AN NCS PREMIERE: CEREMONIAL CASTINGS — “DESECRATION OF GRACE”

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Jan 312022
 

 

2021 brought the 25th anniversary of Ceremonial Castings, the passing of a quarter-century career during which the band produced nine full-length albums and a slew of demos, EPs, and splits. The two brothers who joined forces in this endeavor — Jake and Nick Superchi — decided to commemorate the anniversary in extravagant fashion, by re-recording 18 of their classic songs, as well as two completely new and previously unreleased instrumentals by Nick Superchi, and to release the material in the form of a double album.

The name of that album (and suitably so) is Our Journey Through Forever. It will see the bold light of day on February 25th via the Eisenwald label, and to help spread the word we are today presenting a stream of one of the re-recorded tracks, “Desecration of Grace” (which originally appeared on 2005’s Immortal Black Art). Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): KRVVLA — “X”

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Jan 282022
 

 

As we approach the end of 2022’s first month we bring you a full stream of one of the most relentlessly intense and unnerving albums that the new year has presented so far, The album is simply entitled X, and it’s the sophomore full-length by the Belarusian post-black metal band KRVVLA, which will be released on February 4th by Brucia Records.

Previously, the band had self-released one album and four EPs, but with X they have twisted their sound into even more harrowing directions, and have also added vocals for the first time, which only adds to the music’s terrorizing impact. As compared to what has come before, X is a more atmospheric work, but the atmosphere is one of utter calamity. The experience is like being engulfed almost non-stop in an overpowering maelstrom of dissonance and devastation — of rage, despair, oppression, and downfall. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): VICIOUS KNIGHTS — “ALTERATION THROUGH POSSESSION”

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Jan 272022
 

 

Vicious Knights‘ debut album — Alteration Through Possession — is exceedingly well-named. The band sound possessed, and their music will indeed create both chilling and exhilarating alterations in your mind.

They produce these effects by invoking the old spirits of early Kreator, Destruction, Possessed, and Sepultura, and creating both lyrical and musical themes that conjure ancient horrors. It takes little time at all to realize that this Greek trio are both formidable songwriters, with an almost preternatural talent for crafting hooks while establishing atmosphere, and top-shelf instrumentalists.

And thus it’s with great pleasure that today we present a full stream of the album in advance of its imminent January 28 release by Dying Victims Productions. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): DEEPER GRAVES — “THE COLOSSAL SLEEP”

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Jan 252022
 

 

We’re about to venture off our usual beaten tracks, lured away from the usual ferocity by music that beckons like ghost lights on the other side of our midnight walls of thorns and vipers. It conjures spells and splendid visions, and it often irresistibly quickens the pulse, but the lights are ephemeral and hopes are dashed where these alluring wraiths reside.

The allure of the new album by Deeper Graves that we’re about to premiere in full is powerful. The Colossal Sleep combines visceral rhythms and mesmerizing soundscapes that shine like moon-lit mists and reach heights of even greater splendor, but it harbors harsher aspects as well, and it doesn’t go too far to say that there is a deep and haunting darkness at its core. It often makes you want to bounce, but the gloom of sorrow persists. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: INSINERATEHYMN — “INTRANSITIVE SANCTION”

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Jan 242022
 

All is fire in the premiere we’re now presenting, from the very name of the band — Insineratehymn — to the conflagration consuming the demonic figures in the album’s fantastic cover art, and the blood-boiling heat of the song we’re premiering.

That song, “Intransitive Sanction“, comes from this Los Angeles band’s second full-length, Disembodied, which has been readied for a February 25 release by Blood Harvest Records, in conspiracy with Rotted Life. As the accompanying PR materials correctly observe, the new album presents “a masterclass in ’90s death metal, from the spiraling vortexes of early Tampa to the sewage to come from New York, on to eerie emanations from Europe and the dissonance at the dawn of the new millennium”.

And thus the new album truly does represent a step up from Insineratehymn‘s promising debut in 2018, an elevation that becomes quickly apparent when you hear the lethally contagious “Intransitive Sanction“. Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: VULCANO — “VULCANO WILL LIVE FOREVER”

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Jan 202022
 

 

The Brazilian extreme metal scene has spawned a seemingly endless stream of savage musical thrills for decades. Many metalheads may have discovered some of South America’s deadliest exports through the early works of the now-legendary Sepultura, but if you dig deeper you’ll discover (if you don’t already know) the band that might have been ground-zero of the Brazilian death metal movement. The name of that band, which has influenced generations of extreme metal artists not only in South America but in Europe, is Vulcano.

Those pioneering barbarians, whose influence extends to black and speed metal as well as death metal, can trace their origins back to the early ’80s. Since then, albeit with a significant recording hiatus that began in roughly 1990 and inevitable line-up changes, they’ve released a dozen studio albums, along with live albums and shorter releases. And now they’re rapidly approaching the release of their newest studio full-length (their 19th release overall), Stone Orange, which will be forthcoming on February 4th via Emanzipation Productions.

Today we have the privilege of presenting the premiere of a lyric video for the new album’s closing track, “Vulcano Will Live Forever” — and when you hear it, you can truly believe the song’s title. Vulcano‘s career spans 40 years now (with no sign of stopping), and there’s clearly still fire in the belly, napalm in the veins, and blood on the teeth. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): FERAL — “SPIRITUAL VOID”

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Jan 192022
 

(photo by Arbre E. Saldana)

The French crust/hardcore/grind band Feral chose their name for a reason that becomes obvious when you listen to their second album Spiritual Void. They attack almost relentlessly, with raw, no-holds-barred intensity — intensity that comes through in both the emotional fuel of the music and in its mauling and pulverizing sonic power. It is musical catharsis of a very high order.

The album is set for release on January 21st through Source Atone Records and Basement Apes Industries. For very good reason they recommend it for fans of All Pigs Must Die, Cursed, Napalm Death, and Trap Them (and we might add Misery Index and Rotten Sound to that list). You’ll understand the basis for those recommendations when you hear our premiere stream of the entire album… a handful of paragraphs from now. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: PYRRHIC SALVATION — “REVELATIONS (OF AGONIES TO COME)”

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Jan 182022
 

 

Back in 2016 then-NCS writer Austin Weber (who later moved over to curate the “Tech-Death Tuesday” column for Metal Injection) unearthed a debut demo by a group named Pyrrhic Salvation which made a big favorable impression. As Austin wrote at that time, “This is some dense, eclectic, and multi-layered tech-death the likes of which few bands can conjure…. While I’m hardly jaded, it does take a lot to impress me, and the two songs on display here really have my jaw permanently dropped to the floor.”

Since then, Pyrrhic Salvation have expanded from an instrumental duo (guitarist Michael Altobello and drummer/fretless-bassist Sagar Nadgir) to a three-person unit that includes a vocalist (Chrisom Infernium of Veilburner). Though separated by geography, the trio have worked closely together to create a debut full-length that’s set for release on February 18th. The name of the album is Manifestum I, and today we’re helping spread the word through our premiere of an album track called “Revelations (of Agonies to Come)“. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: HELLFROST AND FIRE — “ACROSS THE BRIDGE OF TYRANTS”

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Jan 172022
 

 

Today we have the sadistic pleasure of introducing the third single to be revealed so far from the debut album of Hellfrost and Fire, which is itself named Fire, Frost and Hell. It harnesses the talents of vocalist Dave Ingram (Benediction), guitarist/bassist Rick “Dennis” DeMusis, and drummer Travis Ruvo (Echelon, Cropsy Maniac) — with guest guitar solos performed by Scott Fairfax (Memoriam UK, As The World Dies).

If you’ve caught up with either of those previous singles you’ll already know that the band’s formulation of death metal gives primacy to skull-smashing, spine-fracturing grooves, and backs up those highly compulsive rhythmic tirades with paranormal melodic accents and of course Ingram‘s belly-deep and thoroughly ravenous growls. As we remarked after hearing those first two tracks, “no bones will be left unbroken” — and this newest song is no more merciful. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): SMOTHER — “CHAPTER IV – TYING THY NOOSE OF RUSTED CHAIN”

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Jan 142022
 

The black metal collective known as Smother are writing a musical saga in chapters, eventually to be joined by a book that is connected to the lyrics and audio experiences of those sonic chapters. The members of the collective have shifted, but are still anchored by drummer SD (Black Vice, Ravnblod), whose percussion tracks and conceptions are the foundation for what the other collaborators contribute.

Four musical chapters have been recorded so far (out of a planned 10 releases), and in each one the sounds have changed. The latest installment, Chapter IV – Tying Thy Noose of Rusted Chain – is the one we’re presenting in full today. For this newest work SD was joined by MW (Crown of Asteria) as principal vocalist and keyboardist, and by guitarist JV (Grst, Uruk), both of whom also participated in Chapter III.

What you now have the opportunity to experience is a single 41-minute track that’s being released by Red River Family Records. At a very high level (and potentially a misleading one), it could be considered atmospheric black metal, but it’s an experience that makes significant use of harsh and mentally destabilizing electronics and of ingredients from catastrophic doom metal. It’s capable of creating trance states, but more often is a manifestation of terrors, most of which don’t seem bound to an earthly plane of existence. Continue reading »

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