MAGOA BRING THE GROOVE AND KVELERTAK BRING THE DRAGON

 Free Shit, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  7 Responses »
Jun 252012
 

To start this Monday off in style, we have two videos, one new and one that has become new again because it won a prize. And starting off a Monday in fine style is always a good goal, because I ain’t feelin’ too fuckin’ stylin’ on a Monday, and any kind of Monday style is a big goddamn plus, don’t you think?

MAGOA

This French band’s last song and video jumped me up like an electrode in the bunghole. Not that I would know what that feels like, mind you, but it seems like a fitting metaphor. Magoa’s “Animal” video is one of the best of the year, and if you haven’t seen it yet, by all means please go visit our earlier post about it. But as of yesterday, Magoa have a new song + video that is a bunghole insertion with extra voltage.

If there’s another modern band doing old-school groove metal with as much punch as Magoa, then I really want to hear about it. Their new song, “Enemy”, is like a brigade of machinists punching rivets through the steel girders of your thick skull. It really is the archetypal convulsive headbanger, a cleverly calculated formula for making people go into paroxysms of spastic neck-snapping.

And if that weren’t enough, it includes a hooky chorus and an old-school breakdown — by which I mean a breakdown that isn’t announced by a big fucking bass drop and one or two atonal chords. The production is just about perfect for this kind of metal — powerful, cathartic, and man, when the double bass comes alive, you’ll want to ram your head into the nearest wall. Even better, the song is a free download. Continue reading »

HEAD ASPLODY

 Phro's Posts, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  22 Responses »
Jun 242012
 

“Metal Kitty” by bloodspit.

(This post was written by Phro. He brings us head asplody things.)

In the metal world, there seems to be a lot of anger, hate, filth, and skullfucking. I approve of this. In fact, I approve of this so hard that I sometimes get rage boners for no other reason than that I love how much negativity there is in the metal world. That said, a bit of humor goes a long way to making a good band a great band. And a shitty band an almost tolerable band.

But what we don’t have (for better or for worse) is much cuteness.

Now, that’s to be expected when you get a lot of misanthropes, bitter assholes, badasses, and posers all in the same general area. (I’ll let you decide for yourself which one of the four you are.) But, hey, it’s the weekend, so you have some free time to remove the corpse paint, take off the studded bracelets, hide in your room, and indulge in a little childish, high-pitched squealing and giggling.

BABY METAL

Baby Metal has released a new video. I love it. I’m not being ironic, sarcastic, or coy. It’s just fucking absolutely nothing more than shitty Jpop with a few rejected riffs and some random douchebag doing “death metal growls” in the background. But I still love it. (I may have brain damage.) Continue reading »

LIVE AT THE BOARDWALK (June 15, 2012): BISPORA, JOURNAL, TAUNIS YEAR ONE, SYMBOLIK, AND EXTIRPATE

 Concert Reviews, Free Shit, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  16 Responses »
Jun 222012
 

(DemiGodRaven reviews another recent show at The Boardwalk in Sacramento, and again uses the write-up to introduce music from a group of up-and-coming bands who might hook you.)

You know, sometimes the internet has a habit of inflating your sense of how popular you think a band really is. I say this mainly because lately it seems like we’ve become something of a heavy metal echo chamber in which one person says, “Hey! You should check this band out!” and then two more pick up on it, and so on. Surely, that means somebody must’ve picked up on it because everyone is talking about it.

Then you actually go to the show and it occurs to you that, yes, this is still a small local band show. It’s a group of guys busting their asses and slumming it out to try and get someone to pay attention to them, even if the big name on the bill couldn’t make it due to a family emergency (that’s 2 for 2, Fallujah, Sacramento remembers the dates that stand it up) and one of the other death metal bands couldn’t make it, so a smaller group had to step in. It’s a show that maybe fifty to sixty people made it out to, including the other bands.

There was a weird sort of hopeful energy, where no one knew who I was (well, except for the one guy who was playing that night who I played with in a band for about two months…) and they were just excited to have someone interested in what they were doing. It’s probably the most hipster and, ‘Oh you’ve probably never heard of them’ that I’ll ever get to be.

The internet is also amazing because it really does widen a band’s reach. Can you believe we had someone from Australia complaining in the comments for the Soma Ras demo review that they couldn’t go to this specific show? How strange is that? You have bands who have anywhere from 800 to 2000 likes on Facebook playing what should be a hometown show to a small crowd, yet you have people 3,000 miles away mad because they couldn’t see it. Continue reading »

NEW KATATONIA: “DEAD LETTERS” FROM DEAD END KINGS

 Exceptions to the Rule, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  7 Responses »
Jun 202012
 

Following up on 2009’s Night Is the New Day, Sweden’s Katatonia have completed their next studio album, Dead End Kings, which will be released on August 27 (a day later in the U.S.) by the Peaceville label (it’s available for pre-order here). Today, Peaceville and the band released a lyric video for one of the tracks on the new album — “Dead Letters”.

It is an Exception to the Rule here, because . . . clean singing. But ever since my one and only witnessing of Katatonia in a live setting, I’ve had a soft spot for the band’s music (it was quite a show), and so I had to pay attention to this. Glad I did.

The video showcases some of the wonderful artwork by Travis Smith that will appear in the album booklet, and the imagery well-suits both the lyrics and the music. The song is a blending of the heavy and the ethereal, both moody and jolting, dark and meditative. I don’t think fans of Katatonia will be disappointed in what they hear. Check it out following the jump.

In addition, Peaceville has made the song available for free download, in exchange for your email address. To get that, GO HERE. Continue reading »

STREAM NACHMYSTIUM’S “INSTINCT: DECAY” – LIVE FROM ROADBURN 2012

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  1 Response »
Jun 202012
 

(BadWolf found us a real gem to start this Wednesday.)

If you still haven’t checked out Nachtmystium, Chicago’s black metal prodigies, where the hell have you been? Their mix of punky black metal with stoner rock, psychedelia, and industrial elements strikes that perfect balance between great songs and great sounds—their two Black Meddle records garnered serious critical acclaim (from myself and others) for it. But Nachtmysitum’s metamorphosis from Norwegian attack clone into unique entity began on their 2006 album, Instinct: Decay.

If you haven’t heard Instinct: Decay, this is the perfect opportunity. It’s required listening for any serious fan of USBM. If you’re a fan of Blake Judd and Friends’ new material, you can hear the beginning of that sound here. If you thought the Black Meddle albums were wussy metal you should still listen: Instinct: Decay is substantially rawer than either of its successors. Nachtmystium played the album front-to-back at this year’s Roadburn Festival, and some German website I have never heard of is streaming the entire performance as recorded straight from the sound board.

http://3voor12.vpro.nl/luisterpaal/playerpage.program.14484831.html

I imagine you can figure it out easily enough—hit the big triangle that looks like a play symbol. It’s a play symbol. [Editor’s intrusion: or, you can stream it at NCS right after the jump.]

The sound of this recording is pretty great, but that’s to be expected—I have Nachtmstium’s Live at Roadburn LP from early last year, and it’s fantastic. As a matter of fact, Blake’s vocals aside, this recording sounds better than the actual album, which is in pretty dire need of a remaster, already. Continue reading »

MORE HELLFEST SWEETNESS: SÓLSTAFIR LIVE

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  5 Responses »
Jun 192012
 

Earlier today, we posted about a series of high-quality performance videos from the French HELLFEST 2012 festival earlier this month. Iceland’s Sólstafir performed at HELLFEST, but their set isn’t included in the collection featured in that earlier post. But some blessed filmographer just uploaded a video of them anyway.

The song being performed is “Fjara”, and as persistent readers are well aware from all my previous blathering about the song, it’s one of my favorite songs ever, of all time, world without end, amen. Fortunately, this video is of high quality, both in the visuals and in the sound. Among other things, it makes the bass drum and the bass guitar sound super-FAT, but the guitars still ring like heavenly chimes.

I don’t think I’ve expressly said this before, but I think Sólstafir are just incredibly cool on stage. They just have to stand there and bob a little on a slow, powerful song like this one, and they still just look so damned cooooool, including the way Aðalbjörn Tryggvason plays his guitar while bending from the waist like a weeping willow. He’s got an amazing voice, too — love the way he moves from the melancholy crooning to the gritty blast of the chorus.

Man, I’m really coming off like a girly fanboy, aren’t I?  I’ll just shut up and direct you to the video after the jump. Continue reading »

GOJIRA – “L’ENFANT SAUVAGE” – FULL ALBUM STREAM!

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  18 Responses »
Jun 192012
 

For those of you who had the self-restraint not to go download the leak of Gojira’s new album L’Enfant Sauvage, I’m very pleased to inform you that the entire album began streaming at MusicRadar.com today.

Fortunately, the SoundCloud player with the album stream is embeddable, and so I’ve embedded it after the jump.

We will have multiple reviews of the album up here on NCS in the near future. And on the subject of that leak, I really hope that if you enjoy the music, you’ll spend the money and buy it. This band deserves that much respect. Pre-orders can be made HERE.

Check out the music . . .now . . . Continue reading »

HELLFEST LIVE!

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  4 Responses »
Jun 192012
 

Thank you, thank you DECIBLOG!

Thanks to the DECIBLOG, I discovered that Arte Live Web has uploaded multi-camera, professionally filmed video of complete live sets from HELLFEST 2012, which took place in Clisson, France on June 15-17, 2012. I’ve only watched parts of a few so far, including the Napalm Death set that DECIBLOG featured, but the quality is outstanding. So are the bands whose performances are captured at the Arte Live site. They include (to name the ones most interesting to me):

Arcturus
Lock Up
Sacred Reich
Aborted
Brujeria
Nasum
Dropkick Murphys
Heaven Shall Burn

Go HERE to access all of these performances, and more (some are still being uploaded). If you’d like a taste first, I’m including the Nasum footage right after the jump. Continue reading »

THRASHING: FASTKILL AND MASTER

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  4 Responses »
Jun 182012
 

I’m so easily diverted from my plans and projects. When it comes to this blog, the occurrence of coincidences tends to distract me like few other things do. I don’t think I’m any more superstitious than the average joe, but coincidences in my metal browsing seem to blare forth commands: STOP WHAT YOU WERE DOING AND WRITE ABOUT THIS NOW!!! And so I do.

I’ve been thinking about thrash today, prompted by our publication of TheMadIsraeli’s review of Kreator’s new album, Phantom Antichrist. As I’ve explained before, thrash is one of the few metal genres that I can only take in small doses. I don’t deny that good speed metal is energizing, and like most metalheads, I do appreciate a catchy riff and a shreddy solo. But so much thrash sounds so much alike to my ears that it can become numbing. And I guess I’m one of those people who TheMadIsraeli chastised for not being enamored of the traditional thrash vocal style. That’s not intended as an artistic criticism. I’m pretty sure it’s just a matter of taste.

Anyway, while pondering these subjects and trying to reflect with part of my brain on why I’m not more enthusiastic about thrash, I came across two pieces of thrashy metal from new albums that Pulverised Records will be releasing in North America on August 14 (both of which can be pre-ordered here). One is a new song by a Japanese speed-metal band named Fastkill, and the other is a previously released song that I overlooked from that very long-running death metal band (now based in The Czech Republic), Master. I got a kick out of both songs, and I’m trying to figure out why. Continue reading »

GREEKS BEARING GIFTS: TARDIVE DYSKINESIA AND LORD IMPALER

 Album Reviews, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  1 Response »
Jun 182012
 

I should probably apologize for using that overworked Homeric phrase in the post title, but those really were the first words that popped into my addled head when I heard the music featured here over the last 24 hours. I listened to songs from both bands back-to-back, and by coincidence they’re both from Greece, and by further coincidence the music from both is really good — though tremendously different from each other.

TARDIVE DYSKINESIA

We’ve written frequently about Tardive Dyskinesia and various side projects of their members after first being grabbed in a bear hug by the fast-paced, infectious barrage of technically sophisticated music captured on their 2009 album, The Sea of See Through Skins. At long last, 2012 will see the release of their follow-up album, Static Apathy in Fast Forward. In late March, they started streaming a rough mix of a new song called “Prehistoric Man” (featured here), and today brings us an animated lyric video for yet another track, “Time Turns Planets”.

Plunging almost immediately into a neck-wrenching groove, the song lurches and punches its way through a cycle of syncopated riffs and off-beat rhythms, but smooths out in a memorable melodic chorus, blending the ethereal and the heavy quite effectively. Fans of Texture’s 2011 album Dualism ought to pay particular attention to this fusion of piston-driven machine complexity and soaring ambience. The video is fun to watch, too (right after the jump). Continue reading »

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