AN NCS PREMIERE: RÉGIMENT — “MORT D’UN NÈGRE”

 Premieres  7 Responses »
Jun 032015
 

 

The French band Régiment have recorded a debut album entitled On les Aura! that will be released by Antiq Records, and today we bring you the premiere of one of the album’s new songs, “Mort d’un Nègre“.

Although Régiment are a new band, the four members have performed in an array of other groups —Wormfood, Mind Asylum, Öxxö Xööx, Lugnasad, Anus Mundi, Vintergeist, Borgia, Aorlhac, Peste Noire, Hanternoz, Ê, and Grylle. The new album is a concept record, and it’s important to understand that concept as well as the meaning of the song we’re premiering, lest you get the wrong idea from the title.

The album (whose title in English means “We’ll Get Them!”) is a musical exploration of life and death on the French lines during World War I. As the band’s frontman H has explained, it was inspired by the thoughts and feelings of the songwriters in seeing such family artifacts as a helmet, letters, military gear, and photographs dating back to the so-called “War To End All Wars”, which devastated an entire generation of men in Europe and had vast ripple effects on future generations as well. It’s not a typical subject for an extreme metal album, but there’s no doubt it’s an interesting one. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: CRUSHER — “NO PROGRESS WITHOUT REGRESSION”

 Premieres  4 Responses »
Jun 032015
 

 

Later this month the French label Deadlight Entertainment will release a special split record entitled Blast From the Past that features songs by two cornerstone bands in the evolution of the French death metal scene — Crusher and Mercyless. We came across the premiere of one of the Mercyless songs in mid-May and praised it here — and now it’s our pleasure to bring you the premiere of one of Crusher’s tracks: “No Progress Without Regression“.

Crusher trace their roots deep into the realm of French extreme metal. They released their debut album Corporal Punishment in 1992, and that was followed by a 1993 EP (Act II: Undermine!). At some point after that it appears that Crusher disbanded — but they have recently reunited and will be staging a comeback performance at the 2015 edition of Hellfest, scheduled to take place on June 19-21 in Clisson.

The song we’re premiering was originally released on the Brutale Génération compilation by Semetery Records in 1995. Despite the passage of 20 years since then, the song hasn’t lost its appeal. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE: AMESTIGON — “THIER”

 Premieres  2 Responses »
Jun 012015
 

 

Earlier today our contributor KevinP, a notoriously hard man to please, named Amestigon’s new album Thier the best release of the month just ended (here). That’s not to suggest it’s merely a highlight of the month of May, because its impact can’t be confined to a single month’s worth of new albums. Though 2015 isn’t even half-finished yet, we expect to see Thier in the upper reaches of year-end lists when 2015 draws to a close. Take the opportunity now to hear this remarkable work for yourselves, as we stream all four of Thier’s titanic tracks for the first time.

Though Amestigon trace their roots to the mid-’90s, the album is still something of a surprise. The band did not release a debut album until 2010’s Sun of All Suns, and despite the quality of that debut, Amestigon still flew under the radar. Thier should change that, in dramatic fashion. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: ARKHUM — “THE SKIES DO GIVE SUCCOR”

 Premieres  1 Response »
Jun 012015
 

NCS and Oregon’s Arkhum go waaaaay back. We first featured the band in July 2010 (here) on the strength of rough mixes of their first three songs and the eye-catching artwork for the album on which they were destined to appear — Anno Universum. We’ve written about them many more times since then, and today we’re happy to bring you a premiere of the first new Arkhum music since their second full-length in 2013, Earthling (reviewed here). It’s a pre-production demo of a song named “The Skies Do Give Succor”, which in final form will appear on the band’s third album, projected for release in early 2016.

An aura of gloom and doom shrouds “The Skies”, its grim, dissonant guitar melody writhing around the somersaulting bass notes and the potent drum beats, which move from tribal pounding to bursts of machine-gun blasting. Kenneth Parker’s scathing shrieks tear like claws against skin, relenting long enough for the song to slow and drift into a bass-led interlude whose sombre tones are accented with the clash of a cymbal and Stephen Parker’s delicate guitar work. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: DISLOYAL — “MORS IMPERATOR MUNDI”

 Premieres  1 Response »
Jun 012015
 

 

Poland’s Disloyal have been recording music since the late 1990s, with three albums to their credit, beginning with 1999’s Pessimistic. There have been significant changes in Disloyal’s line-up over the years, with only drummer “Jaro” Paprota remaining from the group in its original configuration, now joined by guitarist Artyom Serdyuk (Deathbringer, Thy Disease, Amentia, Woe Unto Me), bassist Kolya Kislyi, and vocalist Krzysztof Bendarowicz (Deathbringer). The new line-up have recorded a fourth album entitled Godless, and today we bring you the premiere of the album’s seventh track: “Mors Imperator Mundi“.

With so many changes in the band’s line-up since their last album (2008’s Prophecy), it’s perhaps reasonable to consider Godless a new beginning, and this new song is a sign of the changes. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: THORNESBREED — “DIVIDUA ANIMA PT I”

 Premieres  5 Responses »
May 292015
 

 

Last month we featured an advance track named “Horns ov Gaia” from GTRD, the second album by Germany’s Thornesbreed and their first in 12 years. Now we bring you the premiere of another track, “Dividua Anima Pt I“.

“Horns ov Gaia” was a very intense, gripping, dark piece of music, with slower, harrowing segments pulling you in, and then rapacious blasting segments proceeding to tear you apart. “Dividua Anima Pt I” makes use of similar weapons. Its beginning is slow, pitch black, and dissonant, the constant vibration of the riffs and the explosive drumbeats accompanying what sounds like the enraged howls of a demonic bestiary to create a supernatural aura of doom and derangement. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: DIABOLICUM — “SALVATION THROUGH VENGEANCE”

 Premieres  5 Responses »
May 282015
 

 

Fourteen years is a long time between albums, and that’s the span of years that has passed since Sweden’s Diabolicum released their last full-length. Now they are returning with a new work entitled Ia Pazuzu (The Abyss of the Shadows), with none other than Shining’s inimitable Niklas Kvarforth as vocalist, as well as a new lead guitarist (Likstrand) joining founding members Sasrof and Gorgorium.

It would be natural to wonder what changes 14 years have wrought in the sounds of Diabolicum, and we will now provide a glimpse into what the album holds in store as we premiere a track named “Salvation Through Vengeance“. Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: SHINING — “VILJA & DRÖM”

 Premieres  13 Responses »
May 272015
 

 

The video we’re about to premiere from Sweden’s Shining, for the song “Vilja & Dröm” (“Will and Dream”) off their new album IX – Everyone, Everything, Everywhere, Ends, comes with a NSFW warning. Unlike most metal videos branded with that warning, this one doesn’t include salacious scenes of nudity. Instead, it depicts images of true obscenity — actual film footage and photographs of extreme violence inflicted upon the human body.

The video, beautifully filmed and edited by long-time Shining collaborator Martin Strandberg, also includes the band kicking the hell out of this electrifying song in a boiler room. It begins with the burning of “The Universal Declaration of Human Rights”, adopted by the UN General Assembly in 1948 — and consistently honored in its breach by the savagery of humankind ever since then. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: DISTANT SUN — “ZERO TO HERO” AND “SHATTERED EMPIRE”

 Premieres  1 Response »
May 262015
 

 

That cover art by W. Smerdulak is still just as awesome as when we posted it the first time. The first time we posted it was a couple of weeks ago when we premiered a song named “Kill the Fremen” from the new album Dark Matter by Russia’s Distant Sun, and today we’re happy to bring you the premiere of two more songs from the new album: “Zero To Hero” and “Shattered Empire“.

If you caught that first song, then you already have a sense of Distant Sun’s knack for fusing elements of speed metal, thrash, and power metal. And if you missed it, you’ll get another introduction right now. “Zero To Hero” is a complete head-rush of immediately infectious jolting riffs, bounding bass lines, and galloping drumwork, with a mix of ragged-edged and clean vocals. Of course, once you dig into the track you know there’s got to be a guitar solo coming — and it’s a blistering one. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: VARGNATT — “GRAUSAMMLER”

 Album Reviews, Premieres  5 Responses »
May 252015
 

 

Listen to the first 90 seconds of “Weltverloren”, as it moves from a lilting solo guitar melody into a racing torrent that carries the same melody, driving it home, and then changes again to a rocking rhythm, never losing its fast grip on that brilliant melody — nor its grip on you. If you’re not hooked in the first 90 seconds, I’ll be surprised.

But “Weltverloren” is far from finished in 90 seconds. Before it ends, it staggers into a pool of tears, drenched in sorrow but no less transfixing in its emotional impact, and then accelerates into an even more intense, ravishing finish. And this is only the first song in a magnificent album — all of which you will be able to hear through our premiere of a full streaam.

The album is Grausammler. The band is Germany’s Vargnatt. Continue reading »

 Older Entries  Newer Entries