NEW SUFFOCATION SONG: “CYCLES OF SUFFERING”

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  4 Responses »
Jan 142013
 

As reported in my last post, I’m still droning away at my day job.  But I decided to take another quick break, and lo and behold, look what I found!  Another new song from Suffocation’s next album, Pinnacle of Bedlam, which is due for release by Nuclear Blast on Feb 15 in Europe and Feb 19 in North America.

The new song is called “Cycles of Suffering”, and you can hear it below. It’s a techy flurry of knife-edged riffs and battering drums, with a very cool guitar solo. And Frank the Tank sounds . . . brutal.

To hear the first track released from the album (“As Grace Descends”), go to this page, where the song can also be downloaded.

LECHEROUS NOCTURNE, PORTAL, INTER ARMA, AND BLACK AWAKENING

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  No Responses »
Jan 142013
 

As previously disclosed, my head and my free time are being squeezed down to the thinness of a pancake by my fucking day job this week. But to maintain my own sanity, I did take a quick break today to glance around the interhole in search of filth. I found some, and voila!

LECHEROUS NOCTURNE

Man, talk about delayed gratification. It was January 2012 when I reported that this killer South Carolina band had completed their third album, Behold Almighty Doctrine, and that it would be released later in the year by Unique Leader Records. I even brandished the same delicious album cover that you see up above.

I’m not sure what happened, but 2012 came and went, and the new album never appeared. However, I now see that it will finally be released on March 19. And yesterday the band debuted a song called “Those Having Been Hidden Away”. I like it and will play it for you right after the jump. It’s the sound of a furious tech-death demolition project joined in progress, with a cool bounding bass line and a load of slashing riffs and brutalizing percussion. Continue reading »

NEWSNEWSNEWS

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  3 Responses »
Jan 142013
 

(Here’s a newsy post from DGR.)

Normally Islander is like a sponge when it comes to a lot of the news that is happening around the web; however, like a lot of us he has a job outside of the website (some of you may have already met him!) so some stuff may have flown by him that happened throughout the week. Well not anymore, as I present a round up of stuff that caught my eye that unfortunately never got yacked about here on NCS.

We’re running through a glut of all sorts of things this week from music videos, lyric videos, free tuneage (almost typed this as free tuna! – didn’t want to overpromise to you folks, we’re not that rich…yet), to album announcements, to a limited-time charity deal if you like electronica-rock, to the ever-lovely melodrama of a band as members leave and use the loveliness of Facebook to get those last few barbs in. Have your coffees at the ready to slam into your face as we work our way through the stuff we missed that might be of interest to you.

Aborted

Aborted (above) rang in 2012 pretty early with the release of Global Flatline and that disc quickly became a favorite around NCS. It appeared on a couple of our lists and really reminded people why we all thought Aborted were a great band. Late last week the group released a lyric video for the song “Vermincular, Obscene, and Obese” that animates their cover art for Global Flatline in the background so you can actually see what the heck Sven is saying when he growls out the closing lines of each sentence. Continue reading »

DEVOURMENT, CEREKLOTH, ODIUM NOVA

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  13 Responses »
Jan 132013
 

I’ve been preoccupied by my day job the last couple of days, and unfortunately for me, this distracting state of affairs will continue all the way through the coming week and into the next weekend. I’m afraid this means that things are likely to slow down here at NCS. I will do my best to prepare at least one new thing each day, just to preserve my own sanity, but much more than that will be unlikely.

Before things really get nasty, I thought I’d make a quick survey of what I missed in the world of metal over the last 48 hours. I found the following three items of interest.

DEVOURMENT

As we reported last month, these Texas-based grand-daddies of slam have recorded a new album. Entitled Conceived In Sewage, it’s scheduled for release by Relapse on February 19 in North America (and somewhat later dates in the rest of the world). We only had teaser excerpts available at the time of our last post, but Devourment have now released an entire song — “Fifty Ton War Machine” — and have made it available as a single at places like iTunes. As you can see, the artwork for the single is badass.

Devourment have also released a lyric video for the song. First, a word about the music: It’s ugly. Continue reading »

BANDS I WANT TO TALK ABOUT (by Utmu): URFAUST, THOU, and SLOTH HERDER

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  11 Responses »
Jan 112013
 

Awesome artwork by Michiel Eikenaar

(In this post, guest writer Utmu sheds some light on underground bands who deserve a higher profile.)

I’ve been listening to some bands lately and I really like them. I also wanted to write another article, so I just decided to combine the two. I don’t know how obscure these bands are, although the music they make is great and they should be recognized for that.

The first two are bands who may be well-known in certain circles, but to anyone who merely scratches the surface of those circles (like I often do with different scenes) I think they’re more obscure. Again, I don’t really know how well-known these bands are, so don’t hold me to the “this band doesn’t get enough attention” mentality. I enjoy them and I don’t hear about them often. The third section in this article is about a creative band from my region who I think should get way more recognition than they seem to get.

URFAUST

Here’s a band that’s been on my radar for a while. Ever since Invisible Oranges released that mix-tape containing Aosoth and Infestus, I’ve remembered Urfaust because they have a really unique sound, and more recently I’ve put time into really listening to their music — it was a great decision to do so. Continue reading »

FIVE OF MY FAVOURITE . . . MISHEARD LYRICS

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  16 Responses »
Jan 112013
 

(A post in which Andy Synn presents five of his favorite mondegreens . . .)

This edition comes with a warning. If you want to continue hearing these songs in the ‘Correct’ way, don’t click the jump to the main article, because what I’m covering here today are the sort of misheard lyrics that essentially ruin a song for you forever. Ok, maybe not ruin, but they definitely stick with you. Once you’ve heard them, you can’t un-hear them.

And I’m not talking about the youtube-style ‘Boat Rudder’ or ‘Fishmaster’ parodies where someone’s posited ludicrous alternative lyrics. I’m talking about just a tiny line here or there that I accidentally misheard the first time round, and have never really been able to shake. Thankfully each of these also gives rise to some unintentional hilarity, as they definitely add a new interpretation to each of the tracks!

Some of them are literally only a one-word change, but that’s enough to completely alter the meaning of the surrounding lines, mostly in a rather ludicrous way!

Again – don’t go any further unless you want some songs ruined for you forever! Continue reading »

ANOTHER EARACHE / OSMOSE BANDCAMP UPDATE

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  11 Responses »
Jan 102013
 

In mid-November I wrote a feature about the decision by two landmark metal labels — Earache and Osmose — to establish Bandcamp sites and begin uploading albums from their landmark catalogues for digital distribution. At that point, I had gotten word that Earache was interested in receiving fan feedback on what they should add from the hundreds of albums under their control, so I put in my two cents’ worth with a list of 9 albums.

Since then, many of my wishes have been granted. As previously reported, Earache subsequently added groundbreaking albums from my short wish list by Entombed, Bolt Thrower, and Morbid Angel. And today I got an e-mail alert that they’ve now just added another album from my list — Reek of Putrefaction by Carcass. In addition to the fact that this album occupies a key place in metal history, it’s also timely, given that Carcass are apparently recording a new album.

But that’s not all!  Though I missed the news, Earache also recently added yet another album from my list — Extreme Conditions Demand Extreme Responses, the 1992 debut album by Brutal Truth! I feel like Aladdin with a magic lamp and a drunk genie who’s lost count of how many wishes have already been granted.

But that’s still not all . . . Continue reading »

WITNESSED: OMNIUM GATHERUM’S “NEW DYNAMIC”, PLUS NEW MUSIC FROM WORMED AND CRYSTALIC

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  5 Responses »
Jan 092013
 

I’ve again gotten tired of “Seen and Heard” as the title for these round-up posts. I thought about using “Scene and Herd”, but decided that would give the wrong impression about the news and new music included in these posts, since the subjects are items that get me interested and often excited. So, for now at least, “Witnessed”. This round-up includes not only some things I’d like to share but also a blurb from DGR. Here we go:

OMNIUM GATHERUM

Sadistic bastards that we are, in December we published three different glowing reviews of Beyond, the forthcoming album by Finland’s Omnium Gatherum, despite the fact that the album won’t be released until late February in Europe and March 5 in the U.S. and we had no music we were authorized to stream from the album. Well, now we have music.

This morning Omnium Gatherum put up the song “New Dynamic” on YouTube.  Good choice: along with “The Sonic Sign”, it’s my favorite track on Beyond. Give it a listen and then let us know if you think we were being overly enthusiastic about what Omnium Gatherum has accomplished or if you agree that this shit is fantastic. Continue reading »

MARIE CACHET, VARG VIKERNES, and BURZUM MAKE A MOVIE: “FOREBEARS”

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  60 Responses »
Jan 092013
 

Burzum’s Varg Vikernes and his wife Marie Cachet have made a movie entitled ForeBears. But before getting to that, some background:

On the night of March 31, 2012, I discovered that someone had uploaded the entirety of the new, as-yet unreleased Burzum album Umskiptar to YouTube. At the same time, whoever manages Varg’s web page uploaded a batch of photos of Varg wearing, among other things, chain mail and an archaic helmet. The YouTube stream didn’t stay up for long, but long enough for me to listen to the album once. On April 1, I posted (here) a generally unflattering review along with some snarky comments about Varg and those photos.

That post became a gathering point for a ton of comments, mostly from people who are not regular visitors to NCS, and it still gets a lot of traffic to this day. I’m not sure why — maybe because it was such an early review of Umskiptar. It also led Varg’s wife Marie Cachet (though I didn’t know she was his wife at that time) to ask that I remove the Varg photos that I had added to my article — which she had made — because I posted them without her permission. I then had a very polite e-mail exchange with her, and she graciously agreed to allow me to keep the photos with the post after adding proper credit, despite the fact that I was poking fun at them. Continue reading »

MORE SEEN AND HEARD: OFFICIUM TRISTE, VENOMOUS MAXIMUS, DIABLO SWING ORCHESTRA

 Exceptions to the Rule, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  2 Responses »
Jan 082013
 

Well, I’m afraid I need to take a break from our normal afternoon roll-out of the 2012 Most Infectious Extreme Metal Song list. I could explain why, but then I’d have to kill you.  Well, I wouldn’t kill you myself. I’d send out a squad of ninja lorises.  You’d probably die of old age before they got there.

Anyway, I do have something else for you. Actually, I have three new videos to share. Because time is short, I won’t say much about them other than to say I think you should watch and hear them.

OFFICIUM TRISTE

This long-running doom/death band from The Netherlands have a new album due for release on Hammerheart Records. Its name is Mors Viri, and it was mixed by Ronnie Björnström. The album features vocals by long-time Officium Triste member Pim Blankenstein, and that’s basically all I needed to know.

The video is for a new song called “The Wounded and the Dying”. It’s really just the music, but doom fans will want to hear this. Listen: Continue reading »

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