AN NCS PREMIERE: WINDSWEPT — “SHROUDED IN PALE SHINING, SO SLEEPS INFINITE ANCIENT STEPPE”

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Jan 312017
 

 

I’m in the camp of those who believe that any music crafted by the hand of Roman Sayenko will be worth checking out. Best known for his work in Drudkh for the last 15 years, he has also released powerful music under the banners of Blood of Kingu, Hate Forest, and Old Silver Key, among others. The latest Sayenko project is Windswept, in which he is joined by Drudkh’s rhythm section, V. and K. On March 31, Windswept’s debut album The Great Cold Steppe will be released by Season of Mist, and today we’re helping premiere another track from the album, “Shrouded In Pale Shining, So Sleeps Infinite Ancient Steppe“.

From the album’s title to the cover art to the names of the tracks, it’s obvious, as the label’s press reports confirm, that Windswept drew “inspiration from the harsh and unforgiving nature of the Eastern winter steppes”. But the music itself burns like a storm-driven blaze. Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: MARCHE FUNÈBRE — “LULLABY OF INSANITY”

 Exceptions to the Rule, Premieres  3 Responses »
Jan 272017
 

 

(Today we present the premiere of a video and song from the Belgian band Marche Funebre, and Grant Skelton provides the following introduction.)

Belgian death/doom band Marche Funèbre (a name presumably derived from the Chopin composition of the same name) will release their new album Into The Arms Of Darkness on February 20, 2017 via Moscow Funeral League. Into The Arms Of Darkness was produced by Markus ‘Schwadorf’ Stock. The creepy, nightmarish cover art was created by Brooke Shaden Photography.

No Clean Singing is proud to present an exclusive premiere of a video for the album’s first advance track, entitled “Lullaby Of Insanity.” Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: OMINOUS ECLIPSE — “THE HORDE”

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Jan 272017
 

 

The Ottawa death metal band Ominous Eclipse are working toward the release their second album Sinister later this year, but today they’re releasing a single aptly named “The Horde“, and it’s our poisonous pleasure to bring you a stream of the song.

As the evolution of Ominous Eclipse has progressed, the band have hybridized a seething core of death metal sound with elements of thrash, black metal, and melodic death metal. But if “The Horde” is a sign of what’s to come next, they’re reaching for new levels of monstrous and electrifying destructiveness. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): AU CHAMP DES MORTS — “DANS LA JOIE”

 Album Reviews, Premieres  No Responses »
Jan 272017
 

 

Today is the day when Debemur Morti Productions releases Dans La Joie, the debut album by the French band Au Champ Des Morts, and we’re helping people to discover it.

That’s a worthy mission, because the album is an emotionally intense experience of rare quality. Over the course of helping to premiere two tracks from the album, I’ve already spilled a lot of words about it. So in a rare attempt at brevity, I’m going to introduce the album stream in a summing up that focuses more on the music’s emotional resonance, as I feel it, than on any kind of intricate dissection of its many facets and ingredients. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): BEHEADED — “BEAST INCARNATE”

 Album Reviews, Premieres  2 Responses »
Jan 262017
 

 

This is Malta, and its sister island Gozo. As you can see, they sit sort of dead center in the Mediterranean Sea. Because of its strategically important location, Malta has an incredibly rich and eventful recorded history stretching back for millennia, bearing the influences of a multitude of cultures. From photographs scattered around the web, Malta also appears to be an extravagantly beautiful place.

And it’s also home to a lethally explosive death metal band who have managed to survive and flourish for more than a quarter-century, just as their homeland has survived centuries of occupation and conquest. I’m talking, of course, about Beheaded.

Beast Incarnate is the band’s fifth album, set for release tomorrow (January 27) by Unique Leader Records, and we are very happy to host the premiere of a full album stream today. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: UNDRASK — “BATTLE THROUGH TIME”

 Album Reviews, Premieres  2 Responses »
Jan 262017
 

 

‘Twas the night before Christmas, and all through our house, all the creatures were stirring, even the mouse — because on that day we posted “Conscripted”, a song by Undrask. Further stirring of a frenzied kind will be happening today, because we now have for you a full stream of this North Carolina band’s debut album Battle Through Time, this time on the eve of its January 27 release.

The album chronicles the story of “a man lost to eternity — forced to fight and die repeatedly throughout time and alternate realities.” That sounds like my typical work week at NCS. However, the actual (glorious) sound of the music is more consistent with a saga unfolding on a grander scale. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: A TRIO OF TRACKS FROM THE DISTURBING WORLD OF SLAGMAUR

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Jan 262017
 

 

The gestation of Thill Smitts Terror continues, but now we have a birth date: On March 30, 2017, Osmose Productions will release this new album conceived by the twisted imaginations within Slagmaur. We have for you today streams of three songs to disturb your peace of mind.

Thill Smitts Terror is the third album by these masked Norwegians, separated from its next-oldest sibling Von Rov Shelter by roughly six and a half years. Almost three years have now passed since I first began writing about the album. My intrigue began in the summer of 2014, when I came across pre-production versions of two songs, “The Drummer of Tedworth” and “Werewolf”, and promptly wrote about them. Two years after that, versions of two more songs appeared — “Kom Igjen Norge” and “Bestemor Sang Djevelord” — and I wrote about them, too.

Those tracks have disappeared from the place where they were once available for streaming, and what we have now are the finished album versions of three of those four tracks — “Drummer of Tedworth“, “Werewolf“, and “Bestemor Sang Djevelord“. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: SAURON — “KLASZTOR”

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Jan 252017
 

 

The Polish band Sauron first took shape in 1991, discharging their first demo Hellish Requiem in 1993 and a second one named The Baltic Fog in 1995, helping to introduce the sound of pagan black metal within their homeland. The band broke up in 1999 but resurrected themselves in 2003, and since then have released four albums, including the powerful Wara! in 2016 (which we wrote about here).

Now, Wheelwright Productions is re-releasing The Baltic Fog in a new remastered vinyl LP edition, with a release date of March 3. In advance of the release, we’re helping to premiere a single from The Baltic Fog named “Klasztor“, which includes cover art for the single created by Robert A. von Ritter (Outre, Witchmaster, In Twilight’s Embrace, etc.). Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: DEMONIC RESURRECTION — “MATSYA – THE FISH”

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Jan 252017
 

 

Every country on the planet has distinctive folk music and ethnic music traditions, and while the melodic tonalities, rhythms, and instruments may sound common and familiar to the people of that country, they often sound exotic to the ears of listeners from distant lands. Combining such distinctive folk music traditions with the aggressiveness and weight of heavy metal can produce riveting and fascinating outcomes, in which each of these disparate elements enhances the other, and they can also fall flat. The song you’re about to hear is one of the successes.

The track we’re premiering today through a lyric video is named “Matsya — The Fish“. It’s by an Indian band we’ve been following for many years — Demonic Resurrection — and it comes from their new album Dashavatar, which will be released on March 15th of this year. It has quickly become one of my favorite DR songs, and in my humble opinion one of the best of their creations over the length of a discography that goes back more than 15 years. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: AEGRI SOMNIA — “AD AUGUSTA PER ANGUSTA”

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Jan 252017
 

 

The opportunity to premiere the fascinating debut album by the Spanish band Aegri Somnia is a special pleasure for me, and therein lies a story that I will tell — and part of that story includes commentary about the music by a friend of mine who I think of as a Renaissance man, an American close to my own advanced age who spent much of his younger formative years living in Madrid, and hasn’t ever lost his fascination for the country and its people. For this purpose I’ll refer to him as Oudekerk.

But first, an introduction to the band and the music. Continue reading »

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