DIRTY GRAVE — “UNTIL THE DAY I DIE”

 Exceptions to the Rule, Premieres  No Responses »
Sep 222017
 

 

The power of the riff is important in most forms of metal (though certainly not all), but it’s perhaps especially vital in forms of traditional occult doom and stoner metal. A band in those related genres can go a long way riding a well-muscled riff steed, especially if they can mess with your mind while they’re moving your head. The Brazilian doom metal band Dirty Grave have proven that on their debut album, Evil Desire.

They self-released the album as a digital download back in mid-July as a two-man band (vocalist/guitarist Mark Rainbow and guitarist Victor Berg), but now the Belarusian label GrimmDistribution and the British label Todestrieb Records are joining forces to give it a CD release on October 18. We’re highlighting one song from the album today — “Until the Day I Die” — with a new video for the track. And we’re also able to report that drummer Arthur Assis has re-joined the band, and that the trio are now at work on a second album Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: CORTEX IMPULSE — “BROKEN”

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Sep 212017
 

 

It’s time to confuse people again. It says so right there on our calendar for today: “Confuse people again — stream some metal with clean vocals”. Right under that entry is a note: “Also bludgeon their heads and centrifuge their minds”.

And fortunately we have just the thing — a song called “Broken” by a new progressive metal project from Moscow named Cortex Impulse. “Broken” is one of six tracks (including a King Crimson cover) on the band’s new forthcoming EP, Once In A Lifetime. Continue reading »

AN NCS EP PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): KULT MOGIŁ — “PORTENTAQUE”

 Album Reviews, Premieres, SHORT BUT SWEET  1 Response »
Sep 212017
 

 

Almost  two years on from the release of their debut album Anxiety Never Descending, the Polish death metal band Kult Mogił (whose name translates to “cult of graves”) have surfaced again with a new EP named Portentaque. It is an immaculate rendering of madness, each of its three tracks intricately plotted, constantly changing, persistently fascinating, and deeply unnerving.

The EP will be released by Pagan Records on September 29, and today we’re helping to premiere what has become one of my favorite EPs of 2017. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: CRYOSTASIUM — “MAGNETIC”

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Sep 202017
 

 

The requests we receive to share premieres of new songs often become a source of discovery for me as well as for many of you, and this is one of those times.

Before listening to the track you’re about to hear, the name of which is “Magnetic“, I was unfamiliar with Cryostasium. Only after becoming captivated by the song did I learn that the EP which includes it — Starbound –is merely the most recent in a very long list of releases that extends back to 2003 (and possibly earlier, when the project was known as The Abhorrer). Because this is such a recent discovery, I can’t tell you how the new EP compares to the five albums or the two-dozen shorter Cryostasium releases that have preceded it.

But I can tell you that the haunting fascinations of “Magnetic” act as a powerful lure, not only into the depths of Starbound but also into Cryostasium’s previous creations. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: NEKROHOWL — “BLASPHEMY STILL UNNAMED”

 Premieres  8 Responses »
Sep 202017
 

 

Nekrohowl were spawned last year in Dhaka, Bangladesh, its members coming together from other local bands with the intent of dedicating themselves to “abhorrent and paroxysmal Death Metal” in the grand and gruesome traditions of the ’90s. In doing so, they become a link in what is now a very long and tangled chain (one crusted in blood) that connects back in time to the likes of Suffocation, Autopsy, Immolation, Morbid Angel, and Hellhammer (among others), from whom they’ve drawn their foul inspirations.

There are, of course, a vast number of links in that globe-spanning chain, but some gleam brighter than others. Or, since we’re talking about old school death metal, maybe it’s more accurate to say that some links are more corroded and plague-infested, more likely to cut you, leave festering wounds, and produce seizures of madness. Based upon the quality of Nekrohowl’s debut EP, Epitome of Morbid, they’re definitely one of the brighter (and uglier) links in the chain — as you’ll discover when you hear the song we’re premiering, “Blasphemy Still Unnamed“. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: THROANE — “ET CEUX EN LESQUELS ILS CROYAIENT”

 Premieres  2 Responses »
Sep 202017
 

 

Great lashing storm gales of guitar sound assault the senses. The pulse of the drum and bass sound erratic, find a rhythm, stop altogether, detonate in massive eruptions, move in deliberate and ponderous footfalls. The melody looms and swirls, heaves and shimmers. Peals of dissonance flower and subside. A maniacal voice hurls caustic, blood-chilling shrieks through the song’s titanic movements. The effect is dramatic, unnerving, sorcerous.

And those are this listener’s impressions of “Et Ceux En Lesquels Ils Croyaient“, the second track on the second album by Throane that we’re premiering in this post. Entitled Plus Une Main A Mordre (“No Hand Left to Bite”), it will be released by Debemur Morti Productions on the 20th of October. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: APHONIC THRENODY — “LIFE STABBED ME ONCE AGAIN” AND “ALL I’VE LOVED”

 Exceptions to the Rule, Premieres  2 Responses »
Sep 192017
 

 

“The stars are not wanted now: put out every one; Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun; Pour away the ocean and sweep up the wood. For nothing now can ever come to any good.”
–W.H.Auden

There is a staggering sense of desolation and hopelessness in those words. It’s not surprising that the international funeral doom band Aphonic Threnody have associated those words with the sorceries of sorrow that make up their new album, Of Loss and Grief, nor any surprise in the releasing label’s own formulation of the music’s atmosphere: “No sun shines here, nor happiness or hope … just grey, insurmountable walls”.

The album will be released on October 9 by Terror From Hell Records, and today we present the debut of, not one, but two tracks from the album, “Life Stabbed Me Once Again” and “All I’ve Loved“. Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: MRTVI — “AS CONSCIOUSNESS IS HARNESSED TO FLESH PART 2”

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Sep 192017
 

 

In the mind-melting song “As Consciousness Is Harnessed To Flesh Part 2“, the Serbian, UK-based solo artist MRTVI tells you “Reality is not to be believed“. And in case you don’t believe him, he also makes a determined effort through this music to fracture reality into a shower of sharp shards and splinters, to plow madly through the constrictive channeling of experience through our perceptions, in search of an inner cosmos.

We premiered this song once before, in advance of the late-July release of Negative Atonal Dissonance, the eye-popping album that barely contains its unpredictable energies. I advised you then, “whatever you do, don’t pass this by”. But some people may not have been paying attention, and so I’m quite happy to provide a reminder. Plus, this time the music is accompanied by a lyric video that’s almost as abrasive, bewildering, and neuron-rearranging as the music. But not quite. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): IN TWILIGHT’S EMBRACE — “VANITAS”

 Album Reviews, Premieres  2 Responses »
Sep 192017
 

 

Almost exactly two years ago we had the pleasure of premiering the third album by In Twilight’s Embrace. True to its name, The Grim Muse was vicious, but also electrifying, bursting with magnetic guitar melodies that were given room to shine in even the most turbo-charged and barbaric of the songs. It proved to be one of 2015’s highlights, and something of a breakout release for a band who were demonstrating a new level of both songwriting and performance skill.

And here we are two years later, fortunate again to premiere a new full-length by this Polish band. This fourth album is named Vanitas, and it’s set for release on September 22nd by Arachnophobia Records. And to waste no time answering the question that most fans will be asking, it is at least a match for the quality of The Grim Muse, and in this writer’s opinion even better. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: WAR POSSESSION — “WAR IS THE FATHER AND KING OF ALL”

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Sep 182017
 

 

“War Is the Father and King of All” — so proclaims the Greek death metal band War Possession in the song we’re premiering today. Look around you, look into the sordid past of our species. We might wish it were otherwise, but it’s hard to argue with them. It’s also hard to argue with the visceral appeal of their music.

This new song is one of 10 tracks on Doomed To Chaos, the debut album of this band of slaughtering commandos, whose ranks include current and past members of Embrace of Thorns, Merciless Crucifixion, and Wargoat, among others. The album will be released on October 23 by the Spanish label Memento Mori. Continue reading »

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