FILLER

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  25 Responses »
Feb 132012
 

Hey, I gotta be brutally honest with you, which is the only kind of honest we know how to be at NCS.

Long story short, I had to work for my day job yesterday and I ran out of island time last night. In fact, it’s last night as I write this, and I’m out of time. I’m dead tired, my judgment is impaired, and I don’t feel up to finishing the post I was writing for tomorrow, which is this morning where I am as you see this. So, I’m resorting to what we highly trained metal bloggers call filler. Just something to have up on the site until I wake up tomorrow, which is today, and finish what I am working on as I write this, or was working on last night, as you read this. Shit, this is kinda like time travel.

For this filler, I basically just grabbed the first thing I saw, which was The Commander-In-Chief. I mean, I didn’t actually grab her. I just grabbed the idea for this filler.

She’s a 22-year old Norwegian living in London. She plays some kind of a prototype 7-string Ibanez guitar. She also writes her songs and sings. She has a four-song EP called Evolution coming out on February 15. It was recorded and produced by veteran Sterling Winfield (Pantera, Hatebreed, Hellyeah) who has touted the fact that the vocals and instrumental performances on the EP haven’t been manipulated or enhanced in any way by software.

There’s a recent teaser reel for the EP after the jump, and then a somewhat older “official trailer”, plus more photos. Amuse yourselves, and be sure to salute. I’m going to bed. Continue reading »

NIHILANTH

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  13 Responses »
Feb 122012
 

Nihil: a Latin word meaning “nothing”

Anth: a Sanskrit word for “end”

Nihilanth: a band from Mumbai, India, who have released a grand total of two songs for public consumption. One (just uploaded in the last day) is called “Macabre Existence”, and the other is called “Dimensional Domination”. Both songs are cwaaaazy.

This is death metal viciously struggling to come apart at the seams and engulf the listener in its radioactive fallout. Paying homage to the likes of Necrophagist, Psycroptic, Decapitated, and The Faceless, Nihilanth skillfully whip up a whirlwind of percussion and razor-sharp notes that’s authentically menacing.

With this kind of music, there is indeed a fine line between mindless wankery (yes, there’s that phrase again which has been cropping up in recent NCS posts and comments) and true high-speed death metal that happens to mount its attack through the calculated deployment of precision munitions. I guess it’s obvious that I think Nihilanth stay on the right side of the line. Continue reading »

SCOTS WHA HAE (PART 2)

 Album Reviews, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  16 Responses »
Feb 122012
 

Calling this “Part 2” may imply that I intended to spend this weekend listening to music from Scottish bands, but instead, I’m just being my usual impulsive self. Yesterday, I combined music from four Scottish bands (and one South African one) in a post labeled with the unofficial Scottish national anthem penned by Robert Burns. Via our Facebook page and comments on that post, we got recommendations for other Scottish metal bands to check out. So I thought, what the hell, go for it!

Unlike yesterday’s post, where I featured bands I know and like, this one is more like what we publish in the MISCELLANY series — spotlighting bands whose music we’ve never heard before, not knowing what they will sound like or whether we’ll enjoy what they’re doing.

The bands I picked from yesterday’s recommendations are (in no particular order) Scordatura (Glasgow), Sufferinfuck (Livingston/West Lothian), Co-Exist (Glasgow), Threshold Sicks (Perth), and Zombie Militia (Inverness). I’ll tell you up-front that this is a divergent mix of metal, and it is all GOOD. So prepare for an underground roller-coaster ride.

SCORDATURA

I checked out this band (pictured above) based on a suggestion from Lisa Coverdale on our Facebook page. Scordatura have their own Facebook page here. They released a six-song debut EP in 2009 called Open Skies as well as a 2010 pre-production demo. When I visited their Facebook page, I discovered that they’re working on songs for a new album and released two of them last year in a promo that’s available for free download on Bandcamp. So I downloaded it (HERE) and listened. Continue reading »

SCOTS WHA HAE

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  32 Responses »
Feb 112012
 

A video I saw about some difficulties Apple is experiencing with its Siri speech-recognition software gave me the idea for this post. It don’t seem to do too well with the Scots dialect (or at least the Glaswegian variant of it). I wonder how it would do with lyric recognition when voiced by Scottish extreme metal bands. Probably not to fukkin well. And running some bagpipe metal through the thing would probably cause it to melt down.

First, here’s the video. HIGH-larious. (And to see a translation of what’s being said, along with an explanation by the creator of the video, go here.)

As for Scottish (and Scottish-themed) metal, the line-up after the jump is a mix of new, newish, and older music from three Glasgow bands (Man Must Die, Cerebral Bore, and Achren), one from Edinburgh (Zillah),  and Haggis and Bong (okay, they’re from South Africa, but how can we write about Scottish metal without including some new bagpipe shred?). Continue reading »

DOES LENGTH MATTER?

 Mosh Pit, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  50 Responses »
Feb 112012
 

No, no, no.  This post isn’t about dicks.

Wait!  Where are you going?  Hang on for a minute and let me explain.  This may be interesting even if it’s not about penises, difficult as that may be to believe.

The subject of this post is one I’ve thought about before and discussed with others outside these pages. Here’s what finally prompted me to throw it open for NCS discussion — this Facebook status by Sweden’s Mordbrand, whose killer 2011 EP Necropsychotic we reviewed here and whose November 2011 split with their fellow Swedes in Bombs of Hades we featured here:

“It looks like MORDBRAND’s discography will mostly consist of EP’s and splits at the moment. We’re excited about all suggestions, proposals and offers we have in front of us. But here’s a question to YOU: If a band produces enough material on small releases – is a full-length then necessary? The way we see it: If we record a handful of songs, we can really focus on them and make them turn great. If we record full-lengths, we’ll have less time working on each track. This calls for an interesting discussion!”

Yes, it does call for discussion. As a fan, what would you rather see from the bands you like — shorter but more frequent releases or full-length albums that are more spaced out, e.g., a new one every couple of years? Do you tend to take a band more seriously, particularly a new band, if they release album-length material instead of EPs? Is it the meat or the motion? Continue reading »

GRUESOME GLORY: “CONSUMING THE ANTI-LIFE EQUATION”

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  30 Responses »
Feb 102012
 

This is the third of today’s three single-song posts. I realize that when I started today’s series I said all three songs would be new ones from bands I already knew about, but that’s not the case. I didn’t intend to lie, but I found another song I need to share, and it’s from a band I only discovered today.

The band is Gruesome Glory and they’re from Iceland. Just a few days ago, they added a new song to their SoundCloud page called “Consuming the Anti-Life Equation”, and it’s one hell of a song. The band is relatively young as are its members, but don’t let that fool you. “Consuming the Anti-Life Equation” is technical death metal, but (to quote a recent snarky comment we received about a different band), the music is NOT “mindless wankery”.

True to the band’s name, it’s gruesome, largely thanks to the cadaverous vocals, and yes, it’s full of jabbing riffs, rapidly slithering arpeggios, and other forms of flashy fretwork. But it also has some funk, some groove, and plenty of low-end heft, plus some sweet bass-work. This is making me think of Pestilence. Continue reading »

ENTHRONED: “OBSIDIUM”

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  2 Responses »
Feb 102012
 

Here’s the second of today’s three posts about new song premieres from bands we like.

Last month, we featured the eye-catching cover art created by Olve J. W. l for an album I’m highly anticipating — the new one from Belgian black metal band Enthroned. They recently signed a two-album deal with Agonia Records. Their new album, Obsidium, will be released on March 20 in Europe and on April 10 in North America.

Yesterday, the band debuted the album’s magisterial title track. It’s a charging, plunging animal with claws out and teeth bared, marked by an insistent, needle-like guitar melody that’s already hooked itself in my head. Nornagest’s scraped-throat, mid-range vocals are passionate and powerful, and the brief moment of clean singing behind them works quite well.

This is a jam that I would put on a repeat loop for the morning if I could. It bodes well for the album as a whole. Have a listen after the jump. Continue reading »

BORKNAGAR: “ROOTS”

 Exceptions to the Rule, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  4 Responses »
Feb 102012
 

Yesterday, I devoted three separate posts to three new songs by three different bands (not counting that track by some djent band named Meshuggah). Though I don’t plan to make a habit of this, I’m doing it again today, because yesterday and today I spotted three more songs worth sharing around. But unlike yesterday, today’s songs come from bands whose music I already know.

First up is Borknagar. We already splashed the eye-catching Marcelo Vasco cover art for their new album Urd (here), and now we have the first song from the album — “Roots”. Here’s what Borknagar mastermind Øystein G. Brun had to say about the song on the band’s official site:

“In regards to the depth, diversity and magnitude of our new album, “Urd”, it almost feels painful to slice off just a tiny bit of the bloody roast for the very first official “starter”. I would argue that each and every song on the new album stands on solid ground, but as usual with our music, the songs empower each other in the context of a full album.

That said, “Roots” is probably the song on the album that gives you the most representative impression of “Urd”. Musically it contains most of the elements that framework the musical universe of BORKNAGAR, and lyrically this song is gnawing on the very spine of our lyrical tradition. Hope you enjoy this song, the first tiny glimpse into our new opus. The beast is about to be unleashed…”

The song debuted yesterday exclusively on DECIBEL magazine’s on-line site and on Metal Hammer’s site. I’d recommend a visit to either place, because the song is worth hearing. Continue reading »

IS IT TOO EARLY IN THE MORNING FOR THIS? FUCK NO!

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  14 Responses »
Feb 102012
 

 

Let me just get this off my chest: Fuck the Big Four. If we must have thrash, then let it be scum thrash punks drunk on metal and burning in a vaginal hell. Preferably written, performed, and recorded by a band named Prostitute, whose members preferably are called Scum and Slag.

Preferably playing songs like “Homage To Oblivion”, “Hell Is For Heshers”, “Let’s Fuckin’ Fight”, and “Titanium Scrotum”.

Yeah, go ahead and laff it up. I bet you think this is funny. But that’s because you haven’t heard the music yet. It’s dirty thrash, full of hell, booze, blood, and snot. It’s moshing, head-butting music that doesn’t give a rat’s ass — but damn it’s a kick in tender parts to hear. These two dirtbags know how to throw one compulsive riff after another until your mind is one big filthy riff, with evil vocals echoing off the walls of that empty cell you call a life.

I wish I could tell you more about Prostitute, but all I know is that they’re from Gainesville, Florida, and their debut album — Vaginal Hell Demos — is available for free download courtesy of Satanik Recordings and Bandcamp. Stream one song on the player that follows the jump and I bet you won’t want to stop. And if you do, well then I guess I was wrong: It’s too early in the morning for this. Continue reading »

MESHUGGAH LEAK

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  18 Responses »
Feb 092012
 

This news is spreading like a viral wildfire across the netz, and who are we to question it? It appears the godalmighty Meshuggah have intentionally leaked a new song through the website http://iamaleak.com. I’ve read that the domain was registered by the band’s manager, and that suggests the connection. Plus, the motherfuckin song sounds like Meshuggah.

News of the leak has appeared here and there through anonymous posts, with this message:

the ophidian whispered those who seek shall be rewarded….

a sonic declaration of spIte And resentMent
its resonAnce grinding to dust our souls
the twine of revenge tightLy strung
its subharmonics thE undoing of All

and for those who asK for my name? / dotcom

Go past the jump and give this song a listen. Continue reading »

 Older Entries  Newer Entries