Francis Haserot and his family, it’s also referred to as “The Angel of Death Victorious”. Once you’ve seen that statue (and you can see it here), you won’t forget it. Once you hear Haserot‘s new EP Throne of Malice, it’s unlikely you’ll forget it either.

Haserot are a relatively new group, having come together in the last pre-pandemic year, but they have a veteran line-up that includes current or former members of Doomstress, Funeral Blues, Sanctus Bellum, Spectral Manifest, and Scrollkeeper. The experience shows in both the songwriting and the execution of this new EP.

The influence of ’90s death metal in the vein of Morbid Angel, Entombed, Bloodbath, and Carcass are evident, but the music hits like a combination of meteor strike and bulldozer rather than a rote repetition of what you’ve already heard before. It’s both a powerful reminder of what we loved about the past and a skull-cleaving, heart-palpitating illustration of what you miss if you confine yourself only to the old classics.

We have a riveting example of this point in the first single from the EP that we’re premiering today in advance of its May 27 release by Redefining Darkness Records. Its name is “Incantations At Dusk“. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: SUPPRESSION — “LIFELESSNESS”

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Mar 302022
 

We’ve already been loudly banging the drum for Suppression‘s debut album The Sorrow of Soul Through Flesh. In a recent review for our site, Todd Manning dropped references to the likes of Monstrosity, Resurrection, Gorguts, Morbid Angel, Malevolent Creation, and most especially the legendary Death. summing up the album as “brutal yet technical, ripping yet atmospheric”. He further wrote:

They are students of their genre but easily stand shoulder-to-shoulder with the best. The most complex moments never sound forced but serve the songs. It’s just a killer death metal album from start to finish.

I added my own two cents here about the first single from the album, “Monochromatic Chambers”: “Prepare for a full-throttle rampage, a turbocharged attack of maniacal drumwork, jittery, jagged, and jolting riffage, mercurial guitar leads, and utterly rabid vocals. When the band temper the onslaught, they deliver a fascinating prog-influenced instrumental jam.” From that track I got flashes of old Atheist and Gorguts as well as Dysrhythmia.

And so it’s a thrill for us to give one more push for a fantastic debut full-length by these Chileans, as we premiere the second single “Lifelessness” (a song with an incredibly deceptive name). Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: DAWOHL — “INSTITUTIONALIZED HATRED”

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Mar 292022
 

 

Seven long years after the French extreme metal band Dawohl erupted with their first EP, they are now returning with a debut album named Leviathan that will see release on April 22nd via Dolorem Records — and in a word, it’s stunning.

On this new album Dawohl draw upon well-springs of inspiration from both black and death metal, uniting them to create brutal and barbarous assaults that as ferocious as unchained demon wolves and as exhilarating as the thought of being chased by them. Not for naught does Dolorem Records recommend the album for fans of Zyklon, Hate Eternal, and Arkhon Infaustus.

We have a prime example of the heart-racing qualities mentioned above, and others, in the explosive album track “Institutionalized Hatred” that we’re premiering today. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: DISSOLVE PATTERNS

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Mar 292022
 

 

In their introduction to the self-titled debut album by the Belgian avant-garde black metal band Dissolve Patterns the Italian label Brucia Records recommends it for fans of Oranssi Pazuzu, Ved Buens Ende, and Fyrnask. For many of us, they really needed to say no more. Anyone who might make music that inspires such references would be worth checking out.

It turns out, thankfully, that those wonderful references are accurate, though other compass points also come to mind in following the album’s fascinating maneuvers (at the end of this article we’ll share an excerpt from another reviewer who drops names like Primeval Well, Feral Season, and The Silver).

The songwriting inventively mixes together ingredients of black metal, progressive music, and dark jazz, while also adding experimental accents. It does this in intricate and unpredictable ways, creating a musical amalgam that’s both elegant and assaulting, hypnotic and desperate, often steeped in melancholy and just as often calamitous. Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: GRIDFAILURE featuring MAC GOLLEHON — “PIECES”

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Mar 282022
 

Late last year we had the honor of premiering a video for a song off an EP named The End Is The Beginning by the renowned NYC brass musician Mac Gollehon. It was a diversion from our usual musical interests at this site, but so fascinating that we couldn’t resist. And truth be told, in its spirit and atmosphere it really wasn’t all that far away from some of those interests after all. Both seductive and seditious, the EP created a surreal experience drawn from a midnight other-world.

In its conception and its recording, that EP was the result of a collaboration between Gollehon and David Brenner, who has a variety of accomplishments to his name, including his work in the unpredictable and confrontational audio-visual project called Gridfailure.

What we knew then, but hadn’t yet fully explored, was that Gollehon and Brenner had already engaged in an even deeper and more disorienting collaboration, creating an album named Dismemberment Cabaret that Nefarious Industries released in May 2021. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: REAPER — “THE REAPER”

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Mar 282022
 

 

Metal-Archives lists 8 active bands from around the world who call themselves Reaper (plus a couple more Reapers that have split up and one that changed its name). The one we’re focusing on here is from Melbourne, Australia (not to be confused with the other Australian Reaper from New South Wales).

This Reaper released a blistering six-track self-titled demo in 2017 and have rocketed from that to a debut album named Viridian Inferno that’s now set for release on April 22nd by Dying Victims Productions. Doubling down on all things reaping, the band named the song we’re premiering today “The Reaper” (emphasis added). Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): CHTHONIC CULT — “BECOME SEEKERS FOR DEATH”

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Mar 252022
 

Seven years ago the Polish duo Chthonic Cult seemed to appear out of nowhere, as if charging forth from a hideous nether-dimension through an invisible door suddenly flung open. It was then that their debut album I Am the Scourge of Eternity scourged the metal underground without previous warning. But almost as suddenly, they seemed to vanish back through that terrible portal, falling silent for a long span of time.

And yet here they are again at last, with a ravenous and mind-ruining new album named Become Seekers For Death that reveals different strategies and is all the better for that. While their full-length debut consisted of four monstrous and monstrously long songs, the new one assaults the senses with 8 more compact tracks of head-spinning blackened death metal. These are almost relentlessly explosive and, to a degree not achieved on the debut, they’re rapidly addictive. Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: AMBROTOS — “AERAS, THE INFINITE”

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Mar 242022
 

After releasing two well-received EPs — αμβροτος in 2018 and Cosmic Annulus in 2019 — the Greek black metal band Ambrotos are now poised to released their striking debut album Transcendental Mastery.

Lyrically inspired by pre-Socratic philosophy and ancient cosmology (represented by Khaos Diktator Design‘s stunning cover art, depicting Empedocles’ idea of the Origin of Cosmos), the band have fashioned melodically memorable music of fiery and forlorn intensity that’s capable of reaching towering heights of extravagant and mythic power.

As proof, we present a gripping video for the new album’s second single, a breathtaking onslaught named “Aeras, The Infinite“. Continue reading »

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