SHAMISEN ROCK

 Off Topic, Phro's Posts, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  26 Responses »
Mar 052012
 

(You can’t say we don’t try to broaden your musical horizons here at NCS, but today’s guest post by Phro may push them farther than we ever have before.)

Well, there’s been a lot of talk recently about Celtic/bagpipe metal around these here parts. Which is pretty fucking awesome, if I may be so bold as to force my opinion on you like a political advertisement. Nothing wrong with a little sack in your metal, right? (Yeah, that’s the best I have right now…don’t expect anything too funny from this.)

Anyway, all this “traditional instruments doing dirty things with my metal behind closed doors and having babies that clearly are far more awesome than simply genetics should allow” got me thinking about a traditional instrument that I love: the shamisen. (Click here to get some Wikiknowledge dropped on your ass.)

Now, I know every FrownyFaceTrveCvltMetalHeadOfDoom out there thinks his or her favorite thing is the most metal thing of all, so that’s not what I’m going to say. However, if you don’t find yourself rocking (at least just a little) to some good tsugaru-jamisen, I’d say. . . well, I’d say this music probably isn’t for you and that’s tots cool. Seriously. Tots. Cool.

Before we really get started, I’d just like to explain very briefly what the fuck a shamisen is. A lot of people describe it as a Japanese guitar, which is just stupid. I think “Japanese lute” is the most commonly accepted description, but I prefer to think of it like a banjo. (They sound pretty similar to me.) Anyway, they have three strings, a long, thin neck, and a small box body.

Depending on the kind of shamisen, the form and size will be different.The Okinawan shamisen is smaller and the body is usually round and made of snake skin. The “standard” shamisen is about a 3 or 4 feet long with a body of about 10 inches which looks like a box. (It is a box, but the top and bottom are covered with animal skin.) The tsugaru-jamisen is basically a bigger version of the standard one.

Important note: there are no frets and the damn things go out of tune like a drunken sailor, so players are often re-tuning between songs. The largest string also has a natural reverb to it, so it’s the only acoustic instrument I know of that has built-in distortion. (I could just be stupid. Let us know how stupid in the comments below!)

Alright, so, today, for your totally-not-really-all-that-metal-but-kinda-metal entertainment, I’m going to be presenting some shamisen rocking. Pull on your hakama, throw some sen in your wallet, and let’s get this matsuri going. Continue reading »

SOME FREE SHIT FOR YOUR EARHOLES: ESCHATON, GRANTED EARTH, LASCAILLE’S SHROUD, AND STUBB

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  14 Responses »
Mar 042012
 

(groverXIII drops manna from Hel into your auditory canals.  No charge.  Lots of song streams at the end of this bad boy, too.)

Howdy, folks. I know everyone loves good free music, so I’m just going to jump right into the bands here. Fuck yeah.

ESCHATON – ISOLATED INTELLIGENCE

Eschaton have been mentioned ’round these parts before (here and here), but I first discovered them back when they emailed me about their initial EP release An Instrument Of Darkness a while back when TNOTB was still up and running, and I’ve been a fan ever since. Isolated Intelligence is their first full album (at least, I think it qualifies as a full album… it’s only five tracks, but it is over 45 minutes), and it’s as fascinating a listen as one might expect from these guys.

Stylistically, the album is Eschaton’s usual take on black/death metal, which is to say that it is anything but usual. There is a lot of experimentation going on here, with sprawling post-metal soundscapes rubbing elbows with clean female vocals and discordant guitars, all contained with the basic framework of black metal. Get it on the Bandcamps, honky.
Continue reading »

BARREN EARTH: “THE RAINS BEGIN” VIDEO

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  4 Responses »
Mar 022012
 

I really liked The Curse of the Red River, the 2010 debut album from Finland’s Barren Earth. I had high expectations for that album because the members of Barren Earth include such Finnish metal veterans as vocalist Mikko Kotamäki (Swallow the Sun), Olli-Pekka Laine on bass (Ex-Amorphis, Mannhai), drummer Marko Tarvonen (Moonsorrow)
, and Kreator guitarist Sami Ylisirniö.

With such a strong debut, I’ve had even higher expectation for the band’s second album, The Devil’s Resolve, which is scheduled for release on March 13 in North America (via Peaceville Records). It was mixed by Dan Swanö, it features cover art by Paul Romano, and it includes guest appearances by Mathias Lillmåns (Finntroll) and Jaakko Lemmetty (Korpiklaani). Based on an initial listen to The Devil’s Resolve, I’d say my expectations have been satisfied once again.

In an earlier post, we told you about a chance to download a song from the album called “The Rain Begins”, and as of today the band have now released an official video for the song. The song itself is immensely memorable, with a dramatic, piercing melody delivered by keyboard and guitar that easily takes up residence in your mind. It’s a melodic blend of doom and death marked by Kotamäki’s contrasting clean and harsh vocals.

But the video is almost as fun to watch as the music is to hear. Rather than try to explain why, I’ll just let you see it for yourselves . . . after the jump. (And unlike the song from Spawn of Possession featured in our last post, the lyrics to this song matter, and they’re wonderful.) Continue reading »

ANOTHER SPAWN OF POSSESSION SONG PREMIERE: “SERVITUDE”

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  20 Responses »
Mar 022012
 

I’ll spare you a lengthy introduction, because I’ve already written a novella-length review of Spawn of Possession’s new album Incurso, which is rapidly approaching its March 13 release date. I’ll repeat only this over-the-top concluding paragraph from the review:

“Incurso is a landmark album. In the rarified air of technical death metal, it has re-set the bar to a new height. Compared to it, the vast majority of even very good albums in this field seem . . . rudimentary.  We may see its equal someday, but to this simple mind, it’s difficult to conceive how it could be surpassed.”

The first two songs from the album that have been officially released are included with the review, and today we have a third: “Servitude”. It appears in the form of a lyric video. I find the words distracting. I recommend that you close your eyes and just allow the music and the sound of the vocals to tie your neurons in knots. Thanks to Metal Injection’s premiere, we have the lyric video after the jump. Continue reading »

NEW MUSIC: GOD FORBID AND WRETCHED

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  12 Responses »
Mar 022012
 

Once upon a time, when metalcore was a new thing, I ate it up, all I could get and as much as I could hold. And one of my favorite bands was God Forbid. My listening tastes have moved off in different directions, but I’ve still got a soft spot for this band, and I’m getting curious about what’s happened to their music. We’re all about to find out, because their sixth album, Equilibrium, is going to drop on March 26 via Victory Records.

The line-up hasn’t changed much since the early days — Dallas Coyle is gone and Matt Wicklund is in — but the world of music has changed a lot since the days of Determination, and God Forbid have done their share of changing along the way, too, with a more dominant thrash attack, jacked up by the head-spinning guitar solo’s of Doc Coyle and even the incorporation of progressive influences. But three years have passed since Earthblood, and I’m wondering where we’ll find God Forbid now.

Well, so far we’ve got two pieces of evidence — a portion of one song called “Cornered” and as of yesterday a full song called “Don’t Tell Me What To Dream”. And I’d certainly say, based on yesterday’s release, that God Forbid have . . . “modernized.”

More thoughts about that, plus the new song, after the jump. Also after the jump is a new song from another Victory band, North Carolina’s Wretched, whose 2010 album Beyond the Gate I praised in this NCS review. They also have a new album due for release — Son of Perdition. Continue reading »

TUNE-UP: NEW JAMS FROM HOUR OF PENANCE, ENTHRONED, HIGH ON FIRE, FOUL BODY AUTOPSY, AND JEFF LOOMIS

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  8 Responses »
Mar 012012
 

Lots of new music relevant to my interests debuted yesterday. Because it interests me, I presume that it will interest you, because of course if something is interesting to me it will necessarily interest you simply because I find it interesting. If you disagree with that statement, please keep it to yourself so that I can retain my high opinion of myself.

Because this post includes so much music, I will attempt to keep my verbal diarrhea in check by using the patented NCS butt plug, figuratively speaking of course. Not literally. Literally, I’ll limit my song descriptions to two words each.

HOUR OF PENANCE

We previously featured the artwork for this Italian band’s new album. It will be called Sedition and will be released on March 27 in North America, April 2 in the U.K., and April 6 in mainland Europe via Prosthetic Records.

HoP will be following the release of Sedition with a North American tour — their first — which will be headlined by The Black Dahlia Murder and will also include Nile and Skeletonwitch. I already climbed out on a limb and predicted that this will blow up Hour of Penance in North America much as their fellow Romans in Fleshgod Apocalypse blew up through NorthAm touring in the wake of last year’s Agony.

Now we’ve got the first track from Sedition:, which Terrorizer premiered yesterday: Bone splintering. Continue reading »

AN ICELANDIC TAG TEAM: SOLSTAFIR AND DIMMA

 Exceptions to the Rule, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  16 Responses »
Feb 292012
 

I’m going to do to you what I did to myself last night, and I hope you get the same charge out of it that I got. It will take more time than it usually takes to zip through our posts here, but even if you choose to stay with me for only part of the journey, I think it will be worthwhile. It starts with Solstafir, it continues with Dimma, and it ends with both of them, in the closest thing I’ve ever seen to a live tag-team performance by two bands.

SOLSTAFIR

I’ve lost track of how many times I’ve written about Sólstafir and their brilliant two-disk 2011 album, Svartir Sandir. They’re only a borderline metal band, but the borderland they occupy is a place I go to live in my mind quite often. There’s a song that ends the second disc called “Djákninn”. It’s a jam that’s nearly 11 minutes long, and I get lost in it every time I listen.

Listening is like getting behind the wheel of a car with some muscle under the hood, starting from a standing stillness and patiently shifting through the gears as it builds speed on an a climbing open road with some curves ahead. You hear the engine begin to purr, and as the throttle opens up in stages, it begins to roar, and then you’re really cruising like there’s no tomorrow, with the wind rushing through the open windows under a blue sky with not another care in the world. Continue reading »

DEATH GRIPS GET GOT BY EPIC

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  6 Responses »
Feb 282012
 

BadWolf introduced me and many of you to Death Grips through the first installment of a series in which he spotlights the music of non-metal bands (here) — though I think most listeners would agree that there’s a helluva lot about Death Grips that’s metal. Because of BadWolf’s post, I got interested and starting following the band’s news. Early this month we reported that they intended to release two albums this year, including a song called “Blackjack”, which I included in that earlier post.

More news surfaced yesterday, and it kinda blows my mind: Death Grips has signed a record deal with Epic, the major label owned by Sony whose stable includes artists such as Fiona Apple, Natasha Bedingfield, and Brandy. Okay, to be fair, Epic is also home to Lamb of God, Ozzy Osbourne, and Judas Priest. As well as George Michael and Jennifer Lopez. And Mudvayne.

I hear the distant rumble of a throaty “What the fuck?!?” Or maybe that’s just my throat. I mean, Death Grips isn’t exactly a natural fit with the Epic roster, and I do wonder by what logic Epic saw this as a money-making signing, because this band is definitely out there. Or under there (“I am below / so far below / the bottom line”). Maybe Epic is trying to put some edge on their image.

As for Death Grips, I’m happy they get some label backing regardless of where it comes from; I certainly don’t expect that this group is going to “sell out”. I’m also now waiting for the J-Lo cover of “Beware” — “Dismiss this life / worship death / Cold blood night of serpent’s breath”. Fuck yeah. And I’m also happy that to celebrate the signing news, the band released another new song called “Get Got”. More details about the two albums plus the song are after the jump.

Continue reading »

JOB FOR A COWBOY: “NOURISHMENT THROUGH BLOODSHED”

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  24 Responses »
Feb 272012
 

Anyone who thinks Job For A Cowboy is still a deathcore band didn’t hear the band’s 2011 EP, Gloom. You can simulate listening to it by reading Andy Synn’s NCS review (here). Or you can check out a song from JFAC’s forthcoming album, Demonocracy, because that’s what we have for you in this post.

The new, 9-track album, produced by Jason Suecof, is scheduled for release on April 10 by Metal Blade, who is accepting pre-orders for it now (here). It catches the eye with an album cover by Brent Elliott White, and it includes the return of two musicians who made their first JFAC appearance on Gloom — guitarist Tony Sannicandro and Cephalic Carnage bassist Nick Schendzielos, who replaced Brent Riggs last year.

Gloom revealed a band who were unabashedly leaving their deathcore roots behind and instead connecting with their death metal forebears, and even incorporating elements of black metal and doom on certain songs. What then does Demonocracy hold in store? Continue reading »

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