AN NCS PREMIERE: HOWLS OF EBB — “IRON LAURELS, WOVEN IN RUST”

 Premieres  4 Responses »
Jun 092015
 

 

The 2014 debut album of Howls of Ebb — Vigils of the 3rd Eye — was a strikingly distinctive collection of songs, reflecting a musical vision of otherworldly darkness and derangement. The band have now completed a successor, a mini-album named The Marrow Veil that will also be released by the I, Voidhanger label, and today we bring you an edited version of a song named “Iron Laurels, Woven In Rust“.

The complete version of the song is more than 12 minutes in length. The MLP’s opening track, “Standing On Bedlam, Burning In Bliss”, is almost 20 minutes long. Between them sits the only short track on this three-song offering, “Dusks Tyrannical Lore”, at 2:29. The significant length of the two longer songs isn’t the only difference between The Marrow Veil and Vigils of the 3rd Eye — this isn’t Vigils 2.0. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: TRAPPED WITHIN BURNING MACHINERY — “DIVA PLAVALAGUNA”

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Jun 082015
 

 

Try to begin wrapping your minds around this idea: an hour-long doom metal space opera inspired by the Diva Plavalaguna — the “blue lady” from Luc Besson’s 1997 sci-fi film The Fifth Element. The idea is in fact a reality, because that’s what California’s Trapped Within Burning Machinery have created, and today we bring you the premiere of a song from the new album, named for the blue lady herself.

The new album, fittingly entitled The Filth Element, is the band’s second full-length, following 2012’s The Putrid Stench of Decaying Self. It began to take shape with a version of the song you’re about to hear and then evolved into an entire album of tracks that use characters from the movie as “hosts”, enabling the band to incorporate different stylistic elements in approaching the story from different perspectives. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: DISLOYAL — “GODLESS”

 Premieres  3 Responses »
Jun 082015
 

 

About one week ago we had the pleasure of premiering a new song by Poland’s Disloyal from their new fourth album, Godless. Today we deliver unto your ears a premiere of the entire mind-blowing album.

Disloyal have been around since the late 1990s, though the current incarnation of the band reflects significant changes in membership, with only drummer “Jaro” Paprota remaining from the group when it was first formed. The line-up now includes guitarist Artyom Serdyuk (Deathbringer, Thy Disease, Amentia, Woe Unto Me), bassist Kolya Kislyi, and vocalist Krzysztof Bendarowicz (Deathbringer).

Godless also manifests some stylistic changes compared to Disloyal’s previous releases, and the result is a creative death metal powerhouse that’s both savage and brain-twisting. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: AIRLINES OF TERROR — “TERROR FROM THE AIR”

 Premieres  3 Responses »
Jun 082015
 

 

About five weeks ago we had the pleasure of premiering a lyric video for the first single from a new album named Terror From the Air by the Italian band Airlines of Terror — and today we’re premiering the new album’s title track in advance of its June 25 release.

This new song is a powerful death metal storm front that manages to be both sweepingly atmospheric and viscerally electrifying. The off-the-chain drumming drives the music into the red zone from the beginning, accompanied by a frenzy of furious riffs and Demian Cristiani’s wolf-like howls. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: VACIVUS — “RITE OF ASCENSION”

 Album Reviews, Premieres, SHORT BUT SWEET  9 Responses »
Jun 052015
 

 

Vacivus are a UK band that rose from the ashes of an earlier group known as Dawn of Chaos. With a different line-up and a change in musical direction, Vacivus have recorded a five-track EP named Rite of Ascension that reflects their new focus. Today we bring you a full stream of the EP in advance of its official release.

The music on Rite of Ascension is in the vein of what today might be called “blackened death metal”, but might also be thought of simply as one of the vicious descendants of death metal progenitors such as Incantation. The five songs flow from one to another in an electrifying storm that ebbs and flows but is never less than heartless and scathing. It marks the stunning appearance of a band whose name we expect to see praised throughout the dark places in the underground where ancient death worship is the order of the day. Continue reading »

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

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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 »

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