AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: HELGE — “KEEP THE FIRE BURNING”

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Sep 272024
 

(written by Islander)

On November 1st the Danish metal band Helge will release their sophomore album Gidinawendimin. They explain that the album’s title “is an ancient word from the Ojibwe people that means ‘we are all related.'” If it seems strange that a modern-day Danish band would be drawing upon the culture of an ancient North American indigenous people for inspiration, you’ll learn today that it’s not the only non-European touchstone for the band.

And while it’s fair to say that most bands who perform amalgams of black and death metal (as Helge do) tend to focus on dark and even nihilistic themes, this group has a different bent: it seems they might actually be promoting positive spiritual uplift.

For example, the song from the new album that we’re premiering today, along with an exhilarating music video, is called “Keep the Fire Burning“. It’s the song that ends the album, and lyrically it exhorts listeners to “stand aside from ego”, to forsake anger and poison, to “return to the core of the spirit,” and thus to become reborn, and to rise. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): TORREFY — “NECRONOMISONGS”

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Sep 262024
 

Beginning in late June of this year we began our own gradual march toward the release of Torrefy‘s new album Necronomisongs. At that point we premiered a startling song from the album named “Enslaved New World” (inspired by the Death Gate Cycle fantasy series), and also reprised a previously released single (equally startling) called “Of Wind and Worm” (inspired by Frank Herbert’s Dune). And then in August we brought you the premiere stream of “Street Reaper” (inspired by Stephen King’s Christine).

And now we’re at the end of our march. Necronomisongs will be released tomorrow (September 27th) on the Germany-based Witches Brew label, and today we’re happily sharing a full stream of all the songs. Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: IGNOMINOUS — “THE COMING FALL”

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Sep 262024
 

(written by Islander)

The three seasoned Greek musicians who joined together to form the black metal band Ignominous — just in time to confront the Covid assault — have introduced themselves and their debut album Dawn With No Light through these striking words:

“Ignominous is the pain in our veins, the scream in our hearts, and the shadowed path in our souls — a journey we embarked on many years ago, even before we met each other. The dawn with no light symbolizes our endless struggle, the bleeding of our symbols, and the long journey we have taken together. We have entered the eternal night, and in embracing the shadows, we find true life as the dawn with no light approaches.”

No doubt, the turmoil expressed in that statement has deep and distant origins, but it was exacerbated by more recent events. As noted above, these three joined together in 2020 but the pandemic slowed their work, and by March 2021 all their rehearsals ceased due to severe Covid-related health issues that afflicted bassist Anestis Nekhromancer.

However, the band rose again at the dawn of 2022 and completed the writing of the songs that are now encompassed by their full-length debut, which will be released in early October. As a vivid sign of what they’ve accomplished, we now premiere a song from the album named “The Coming Fall“, presented with a lyric video. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): MARCHE FUNÈBRE — “AFTER THE STORM”

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Sep 252024
 

(written by Islander)

“You forget what you want to remember, and you remember what you want to forget. That is how memory works. Pain and suffering etch themselves onto your soul, while joy seems to be a fleeting whisper you can barely hold onto. It is this paradox of memory that haunts us all, leaving us to wonder what we are, what we were, and what we might become.”
— The Road by Cormac McCarthy

“I stand beneath the open sky, at the setting of the sun. The still waters stretch before me to the distant horizon and the clouds drift slowly across the vast canvas of the sky – a brilliant blending of deepest blues, rich purples, vivid red and warm orange. Yet for all the open vista, the space and freedom, I am trapped; suffocating in a labyrinth of black desperation. The cold walls of insurmountable sorrows and confusion contain me and I am imprisoned by past scars that have become infected, poisoned by the cruel, slow venoms of grief, loss and guilt. I built this maze, but I have long since forgotten the way to freedom…”
— Marche Funèbre

I probably could have left those two quotations and moved right along, without further embellishment, to the premiere stream of Marche Funèbre‘s new album After the Storm (set for release by Ardua Music on September 27th) that we’re hosting today. I had the second one already. Purely by coincidence, I saw the first one shared on social media just as I was finalizing this premiere article. It’s from a devastating and unforgettable work by the late Mr. McCarthy, and seemed entirely suitable to the experience of the album, which is itself often devastating — and I suspect will be very hard to forget as time passes.

On the other hand, those quotations could also be a bit misleading, because it turns out that After the Storm is as vibrant and as heart-pounding as it is heart-aching. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): WARLUST — “SOL INVICTUS IN UMBRAE SATANAE”

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Sep 242024
 

(written by Islander)

Warlust is the kind of name chosen by a band who want to broadcast that their main interest is sonic violence, without nuance or mercy, wholly devoted to musical experiences that provide the reptile-brain thrills of ugly and unrestrained barbarity.

But it turns out that even a band named Warlust is capable of more than that, and this German band who took that name prove it in spades on their new third album Sol Invictus In Umbrae Satanae, which we’re premiering today in advance of its September 27 release by Dying Victims Productions.

Hell, it even proves they’re capable of… progression (a dirty word in come circles, but not intended as an insult here). Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND REVIEW): INGURGITATING OBLIVION – ONTOLOGY OF NOUGHT

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Sep 242024
 

(Andy Synn engages his inner art critic as he plays host to the premiere of the brand new album from Ingurgitating Oblivion, set for release this Friday via Willowtip Records)

I’ve said this before, but it bears repeating – the word “masterpiece” doesn’t mean what you think it does.

While it’s often (all too often, in my opinion) used as an almost throw-away term to hype up whatever the latest flavour-of-the-month album happens to be getting the most buzz, the reality is that a true “masterpiece” is just that – it’s a piece of work demonstrating your mastery of your chosen artform, one which your peers all agree earns you the right to call yourself a “master” of your medium.

And, by any measure, Ingurgitating Oblivion already unveiled their masterpiece, in the form of 2017’s career-defining Vision Wallows in Symphonies of Light, quite a few years ago.

But here’s the thing they don’t tell you about producing a masterpiece… once you’ve done it once, you don’t have to do it again.

Sure, some artists do, but a lot of them take the opportunity, now that they’ve proved themselves, to take more creative risks and experiment with both form and function, to push the boundaries and expand their horizons, with an almost devil-may-care attitude as to what might happen.

And that’s exactly what Ingurgitating Oblivion have done with their new album, Ontology of Nought.

Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): CRYPT OF REASON — “STARGAZER”

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Sep 232024
 

(written by Islander)

Today, on the eve of its September 24 release, we premiere a full stream of Stargazer, the debut album by Crypt of Reason from Homiel, Belarus.

The road toward completion of the album was not an easy one. Five years after forming in 2008, the band released their debut EP Creation of Despair. But after completing the writing of their first full-length, the band’s main songwriter Pavel Minutin unexpectedly passed away in 2016.

Crypt of Reason ultimately decided to finish their work on the record that became Stargazer, and they have dedicated it to Pavel‘s memory. They introduce it with a line from Solaris, the fantastic science fiction novel written by the great Stanislaw Lem:

“Man has gone out to explore other worlds and other civilizations without having explored his own labyrinth of dark passages and secret chambers, and without finding what lies behind doorways that he himself has sealed.” Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): GRAVA — “THE GREAT WHITE NOTHING”

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Sep 202024
 

(written by Islander)

The 2022 debut album from the Faroese/Danish sludge/post-metal metal trio Grava was an unusually compelling union of visual and musical art. If you’ve seen the cover of Weight of a God (here) and then listened to any of the songs, you already know how well the image matched the crushing music and the album’s utterly bleak conception.

That cover was conceived with one track principally in mind, a song named “Crusher” about a man condemned to be trampled to death by a work elephant in front of a crowd of onlookers, told from the point of view of the condemned man, who sees the beast as the manifestation of a god — a perception that connects to the album title.

All the songs on Weight of a God portrayed different instances of a human being meeting death, seen through their eyes at the last moment. Grava continue telling such harrowing tales on their follow-up album The Great White Nothing, which we’re about to premiere in full, one week away from its release by a trio of labels.

Once again, the cover art (again created by Johannes Larsen) vividly connects to some of those terrible stories, and to the album’s title, as explained in introductory comments provided by vocalist/guitarist Atli Brix Kamban: Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): BLACK MOLD — “IN THE DIRT OF OBLIVION”

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Sep 192024
 

(written by Islander)

“Having named themselves for a particularly nasty-looking, fast-spreading, difficult-to-remove, and potentially dangerous fungus, Portugal’s Black Mold churn out a nihilistic amalgam of black metal and punk that makes their disgusting namesake seem mild.”

That’s how we began our premiere of a song in the early days of this month from Black Mold‘s new album In the Dirt of Oblivion, which will be released by Helldprod Records on September 20th.

The label provided their own preview of what the album holds in store for unsuspecting listeners: “[T]hese true spirits of the underground only have one thing in their minds. To drain the soul out of your body and fill it with darkness, hate and despair”.

We have some more words of warning, or invitation, depending on your predilections, but the main thing we have today is a full stream of all the album’s dirt and oblivion. It proves to be a lot more interesting and varied than you might be expecting from what you’ve read so far Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: BONJOUR TRISTESSE — “LIGHTBEARER”

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Sep 192024
 

(written by Islander)

All ardent and avid followers of music like to go exploring, in search of artists they’ve never heard before who might ring some previously un-rung chimes in their head. Of course, such listeners are also drawn to whatever new is propagated by artists whose previous releases have already primed their followers to expect some kind of joyful reaction, even when the music might sound wretched to un-schooled ears.

And then there are artists who simultaneously trigger both reactions, where past experience means you’re going to dive into whatever they decide to release, and where you also expect to find something unexpected.

In my case, Bonjour Tristesse is one of those bands. As you may know, it’s the solo work of Nathanael, who is also in Heretoir, and has been in King Apathy, Thränenkind, Agrypnie, and ClearXcut. Even the band’s name (“hello sadness”) signifies a focus on existential despair, and the music has historically delved quite powerfully into depressive moods, but it hasn’t been frozen in form. Surprises still lie in wait, and they do again in The World Without Us, the forthcoming fourth album of Bonjour Tristesse, which will be released on October 18th by Supreme Chaos Records. Continue reading »

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