ONE AT A TIME: COMMUNION (“WITCHING THRUST”)

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  2 Responses »
Dec 032017
 

 

As I’ve mentioned more than once, I’m leaving the country today on a 12-day vacation. I was able to write the two premieres posted earlier today, but ran out of time before I could put together a SHADES OF BLACK feature for this Sunday. As I’ve also mentioned, I made a pact with my wife that I will severely restrict my blogging during this trip. That’s my interpretation of the pact; hers is that I won’t blog at all. This is an ominous misunderstanding.

Before we began the negotiations that led to this pact, I had committed to write three premieres spread over the coming 12 days. I will keep those commitments. I also plan to format and post Andy Synn’s year-end lists, which traditionally kick off our staff’s contributions to LISTMANIA, and I further intend to keep my eye out for the appearance of year-end lists by certain print publications and “big platform” web sites that I usually include in our LISTMANIA series. And I have one more modest goal:

I’m going to attempt to briefly write about one, and only one, new release in order to avoid barrenness on days when we would otherwise have nothing new to post at NCS while I’m gone. It might be a single new song or as much as an entire new album. This post you’re now perusing is an example of that. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD ON A SATURDAY: INQUISITOR, GODLESS ANGEL, DEMONSTEALER, GHOSTBOUND, LENTO

 Exceptions to the Rule, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  5 Responses »
Dec 022017
 

 

We’re rushing toward the end of the year like an out-of-control car speeding toward a precipice. And I find myself getting a similar panicked feeling, as if it will be a world-ending event for a metal writer and I only have four weeks to finish spouting off about 2017 releases, a task made even more daunting by the fact that I’m leaving on a 12-day vacation tomorrow (as explained here), and by the prospect of all the LISTMANIA stuff we will be doing between now and December 31 as well.

Of course, this is a completely irrational feeling. There’s no law which prevents us from continuing to write about 2017 releases after New Year’s Day, and no doubt we will. Nevertheless, I’m still feeling a feverish compulsion to give as much attention as I can to recent releases (and a few forthcoming ones) before “time runs out”. So I’ve crammed music from five bands into this post, without nearly enough time to say what I want about them, and I also have some hopes of finishing a SHADES OF BLACK post for tomorrow before beginning my 12-day hiatus. Don’t know if that will work out or not….

INQUISITOR

Thanks to a message from Conor O., and then a subsequent e-mail from the Dutch label Hammerheart Records, I learned that after a 22-year hiatus, Inquisitor have returned with a new album, and it’s an explosive resurrection for sure. Continue reading »

THE MORBID ALPHABET

 Mosh Pit, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  12 Responses »
Dec 022017
 

 

(We invite you to respond to Andy Synn’s invitation to fill in a certain alphabet…)

Unless you’ve been living under a rock recently, you’ll doubtless be aware that a little band called… Morbid fuckin’ Angel… just released their long-awaited and highly-anticipated – albeit with a certain amount of trepidation – new album, Kingdoms Disdained.

And while it’s not a total three-point-slam-dunk-home-run (I don’t know sports…) it’s still a solid album, replete with a bevy of stand-out tracks that go a long, long way towards redeeming the band’s slightly tarnished reputation.

Although I still contend that it should have been called Judas… Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: BESTIALORD — “VERMIN”

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  No Responses »
Dec 012017
 

 

Bestialord have already chosen their name, but if they hadn’t, I would have suggested Riff Lord (it seems that “Rifflord” has already been taken). Seriously, if you don’t want to severely strain your levator scapulae, I’d recommend you give them a good limbering up before listening to this new Bestialord song from their debut album, Law of the Burning, because headbanging is pretty much compulsory.

But there’s also some logic in the name this trio did choose for themselves, because their brand of occult horror doom also sounds like it was concocted in the infernal lair of a bestial demon overlord. Continue reading »

THE NEAR FUTURE OF NCS: A FORECAST OF THE REMAINING WEEKS OF 2017 (AND SOME NEW MUSIC BY MARIJANNAH)

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  10 Responses »
Nov 302017
 


…a photo from a place I’m about to visit again…

 

I’m never sure how many people make visits to our site a clockwork part of their day, like a piss upon rising, or a morning coffee, or a shot and a beer at the end of the workday, or a way of re-setting the mind before entering the Land of Nod at night. But I like to think it’s more than a few of you, and so in fairness to those people, I’m writing this post.

Today is the last day of November, and so one month remains in the countdown of our completely arbitrary but ingrained measurement of a milestone in our lives — the passage of one more year. Because this is a metal blog, that means we are about to enter, in full force, our year-end LISTMANIA. But this year will be different. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD: TAARNA, CONVULSING, SIBERIAN HELL SOUNDS

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  1 Response »
Nov 282017
 

 

This is a rare kind of round-up, relative to what I usually pull together. Most obviously, there are only three bands featured in this one. And the other difference, which is related to the first one, is that while I’m including only one song by each band, each of these songs is more than 20 minutes long.

Wait! Don’t leave! I promise you won’t become bored — though your emotional well-being will be assaulted and your sanity may be severely tested. Yes, 20 minutes is a long time to arrest your constantly flitting and dithering mind and apply a little focus. It will be worth the effort.

TAARNA

Actually, Taarna’s track, “Sanguine Ash“, is almost 30 minutes long. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD ON A SATURDAY: TRIBULATION, DDENT, TRESPASSER, CAVEMAN CULT, LEFT ALONE

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  3 Responses »
Nov 252017
 

 

It seems that the four-day Thanksgiving holiday here in the U.S. has made mincemeat out of our site’s traffic, and while we don’t depend on traffic for money, it’s not much fun to put a lot of work into a post and then realize that few people will see it. It’s a test of the severity of my own blog compulsion. As you can tell, my compulsion passed the test with flying colors.

These are a few recent things I enjoyed last night and this morning, and hope you will enjoy too.

TRIBULATION

Well, this is sort of recent. I somehow missed it when it came out 8 days ago. Not sure how that happened, but anyway, I found it last night. It’s a video for a new song named “The Lament” off the next album by Sweden’s Tribulation. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD ON A DAY OF THANKS-GIVING: AMENRA, DRAWN AND QUARTERED, SARINVOMIT, ATARAKTIKA

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  4 Responses »
Nov 232017
 

 

If the analytical stats about the composition of our visitors are correct, about half of you will be observing Thanksgiving Day while for everyone else it will be just another day. It’s sort of just another day here at NCS — as you can tell, we’re still posting about metal — but it’s also Thanksgiving Day here in Seattle. And inevitably, I’m feeling thankful.

To give thanks, you need someone or something to thank, don’t you? In the tradition of this holiday, the idea is to express gratitude to some higher power, but if that seems like a fantasy (as it does to me), you become mindful of the thanks you owe to other people instead. Since our eighth birthday was only a few days ago, I’ve already thanked all the people (including you) who have contributed to the perplexing longevity of NCS. Today, I’m feeling especially thankful to the bands who help make life pleasurable, even during the dark days when it’s a struggle to find anything else that makes you feel thankful.

And so, voila, here’s a random selection of recent news and new music for which I’m grateful, with few words (because I’m headed off soon for a Thanksgiving get-together with family and friends).

AMENRA

I was late in getting around to checking out Amenra’s new video for the song “A Solitary Reign” off their new album Mass VI, which is out now via Neurot Recordings (and was reviewed here by Wil Cifer). It is a captivating video, made by Tine Guns, the mother of Amenra guitar player Mathieu Vandekerckhove’s son, Wolf. The song is completely captivating as well, perhaps the high point of Mass VI. The music was described in this way by the band’s Colin H. Van Eeckhout: Continue reading »

LISTMANIA BEGINS: THE DECIBEL TOP 40 FOR 2017

 LISTMANIA 2017, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  42 Responses »
Nov 202017
 

 

Every year our LISTMANIA series of posts includes not only lists of the year’s best releases as compiled by our staff, invited guests, and our esteemed readers, but also lists assembled by what we call “big platform” web sites and selected print magazines. And every year, it seems that DECIBEL magazine provides the launch for LISTMANIA by coming out with the first of the lists we see from that category of web sites and print zines — and they’ve done it again this year.

I’m a long-time DECIBEL subscriber, but my hard copy of the January edition, which features Steve Tucker on the cover and includes the YE list, hasn’t hit my mailbox yet. However, today DECIBEL provided an on-line teaser for the issue that included their full ranking of the year’s Top 40 albums.

This is the second year in a row that DECIBEL has scooped their own list rather than letting leeches like me do it, and so I can now again re-publish their list without too much guilt. There is of course a lot more content in the January issue, including commentary about each of these 40 albums and why they were selected (you can read everything else DECIBEL has previewed about the January issue here). Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD ON A SATURDAY: MIGRATION FEST 2018, SCORCHED, ETERNAL HELCARAXE, EARLY DEATH

 Album Reviews, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC, SHORT BUT SWEET  2 Responses »
Nov 182017
 

 

The best laid schemes o’ mice an’ men gang aft a-gley, and sometimes they’re just naturally daft and glazed, which is a good description of myself this morning.

As I mentioned in yesterday’s round-up, I’m now deep in the heart of Texas for a high school reunion tonight, and spent last night catching up with some old friends over a bottle of whisky. I then slept 11 hours, which I don’t think I’ve done since the year of my high school graduation. And so, this Saturday round-up includes fewer items than I had originally planned.

MIGRATION FEST

The first Migration Fest (organized by Gilead Media and 20 Buck Spin), which took place in Olympia, Washington, in August 2016 was fantastic. The next one is now set for July 27-29, 2018, at Mr. Smalls in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. And this morning the festival announced the first round of confirmed bands: Continue reading »

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