SEEN AND HEARD (PART 1): MIDNIGHT, KARTIKEYA, IMPUREZA, ENDSEEKER

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  2 Responses »
Aug 112017
 

 

Surprise! Hope your kids or your parents or your bosses weren’t looking over your shoulder when you landed on this post. But hey, we have to have our fun where we find it. Just tell ’em that’s a recently discovered Michaelangelo that’s making news throughout the art world.

Midnight also has a new promo photo that you can view after the jump. Your kids/parents/bosses will really love it!

I’ve got a few bits of additional info about Midnight’s new album to start this end-of-week round-up, plus another piece of album art and news about a long-awaited new album, and then some music. I’ve collected so many new song streams that I’ve decided to break up this rond-up into somewhat smaller bites so your mind won’t choke on it. I’ll probably be posting round-ups from now straight through the weekend.

MIDNIGHT

As you can see, the new Midnight album is named Sweet Death and Ecstasy. There’s some more info about the album that I’ll quote below. Unfortunately, Hells Headbangers didn’t tell us who created the scissor-sisters cover art. Might be William Lacey, who’s done work for these sleazy Clevelanders before, but I’m not sure if he’s responsible for this one. Here’s that new promo shot: Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD: BELL WITCH, SUMMONING, INCANTATION, OBITUARY, BOLT THROWER, BLASPHEMY, SXUPERION, SERPENTS LAIR, FIREBREATHER, ORBSEVEN

 Album Reviews, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  6 Responses »
Aug 082017
 

 

This is, obviously, a humongous round-up of things I’ve recently discovered. I’ve organized it in this way:

First up there are two news items that feature imagery and info about eagerly anticipated new releases but no music. Then I’ve got new videos and music streams by (or related to) a quartet of venerable and revered bands, followed by new advance tracks from two younger favorites who are returning with new releases this year. And then I’ll close this out with music from two bands whom I’ve just discovered.

BELL WITCH

On most days I post a piece of usually dark or surreal artwork on our Facebook page. I keep an archive of what I’ve posted over the years, as a way of trying to avoid repeating myself. In that archive I’ve counted 22 paintings by the Polish artist Mariusz Lewandowski that I’ve posted over the years since I began doing that, which I think is proof of how strongly I like his creations. But as far as I can recall, he has never created artwork for the cover of a metal album… until now. And his cover for the new Bell Witch album will surely stand as one of the best album covers of the year, if not THE best. Continue reading »

IRRELEVANT LISTENING (VOL. 3)

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  2 Responses »
Aug 082017
 

 

(Last year TheMadIsraeli posted the first two installments in this irregular series, and now brings us a third one.)

Another installment of irrelevant listening where I share albums in my rotation lately that aren’t current. Let’s get started.

Killswitch Engage – Alive Or Just Breathing: Top-Shelf Edition

Alive Or Just Breathing is the melodic metalcore album that in my mind has never been topped. Even the band themselves admitted in an interview, I think it was this year, that this is STILL their best album. I’ve written about this album before on the site and stumbled upon the so-called “Top Shelf” expanded edition (released in 2005) some time ago. Continue reading »

BLACK METAL (PART 6): A COLLECTION CURATED BY NEILL JAMESON (KRIEG, POISON BLOOD)

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  4 Responses »
Aug 072017
 

 

(Last year we were fortunate to present five installments in a series by Neill Jameson (Krieg, Poison Blood) recommending black metal releases from years past. Neill now brings us (and you) a further installment collecting music from six more bands. To get a look at previous editions of the series, click this link and scroll down. If we’re lucky, more will come our way in the future.)

For some reason people seem to like talking to me, especially the ones I don’t want to talk to. And inevitably in these conversations I get poked and prodded about current black metal because the vacant look in my eyes isn’t speaking loudly enough. And most of the time I try to shrug it off because I’m terrible in social situations and also I don’t have a lot to say about many modern bands. Like fresh out of the womb modern with a demo in one hand and a fistful of dreams in the other, not new projects with veteran members or anything like that. Jesus this got confusing.

What I’m trying to get at is (1) I’m old and boring, and (2) it’s incredibly difficult for me to constantly keep up with modern shit when there’s still so much to be mined from an earlier age. Which is why I like to dip back into the well that was supposed to be a three-part series that’s now on its sixth iteration with no real ending planned.

Dedicated for those of you who complain about people being stuck mining the past while spending an absurd amount of money to look like you were an extra in one of the original Mad Max films. Continue reading »

THE REARVIEW MIRROR: A LIFE ONCE LOST (AND MIND POWER AND OLDBONES)

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC, THE REARVIEW MIRROR  10 Responses »
Aug 072017
 

 

The original idea for The Rearview Mirror (credit to DGR) was to give us a quick and easy way to begin Sundays at our site when we had nothing else ready to go. It was supposed to be quick and easy because all we’d do would be to post a song stream from fondly remembered releases from the past, as opposed to our usual constant focus on new and forthcoming albums, EPs, and splits. Yesterday would have been a good day for that since I was on a mini-vacation and had nothing ready to go. Of course, I forgot.

It didn’t take long for the original idea to morph. “Wordiness” is our middle name, and so our Rearview Mirror posts expanded into essays and took almost as much time to prepare as everything else around here. Which is probably why the series eventually melted away. It might come back on a regular basis since I’m now thinking about it, or it might not. But I am reviving it at least for today… since I don’t have anything else ready to go on this Monday morning (things are in the works, just not finished).

But this post still doesn’t follow the original Rearview Mirror idea. Wordiness still reigns (though in this case I’ve cribbed from some things we’ve written in the past). Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD: REBEL WIZARD, THE KING IS BLIND, OWLCRUSHER, VOIDSCAPE, PROJECT OMEGA, NESSERIA, THE INVICT, VOREAN

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  3 Responses »
Aug 022017
 

 

Well, as you can see, I’ve gotten carried away again.

Here’s a selection of new music by 8 bands, chosen in part to display once again the diversity and promise of extreme music in the current day.

REBEL WIZARD

The sound of Rebel Wizard has now become branded in my head; I would have known this first song was a Rebel Wizard creation even if the music’s source had been concealed. And in an age in which new metal arrives every day in a flood, with so many bands rushing through ravines already carved by their influences, creating a distinctive style and sound is a rare achievement, and even more rare when it’s distinctive despite being difficult to categorize in conventional genre terms. Continue reading »

SHADES OF BLACK: SATYRICON, ABIGOR, WINGS OF DAHAK, ONE TAIL ONE HEAD, UHTCEARU, ASTROPHOBOS, LUSTWORM

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC, SHADES OF BLACK  5 Responses »
Aug 012017
 

 

In this past Sunday’s regular episode of this feature I explained that I had more new music in a black vein that I wanted to share and expected I would do it on Monday. So, I’m a day late, and with the delay I’ve expanded it a bit. The result is divergent music by seven bands from seven countries, but we begin with a news item.

SATYRICON

Today we got some additional information about the new album by Satyricon. As previously reported, it is entitled Deep Calleth Upon Deep and will be released by Napalm Records on September 22. The cover art is an obscure 1898 drawing by the famous Norwegian artist Edvard Munch. The album has been described by the label as “a wholesale reinvention and a brand new era in SATYRICON history”. And with that titillating pronouncement we also have this statement by frontman Satyr: Continue reading »

DEATH RITUALS: NEW MUSIC FROM DYSCARNATE, ARCHSPIRE, ORACULUM, ANTIVERSUM, CASKET ROBBERY, BLACK BLOOD INVOCATION, SACROSCUM, MORBITORY

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  5 Responses »
Jul 282017
 

 

Although I put together a round-up of news and new music yesterday, I still had a lot of new stuff I wanted to spread around today. As I began picking through a very long list of newly revealed tracks, it dawned on me that a big chunk of what I found attractive fell within the realms of death metal. And that’s what I’ve got for you below — new (or newly discovered) deathly music from 8 bands.

DYSCARNATE

Five years after their superb last album and with a new bassist/vocalist (Al Llewellyn) now in the three-person line-up, Dyscarnate are returning with their third full-length, With All Their Might. Yesterday DECIBEL premiered a new song and video from the album, and it’s  fittingly named “Iron Strengthens Iron“. Continue reading »

A NEW DARK DESCENT SAMPLER ARRIVES, WITH BRAND NEW SONGS BY 11 BANDS

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  5 Responses »
Jul 282017
 

 

Colorado-based Dark Descent Records must be very, very happy with 2017. (I’m talking about their slate of music releases, of course, because many other things about the year suck harder than a shop vac.) Here we are just past the halfway point, and Dark Descent has already served up new albums by the likes of Heresiarch, Undergang, Father Befouled, Bestia Arcana, Ascended Dead, Phrenelith, Ensnared, Gorephilia, Craven Idol, Lantern, Excommunion, Sarcasm, and Diabolical Messiah, and a new EP by Devouring Star (and I might have overlooked something).

But with more than five months left in the year, the label has a lot more nastiness up its sleeve, and today we’re getting a big taste of what’s to come. Today Dark Descent has released via Bandcamp and YouTube a new sampler that consists of a whopping 11 track premieres all at once, and they all happen to be from releases we’ve been very eager to hear, or that come as very intriguing surprises. Many appear headed our way before year-end; some may not arrive until 2018.

Below you’ll find some info about those 11 offerings, plus impressions of the music (aided by a bit of a sneak peak we got in advance), and of course streams of each song. To begin, here’s the track list: Continue reading »

BRIDGE BURNER: “ILLNESS & LOATHING”

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  1 Response »
Jul 242017
 

 

(Our friend from New Zealand Craig Hayes (Six Noises) brings us this alert about the first excerpt of sound from the new album by NZ’s Bridge Burner.)

Crusty New Zealand death metal band Bridge Burner features members who’ve played in groups like Graves, Diocletian, Ulcerate, Punished, Heresiarch, Witchrist, In Dread Response, and The Mark of Man. That’s an intimidating roll call of bands, but I’d draw your attention to the first name on that list, because the death of turbo-speed Auckland punk/metal band Graves resulted in the birth of Bridge Burner.

Graves released a couple of thoroughly neck-wrecking and nihilistic albums before calling it quits in 2015. And the band’s guitarist, Josh Hughes, went on to compose all the pulverizing music on Bridge Burner’s first EP, Mantras of Self Loathing. That release featured a crushing mix of brute-force punk and death metal, and vocalist/lyricist Ben Read howled with unhinged rage over the vitriolic barrages within. Mantras of Self Loathing’s marriage of intensity to belligerence promised great things, and Bridge Burner have recently stoked the fires of anticipation even more by releasing the preliminary mix of a storming track entitled “Illness & Loathing” from their upcoming full-length debut. Continue reading »

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