Album Reviews Archives - Page 156 of 557

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): MORTUUS INFRADAEMONI — “INMORTUOS SUM”

Mar 232022

“Sumptuous” might not be the first word that springs to mind in considering a new album by a band who proudly embrace baleful black metal traditions from the mid-’90s, but it actually suits the forthcoming third full-length by Germany’s Mortuus Infradaemoni.

For one thing, the band have loaded the new album Inmortuos Sum with more than an hour’s worth of music, which perhaps should be expected given that a long 13 years separated this new one from the band’s last full-length, Imis Avernis. But it is lavish in other ways, beyond its significant length, as you’ll discover through our complete premiere of the record today. Continue reading »

KVAEN – THE GREAT BELOW

Album Reviews 3 Responses »

Mar 232022

(Andy Synn checks out the new album from Kvaen, set for release Friday, to see if the band’s fire still burns as brightly)

I’d hazard a guess that most – if not all – bands, when they’re first starting out, do so with the dream that their first album is going to be the sort of massive breakthrough that instantly puts them on the map and establishes them as a force to be reckoned with.

What a lot of them probably don’t consider, however, is that this sort of instant, straight-out-of-the-blocks success can be both a double-edged sword and an albatross around your neck.

After all, I’m sure we can all name a number of bands whose debut immediately got them over with the fans but who, for whatever reason, never quite managed to achieve that same level of impact or intensity again.

Case in point, Kvaen‘s debut album, The Funeral Pyre, was unquestionably one of the best albums of 2020, one which seemed to come out of nowhere and immediately establish the band (in reality the solo project of multi-instrumentalist Jakob Björnfot) as a force to be reckoned with.

Two years have passed since then, however, and the impending release of the project’s second album, The Great Below, now has two major questions hanging over it… can lightning strike in the same place twice?

And, if so, can Kvaen capture it in a bottle once again?

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): DESOLATE SHRINE — “FIRES OF THE DYING WORLD”

Album Reviews, Premieres 5 Responses »

Mar 222022

In 2017 our man Andy Synn reviewed Desolate Shrine‘s Deliverance From the Godless Void (along with the band’s preceding three albums), calling that fourth full-length in the group’s discography “another triumph of will and wickedness, and well worth getting hold of if you’ve ever had an urge for a truly masochistic metallic experience.”

With “a production that may be more powerful than ever”, Andy wrote, “the band are still as foul and filthy at heart as they have always been, at times bringing to bear a crippling sense of dissonance and discordance,” meshing together “neck-wrecking grooves”, “gnarly, guttural vocals,” “bulldozing riffs,” “strangling bass lines,” and “foul, demonic atmospherics” to produce a truly electrifying experience.

After a 4 1/2 year wait this devastatingly talented Finnish trio now return with their new fifth album, Fires of the Dying World, which Dark Descent Records will release on March 25th. The wait is now only days away from ending, but today you’ll get to hear the album without any further delay, as we present a full stream below. Continue reading »

BEST OF BRITISH – HELPLESS / SIDIOUS / TUSKAR

Album Reviews No Responses »

Mar 212022

(Andy Synn brings us three more examples of British brilliance)

It feels like absolutely ages since I’ve written one of these columns, but – after double-checking – it turns out I actually did do one just last month.

For some reason my sense of time has been all out of whack this year, to the point where the days either feel like they’re rushing by (meaning I simply don’t have time to write about all the things I want to) or else have been slowed to a mind-numbing crawl (meaning the wait for new releases seems interminable).

My terrible time-keeping, therefore, is ultimately what’s to blame for this particular edition of “The Best of British” covering such a wide spread, as one of the album’s featured here has been out for almost a full month, the other was released a few weeks ago, and the third isn’t out until Friday, making for a mixed-bag of older, newer, and unreleased records for you to wrap your ears around.

Thankfully one thing that isn’t mixed is the quality, as each of these albums represents the very best work yet by each of the three bands in question. So let’s start the show, shall we?

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): NECROMANTE — “XI”

Album Reviews, Premieres No Responses »

Mar 212022

Most of our parents tried to educate us about the importance of first impressions, even the ones who didn’t seem to be very good about setting a useful example. Many of us didn’t take the lesson seriously, or tried and failed often enough that we stopped caring. Necromante, however, learned the lesson well.

The first track on their new album XI, “The Equinox of New Aeon“, seizes attention with a haunting melody of piano and strings and two speakers (one of them gloomily beseeching and one of them demonstrably demonic) fighting to be heard. Even people who don’t speak the language can make out the name “Lucifer”.

But this is only the first piece of their first impression, and they answer their own call with the rest of it when “Lucifer Rising” floods the senses with diabolical riffing that blares, jolts, skitters, and darts, backed by drums that pummel and clatter, overlaid with scorching goblin snarls. The aroma of sulphur is strong, the black magic is vivid, and Lucifer does indeed rise as the music itself rises in a vision of infernal grandeur. Continue reading »

GGGOLDDD: “THIS SHAME SHOULD NOT BE MINE”

Album Reviews, Exceptions to the Rule No Responses »

Mar 212022

(Our friend Justin Collins rejoins us with the following review of GGGOLDDD‘s new album, which is due for release on April 1st via Toronto-based Artoffact Records.)

The time many of us have spent in isolation during the pandemic has, not surprisingly, had a wide range of psychological effects. I’m kind of a recluse to begin with, so I enjoyed the chance to work from home and more or less be left alone. The downside to that is that whatever emotional weight we might have been carrying around can certainly demand attention, louder than before. The distractions are fewer, allowing more space for any obsessions, regrets, and fears that might have otherwise remained drowned out by the larger world.

Milena Eva, singer of the band GGGOLDDD (formerly known as GOLD–we’re all at the mercy of Googlability at this point), found that she needed an outlet for some of those dark thoughts. She was raped at age 19, and she took the opportunity to try to process that pain in a piece commissioned for the online edition of Roadburn 2021.

I’ve been a long-time fan of this band, and the Roadburn performance–what would become the album This Shame Should Not Be Mine–was revelatory. Not only had the band achieved new artistic heights, but they’d also created a piece that had specific resonance for me. I was sexually assaulted nearly 30 years ago, and perhaps like Eva, I struggled for many years for what to do with that information. I didn’t even manage to tell anyone until 25 years after the fact. Continue reading »

SHADES OF BLACK (PART 2): SAVAGE NECROMANCY, ABOLITION RITUAL, PHENOCRYST

Album Reviews, SHADES OF BLACK, SHORT BUT SWEET No Responses »

Mar 202022

In rooting around among new releases over the past week I got myself into some pretty nasty and gnarly music. Because it’s my habit to impulsively share whatever I happen to be into, I’m sharing some of that with you here. But it’s not just the nastiness that hooked me to these releases. As I hope you’ll agree, the following two albums (and one EP) have other qualities that make them noteworthy.

Fair warning: on the spectrum of black/death metal, most of these lean more in the direction of death. Further fair warning: I haven’t had time to write thorough reviews, just some very broad and possibly superficial impressions, just a come-on for you to do your own listening.

SAVAGE NECROMANCY (U.S.)

The vocalist of this Arizona band has a great pseudonym — Diabolical Fuckwitch Of The Black Flame — and she also has a helluva voice. She opens the band’s debut album Feathers Fall To Flames with a gripping performance in the opening track “Milenio De La Crucifixión”. There she voices a fervent melodic chant in Spanish, though later in the album she also growls like a subterranean hell beast and howls like a rabid wolf. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): CAEDEOUS — “OBSCURUS PERPETUO” (AND A VIDEO PREMIERE TOO!)

Album Reviews, Premieres, SHORT BUT SWEET No Responses »

Mar 182022

On March 22nd the Portuguese symphonic black metal metal band Caedeous will release their third album, Obscurus Perpetua, and today we present not only the premiere of the album as a whole but also an official video for the song “Magisteri Peccatorum“.

If we were trained medical professionals we’d advise you to take your seats and get a firm grip on something solid before embarking on this journey, because Obscurus Perpetua is a dazzling, diabolical, and disorienting trip through the imperiums of Hell. The music is elaborate and unpredictable, theatrical and bombastic, sometimes breathtaking in its splendor but always as scary as your worst nightmares. Fascinating music, to be sure, but also demented and intensely unnerving. Continue reading »

GLOSON – THE RIFT

Album Reviews 1 Response »

Mar 162022

(Andy Synn descends into The Rift, the astonishing new album from Sweden’s Gloson)

Let me ask you something… what is it that makes one album, or one artist, better than another?

It’s not a question with an easy or simple answer, I know.

There are some people, for example, who seem to believe that being more accessible – more listenable, more likable, more relatable – is something that inherently makes an artist/album better, as their music is now capable of appealing to a wider audience.

On the flip-side of this, though, there are also those who affirm that becoming more challenging, more difficult, more complex – in any of a variety of different ways – is the only true way to keep getting better as a band.

Ultimately, of course, it’s all somewhat subjective, and each of us will have a slightly different set of criteria, a different suite of sensibilities which need to be satisfied (or not), in order to make that judgement for ourselves.

So when I tell you that The Rift, the second album from Swedish quartet Gloson is by some margin the best Post-/Sludge Metal album I’ve heard so far this year – surpassing even Cult of Luna‘s fantastic new record (a statement which I’m sure will inspire much shock and consternation amongst many of our readers) – chances are that some of you will believe me, and some of you won’t.

But that’s fine. Because it’s still true either way.

PERSECUTORY – SUMMONING THE LAWLESS LEGIONS

Album Reviews No Responses »

Mar 142022

(Andy Synn joins the lawless legions of Persecutory fans with this review of the band’s new album)

So, it’s official – my Hardcore phase which dominated the start of this year is now over and I am now fully engrossed in a shameless Black Metal binge, with new reviews for Vanum, Vimur, Terzij de Horde, Feral Light, and more, all in the works.

Before I get to any of those records, however, I want to draw your attention to Summoning the Lawless Legions, the recently-released second album from Istanbul’s Persecutory, as ever since I discovered it last week I’ve become addicted to its devilish delights. Continue reading »

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