SEEN AND HEARD (Part 2): PRIMORDIAL, DECLINE OF THE I, A PREGNANT LIGHT, ISKRA, ANAAL NATHRAKH

 Exceptions to the Rule, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  4 Responses »
Oct 232014
 

 

Here’s the second part of a round-up of new things that I began earlier today, collecting some of the news and music I discovered over the last 24 hours that I thought would be worth your time, because they were worth mine.

PRIMORDIAL

Where Greater Men Have Fallen is the name of the new Primordial album, due for release by Metal Blade on November 25. The title track premiered previously, and a couple of days ago Stereogum premiered another song, “Come the Flood”.  It’s powerfully heart-wrenching and melancholy in its atmosphere, driven at first by heavy, thumping drumbeats and a flowing curtain wall of guitars, and later by percussion that sounds like gunshots and a vital lead guitar melody. But at the center of the song is its most arresting feature — Nemtheanga’s  high, soul-stirring, dramatic voice. Amazing.

Listen here (Primordial’s FB page is at this location):

http://www.stereogum.com/1713126/primordial-come-the-flood-stereogum-premiere/mp3s/ Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD (Part 1): WOLFHEART, TAAKE, SKÀLMÖLD, BRANT BJORK

 Exceptions to the Rule, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  6 Responses »
Oct 232014
 

 

Yesterday brought a flood of new music and announcements that peaked my interest. I didn’t have time to post about any of them yesterday, so I’ve got a lot to cover this morning. Which is why this round-up is divided into two parts, with the second one coming later on.

WOLFHEART

Wolfheart’s self-released 2013 debut album Winterborn was fantastic. It was exactly the balm needed to salve the wounds that Tuomas Saukkonen temporarily inflicted on fans when he folded all of his other projects (including Before the Dawn and Black Sun Aeon) to start fresh. Yesterday brought the announcement that Spinefarm Records has now signed Wolfheart and will be re-releasing Winterborn on February 3, 2015, with two additional bonus tracks — “Isolation” and “Into the Wild”. This will be the first physical edition of the album to be made available worldwide.

But even more exciting than that was the news that next year Spinefarm will also be releasing Wolfheart’s second album Shadow World, which the band is now in the process of completing. And here’s one more titillating tidbit of Wolfheart news from the same announcement: Continue reading »

A BYZANTINE UPDATE (AND NEWS OF SOME FULL-ALBUM STREAMS BY ABYSMAL DAWN, DECAYING, ATRIARCH, AND EINHERJER)

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  5 Responses »
Oct 222014
 

Byzantine, celebrating

Here are a few things that caught my eye yesterday.

BYZANTINE

There aren’t many bands that all the long-tenured writers at this site like, but West Virginia’s Byzantine are one of them. Their 2013 comeback album got loads of praise here and elsewhere, and so we were stoked to find out that the band had launched a crowd-funding campaign to help finance production of a new album — To Release Is To Resolve.

That campaign surpassed its goal (though contributions can still be made here, which will get you a pre-order of the album), and yesterday brought the announcement that the band have now finished recording all the music for the new record, with only Chris “OJ” Ojeda’s vocal tracking left to be done. But one thing will happen first — and that’s the second piece of Byzantine news we want to spread around: Beginning today, the band are embarking on a tour that will run through the end of October, with Thy Will Be Done and IKILLYA. The dates are after the jump… Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD: SUNBURSTER, THE SLOW DEATH, THANATOS, BARING TEETH, THE CRINN

 Exceptions to the Rule, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  7 Responses »
Oct 212014
 

 

I got carried away with a lot of rifftastic death metal malignancy in yesterday’s round-up’s, so I thought I’d move in more varied directions today. The following new and newish songs are among those I found in my trawling through the interhole yesterday, after siphoning off the effluent that would sicken you, plus one find by my comrade in arms Austin Weber. Prepare for brain spasms and spinal trauma.

SUNBURSTER

I enjoyed the hell out of this Philadelphia band’s last release, the 2013 EP SolarBipolar (reviewed here). Just to give you a flavor of my reaction to it (and because if I don’t quote myself, who will?), here’s an excerpt from my review:

This is the kind of music that will give your neck muscles a real workout while dosing you with a narcotic addictiveness that will pull you back for another hit, and another. I know. I have plenty of other things to do, but I’ve been jamming this little three-song smasher over and over again. Continue reading »

GUITAR PORN: BLOODSHOT DAWN RELEASE ANOTHER NEW SONG — “THE IMAGE FADED”

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  2 Responses »
Oct 202014
 

 

You see that guy up there straddling that futuristic city like a colossus, preparing to unleash arcane energies upon its helpless inhabitants? If you want to know what’s going through his head, the answer is a vision of a Bloodshot Dawn and the music on a new album named Demons. The first advance song from the album (“Smoke and Mirrors”) premiered earlier this month, and now a second one is out.

This new one is named ‘The Image Faded”, and holy hell, it features solos from Chris Amott, Per Nilsson, Andy James, and Teemu Mäntysaari, as well as the band’s own hot shit guitar duo of Josh McMorran and Ben Ellis. I don’t think guitars get erections, but if they did, the song would need one of those warnings about seeing a doctor if it lasts for more than four hours. Continue reading »

RECALCITRANT ROUND-UP: THE DEATH OF DEARTH, PART II, INSTALLMENT 7

 Album Reviews, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  No Responses »
Oct 202014
 

 

(In this 7th and final installment of a multi-part piece, Austin Weber continues rolling out recommended releases from his latest exploratory forays through the underground. Previous installments are linked at the end of this post.)

EXHAUSTED PRAYER

Exhausted Prayer are one of my favorite Los Angeles metal bands, and their streamlined yet progressive merger of black and death metal is a thing of wonder to take in. They’ve been at this since 1997, and Ruined marks their fourth full-length as a group, completely self-released by the band. Somebody needs to sign these guys, for real.

Ruined is an organic, often heavily atmospheric and deeply breathing record — one whose airy yet not hollow production perfectly marries their impressive approach to fusing black and death metal together. Ruined sports a natural production, one which will likely require you to turn your speakers up since it isn’t a loud, brickwalled lump of pain. Sometimes it’s nice to listen to a record that isn’t an over-compressed offering that hurts to listen to with headphones. Continue reading »

DEATH RITUALS: NECROMUTILATOR, CRETIN, NO MORE ROOM IN HELL, DEMONIC MANIFESTATION

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  7 Responses »
Oct 202014
 

As mentioned earlier today, I spent a chunk of time yesterday listening to new songs and found many to recommend. By happenstance, most of them were various flavors of death metal, so I altered the usual “Seen and Heard” title of these round-ups. And because I found so much new music I wanted to commend to your earholes, I divided it into two parts. Part One is here.

NECROMUTILATOR

Necromutilator are a three-man band from Mantua, Italy, whose existence I discovered by browsing the Facebook page of Elektroplasma Musik, who will be distributing the band’s debut album on Terror From Hell Records. The debut album is entitled Eucharistic Mutilations, and the one song from it I’ve found so far on the web is “Fuck With Darkness”. Continue reading »

DEATH RITUALS (Part 1): SKELETHAL, MASACRE, NIHIL KAOS, ASSUMPTION

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  6 Responses »
Oct 202014
 

 

I plowed through a lot of new songs yesterday and found a lot to like. Most of it happened to be death metal, though not quite all. So I decided to skip the “Seen and Heard” title for this round-up in favor of a more descriptive lead-in. Also, I found so much to recommend that I’ve divided the round-up into two parts. The second one will come a bit later today.

SKELETHAL

I loved this French band’s previous 2014 EP Deathmanicvs Revelation with an unholy love. I have little reason to doubt that I will experience similarly unnatural attractions to their new one, Interstellar Knowledge of the Purple Entity. Apart from my intense desire to obtain more knowledge about The Purple Entity (!), the advance song that became available for listening this weekend is like an aphrodisiac for the ears. Continue reading »

A NEW SONG AND VIDEO FROM AT THE GATES: “DEATH AND THE LABYRINTH”

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  5 Responses »
Oct 172014
 

 

I’d dashing off for my (fucking) day job, so I’ll make this brief:  At the Gates have just debuted a video for the song “Death And The Labyrinth” off their forthcoming album At War With Reality. It was directed by Patric Ullaeus , and here’s what vocalist Tompa Lindberg has to say about it:

“We had a very special idea about the kind of approach we wanted for the first video from ‘At War With Reality’. What we needed was someone gifted enough to throw himself artistically into the project full on. The lyrics to the song are very multi-layered and surreal, so we wanted someone to create a fevered dreamworld that went with the melancholic frustration and dramatic desperation that we feel comes across in the song. This is exactly what Patric has created for us. It’s his vision of the music and lyrics, which compliments the track perfectly in my opinion. I couldn’t be happier!”

Without further ado, watch and listen to “Death and the Labyrinth”. Please leave any reactions you may have in the Comments. Continue reading »

VIDEOGRAPHY: GOATWHORE PREMIERE “NOCTURNAL CONJURATION OF THE ACCURSED”

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  4 Responses »
Oct 162014
 

 

I took a short break from my fucking day job to scan through the NCS e-mail, and what did I see but an alert that Goatwhore had just premiered an official video for the song “Nocturnal Conjuration of the Accursed”, from their most recent album, Constricting Rage of the Merciless.

So I watched it. And you should, too. Because it’s Goatwhore. And they fuckin’ rock.

(and the lighting and colors in the video are cool)

Here’s the video: Continue reading »

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