AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): UNDERGANG — “MISANTROPOLOGI”

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Jun 202017
 

 

Undergang have become masters of a particular kind of lean and mean audio horror, one that is simultaneously brutish and primitive, atmospherically morbid and grotesque, mercilessly destructive, physically jolting, and virally infectious. They write compact songs that are nevertheless dynamic in their pacing and rhythmically varied. And they execute their strategies just as masterfully as they have conceived them.

All of these talents are powerfully on display in this Danish band’s new album Misantropologi, which will be released by Dark Descent Records on June 23, and today we have the privilege of bringing you the streaming premiere of all 10 tracks. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: THE FATHER OF SERPENTS — “THE AFTERLIFE SYMPHONY”

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Jun 182017
 

 

Age of Damnation is the first album by the Serbian doom band The Father of Serpents, a group of six individuals from other well-known bands in the Serbian scene who united in 2015 to follow in the steps of such groups as My Dying Bride, Saturnus, Paradise Lost, and Moonspell.

Age of Damnation will be co-released on June 19 by Satanath Records (Russia) and United By Chaos (Finland). Today we are premiering a powerful song named “The Afterlife Symphony“, and providing streams of two previously released songs as well, so that you might become more fully immersed in the apocalyptic atmosphere created by The Father of Serpents. Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: DIVINE ELEMENT — “BEYOND THIS SEA”

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Jun 152017
 

 

The Greek band Spectral Lore, a long-time NCS favorite, is probably the best-known musical vehicle of its alter-ego Ayloss, but it’s not the only one. As those who are familiar with Spectral Lore’s releases already know, the musical interests of Ayloss and his methods of expressing them are wide-ranging, and another band named Divine Element is the method through which some of those diverse interests have been channeled. Divine Element’s first album appeared in 2010, and now a new one has finally arrived, bearing the title Thaurachs of Borsu. It’s the source of a song called “Beyond This Sea” that’s the subject of a lyric video we’re premiering today.

Despite the passage of seven years leading to the Divine Element comeback, Ayloss remains in harness with original vocalist Antonis on this new album, which was released last month by I, Voidhanger Records, but this time he has also enlisted the services of drummer extraordinaire Hannes Grossmann (Alkaloid, Blotted Science, ex-Obscura, ex-Necrophagist). Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: EL CAMINO — “CROOKED WAND”

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Jun 132017
 

 

Four years on from the release of their last album, Gold of the Great Deceiver, the Swedish band el Camino are returning with a new one named Cursed Congregation, which is set for a July 2nd release by Night Tripper Records. In April the band delivered a two-track single of music from the album (Stars and Silence), and today we have another new song for you, this one named “Crooked Wand“.

If this is your first encounter with el Camino, prepare yourselves for a very interesting discovery. “Crooked Wand” casts a spell of mystery and menace, incorporating differing musical traditions (including doom, black metal, and heavy rock) in a way that both mesmerizes and chills the skin, drawing the listener into the presence of what might be a ritual summoning of some unseen and hungering terror. Continue reading »

AN NCS SPLIT PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): LLNN AND WOVOKA — “MARKS / TRACES”

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Jun 122017
 

 

It would be difficult to imagine a more well-matched pairing of bands than the two whose music is captured on the new album-length split we’re about to premiere, and it would be difficult to imagine an album cover that’s more evocative of the chilling, unearthly, and inhumanly destructive power of these 7 tracks, or their ability to seize and hold the listener’s attention. The bands are LLNN from Denmark and Wovoka from Los Angeles, and the name of the split is Marks/Traces. It will be released by Pelagic Records on June 16th.

The album’s advance press contains this advice: “Fans of Cult Of Luna, Neurosis, Amen Ra, Rosetta, and ISIS pay heed”. And that’s good advice, but we have a few more introductory thoughts about the music as well. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): TIRED MINDS — “LOOM”

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Jun 122017
 

 

Loom is the new album by the post-hardcore band Tired Minds from Newcastle, Australia. It’s scheduled for release on June 16 by Art As Catharsis, and today we bring you a full stream of the album.

“Post-hardcore” can be an amorphous label, encompassing a range of different sounds with greater or lesser degrees of hardcore in the scaffolding of the music and variations in the other construction materials as well. In the case of Tired Minds, attempting to formulate a linguistic synopsis for the music is especially challenging — Art As Catharsis pulls together references that extend from The Dillinger Escape Plan to Converge, from La Dispute to Cursed, and even The Bronx. And indeed, this wrecking crew aren’t moving down any well-manicured, well-mapped, straight-ahead path. And “easy listening” definitely isn’t a term in their vocabulary. Continue reading »

MOULDERED: “CHRONOLOGY OF A ROTTEN MIND”

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Jun 112017
 

 

The dictionary tells us that “mouldered” is the past tense of the word “moulder” (or molder), which means to slowly decay, rot, putrefy, or disintegrate. And Mouldered is the name chosen by a brutal death metal band from the north coast of Colombia whose album Chronology Of A Rotten Mind will be jointly released on July 13 by the trio of Satanath Records (Russia), More Hate Productions, and Butcher Entertainment (Ukraine). What we have for you today is the title track, along with streams of two previously released songs from the album.

Mouldered was initially created in late June of 2013, drawing influence from such bands as Cannibal Corpse, Deicide, Vader, Morbid Angel, Cryptopsy, and Death, and Chronology Of A Rotten Mind is their first album, following the release of a self-titled demo last year. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): ANTHESIS — “THE AGE OF SELF”

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Jun 092017
 

 

Today marks the official release of The Age of Self, the new album by the Canadian trio Anthesis, and their first full-length in more than seven years. To commemorate the occasion, we bring you a full stream of the album’s 11 tracks.

A pervasive air of insanity and incipient (or actual) catastrophe surrounds almost everything on the album, but the derangement manifests itself in very different ways. To describe the shattering intersection of styles on display within the album may make you think of a jigsaw puzzle where the pieces don’t fit — except they really do. And so while the band never let you get comfortable at any point, their off-balancing strategies succeed in keeping a grip on your throat and a hammer-lock on your head all the way through. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: RAM-PAGE — “THE PRESIDENT”

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Jun 092017
 

 

The Grave of Seven Billion is the name of the new album by the Russian metal band Ram-Page, and it’s a name that would seem to reflect a fairly unkind view of our planet, or at least the swarms of people who crawl upon it (as if you couldn’t tell from the death’s-head globe being clubbed and slashed on the album’s cover). The music isn’t very kind either, as you’re about to discover, but it sure is electrifying.

What we have for you today is the premiere of a song from the album named “The President“, along with streams of two previously released tracks. Those three and seven others make up the album, which is the band’s fourth full-length. It will be released on June 30 by the Belarusian label GrimmDistribution. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: IN HUMAN FORM — “ZENITH THESIS, ABBADON HYPOTHESIS”

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Jun 092017
 

 

We’ve been following In Human Form since 2013, reviewing both their debut album Earthen Urn that year and their contribution to the Northeastern Hymns split in 2015. Late last fall they independently released their second album, Opening Of The Eye By The Death Of The I, which was spotted by the sharp eyes and ears of I, Voidhanger Records — who will now release the album both digitally and on CD later this month. And that provides the occasion for us to stream a mammoth (and utterly fascinating) track from the album named “Zenith Thesis, Abbadon Hypothesis“.

For those who haven’t yet encountered the music of this Massachusetts band, it’s far from easy to classify in recognizable genre terms. The label refers to it as “an audacious blend of aggressive black metal and progressive music, tinged with jazz-fusion colours” and recommends it for fans of Abigor, early Satyricon, Taake, Enslaved, Death, King Crimson, and Frank Zappa. Not surprisingly, under such circumstances, the band conceived their own term for the music: “Atra Metalli Metaphysicam”. Continue reading »

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