SHADES OF BLACK: COSCRADH, ENDSPACE, MERCULISTARYA, CAGED BASTARD

 Album Reviews, SHADES OF BLACK  2 Responses »
Jan 112026
 

(written by Islander)

This morning I read an unexpectedly engrossing essay written by a woman who unexpectedly became an obsessive fan of a Broadway musical named Operation Mincemeat. She makes very clear that fanatical fandom isn’t typically part of her personality — far from it. She spends the entire essay thinking out loud, trying to understand why she has seen the musical at least 12 times, interspersed with evidence of her obsession and stories about how the musical came to be and what it’s about.

Eventually the writer comes close to an answer, which is that the musical is an exception to the “desert drought of originality and ideas” that surrounds us. She writes: Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD ON A SATURDAY: INCANDESCENCE, SPEGLAS, PIGPEN, HEIR CORPSE ONE, DEADWOOD, PATRIARCHS IN BLACK, EXHUMED

 Album Reviews, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC, SHORT BUT SWEET  No Responses »
Jan 102026
 

(written by Islander)

I’m obviously still doing what I usually do around here, picking out some new songs and videos to share with you this weekend. But in addition to being overwhelmed by the sudden January surge in new music, the task has been especially difficult because I’ve been so infuriated and depressed by the murder in Minneapolis, the outrageous bald-faced lies spouted about it by Trump and his minions, including the fabricated demonizing of the deceased, and the likelihood that the murderer will face no accountability at all. Only ten days into the New Year, and 2026 already looks devastatingly dark here in the U.S.

I haven’t listened to new music over the last couple of days to take my mind off these events, or other terrible events both here and around the world. I do often immerse myself in music for that very reason, as many people do — to get some relief from more awful aspects of existence. But not now. The rage and the sadness aren’t going to be diverted. Now, I’m just trying to keep my head down and carry on because I don’t have any better ideas, even though it seems on days like this that what we’re doing here is unimportant in the grand scheme of things.

Well, sorry for unloading like that. I still want you to listen to all the songs I picked for today. In my humble estimation, they’re all very good, even though I suspect I’ll appreciate them even more on some distant and brighter day. Continue reading »

KREATOR – KRUSHERS OF THE WORLD

 Album Reviews  4 Responses »
Jan 082026
 

(Andy Synn has loved Kreator for a long time… but does he love their new album, out 16 January?)

Let’s get one thing straight… Krushers of the World is one of the best albums of the year so far.

Of course, we’re only 8 days into the year, so if you really think about it the above statement isn’t really saying much, but it’s a nice way to start the review, right?

Maybe it’ll be more helpful to say this… Kreator have been going for over 40(!) years now, and are considered living legends for a reason, but on their 16th(!!) album they somehow still come out swinging with the energy and intensity of a much, much younger band.

And, really, at this stage in their career, what more could you ask for than that?

Continue reading »

THINGS YOU MAY HAVE MISSED (BUT SHOULDN’T)

 Album Reviews  3 Responses »
Jan 062026
 

(Andy Synn has not one, not four, but six albums from 2025 to recommend that may have passed you by)

We might be in a new year… in fact, I’m pretty sure we are… but that doesn’t mean we can leave 2025 behind without one last look at a few releases that might have flown under the radar.

Of course, you may also want to check out my extensive, five-part year-end assessment to find even more stuff to check out before 2026 really kicks into gear (and to help you out I’ve provided the relevant links below):

But before you do, make sure to give each of these artists/albums – which collectively cover a pretty good swathe of styles and genres – a chance, as you might just like what you hear!

Continue reading »

SHADES OF BLACK: WOE, INNER CLOISTER, PILLAR AMONGST WILLOWS

 Album Reviews, SHADES OF BLACK, SHORT BUT SWEET  2 Responses »
Jan 042026
 

(written by Islander)

I had grand ambitions for this column but they were derailed when I spent more than five alcohol-assisted hours yesterday afternoon and evening watching an especially important football game with my spouse and friends, and then celebrating the outcome. When all was said and done I must have needed a really long period of sleep, because that’s what I got. As I write this, the day is well underway but my head hasn’t caught up yet.

Well, enough about me. I should turn to the music I’d like to recommend, even though the lateness of the hour and the slowness of my mind have conspired to make this column shorter than originally planned. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD ON A SATURDAY: FROST, EXCAVATED GRAVES, DWELLNOUGHT, A LIGHT WITHIN, GROS ENFANT MORT, NEON SCAFFOLD

 Album Reviews, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC, SHORT BUT SWEET  No Responses »
Jan 032026
 

(written by Islander)

Here we have the first Saturday NCS roundup of new songs and videos in 2026. It’s a temporal and stylistic mix of things. Temporally, some of it is from records released in 2025 and some from releases slated to happen this year. Stylistically, it will jump you around like popcorn kernels getting hot, including one new song and video that’s well outside our usual musical focus and a closing selection that’s beyond categorization.

I don’t expect everyone to enjoy everything I’ve assembled here, even though I do. That would be too much to expect. I do hope you’ll find at least one thing to brighten your day (i.e., to darken it like a storm cloud). Continue reading »

ULVER – NEVERLAND

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Jan 022026
 

(Andy Synn begins another new year here at NCS with a new album by an old favourite)

The turning of the year is all about change, about rebirth and renewal… and if one band’s career has epitomised all of these things it’s that of Black Metal’s very own “lost boys”, Ulver.

That being said, as someone who’s been a fan of the band for a long time (especially since they fell out of the Black Metal pram and landed somewhere much stranger), the group’s last couple of albums (Drone Activity excluded) have – in my opinion, at least – fallen into a bit of a creative rut, with their attempts to follow in the footsteps of 2017’s fantastic, career redefining, The Assassination of Julius Caesar resulting in increasingly diminishing returns.

Thankfully, however, if history has taught us anything about Ulver it’s that they’re never too far from another stylistic shift, and with the start of a new year comes the start of yet another new era for the band.

Or does it?

Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD ON A NEW YEAR’S DAY: KARLOFF, TOMBSEEKER, HEXER, 1986, KATHAREIN, HURSAN

 Album Reviews, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC, SHORT BUT SWEET  2 Responses »
Jan 012026
 


Seattle Space Needle in the fog, Dec. 31, 2025, photo by Akash Pamarthy for The Seattle Times

(written by Islander)

Yesterday a newsletter I subscribe to (“This, Not That“) compiled quotations by many famous writers about New Year’s Day and the ending of the previous year, some of them humorous, some of them depressing, some of them wise. One of the quotes, by Charles Lamb, seemed to sum up all the others: “No one ever regarded the First of January with indifference.”

I’m certainly not indifferent. I’m determined… determined not to let the day go by without posting here about new music, notwithstanding the likelihood that many people are too hungover or sleep-deprived to wreck their heads with our preferred sonics today. It’s a compulsion of long standing, one that has resulted in our making some kind of music post 365 days a year, or close to that, with fewer than a dozen missed days over the 16+ years of our site’s existence.

As it always does, the new year of heavy music won’t waste much time taking off and achieving orbit velocity. We’ve already seen and spotlighted lots of songs from albums slated for release in the new year’s first quarter, and more will begin surfacing at an accelerated rate after this relatively slow week ends. I’ve picked an array of recent surfacings in this New Year’s Day column.

But, for better or worse, we haven’t completely finished reflecting in other ways on the music that 2025 brought us, including a few of today’s picks. Continue reading »

SHADES OF BLACK: GATES OF DAWN, HANDFUL OF HATE, THE BLOOD MOUNTAIN BLACK METAL CHOIR, ISLEPTONTHEMOON, WOUNDS OF RECOLLECTION

 Album Reviews, SHADES OF BLACK, SHORT BUT SWEET  No Responses »
Dec 282025
 

(written by Islander)

We’ve arrived at the last SHADES OF BLACK column for 2025.

If you read yesterday’s column (and surely you did, and no I’m not calling you Shirley) then you’ll know I’m flying the coop mid-morning today to watch a football game at the local sports bar (there’s only one), accompanied by my spouse and a good old friend. Despite that plan I did not wake up extra early (it is a Sunday, after all) to finish today’s column, and I wasn’t able to make much of a head start yesterday due to watching a very long movie set on a planet where the indigenous peoples have tails (watching in 3D, no less), followed by dinner at the very same sports bar where we’ll be returning in a couple of hours.

Given my limited time, I had to make some hard choices, but also some extremely impulsive ones. How impulsive? Well, despite the fact that I had my own very long list of candidates from which to select, I chose one thing I didn’t know about until this morning. However, the first thing below has been on my radar for a while. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD ON A SATURDAY: JUODVARNIS, ANGERSEED, MAGNACULT, SKULLD, GAMO GRIND, GRAVETAKER

 Album Reviews, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC, SHORT BUT SWEET  No Responses »
Dec 272025
 

(written by Islander)

We all made it through Christmas week more or less intact, not just those of us who toil here at NCS but you too, or you wouldn’t be reading this. Taking some deep breaths, we now look ahead to the final five days of 2025. We have a few more year-end lists to share from friends of our site, although I think one or two of those won’t appear until on or after New Year’s Day. And somewhere around the first day of 2026 I’ll start rolling out the last part of our year-end LISTMANIA celebration, the only one I’m responsible for — our list of 2025’s Most Infectious Extreme Metal Songs.

In the meantime, here’s one last 2025 edition of SEEN AND HEARD, and tomorrow I hope to bring you the year’s last edition of SHADES OF BLACK (it’s more hope than promise because there’s a mid-morning start on Sunday to an NFL football game that will rivet my attention; one does not live by metal alone).

As usually happens, the flood of new music diminished during Christmas week, although there was plenty of actual flooding out here on the U.S. West Coast. However, the diminished music stream still included some very good offerings, on top of what had breached the levees in the weeks before that. As you try to recover from the week just ended and begin peering ahead toward 2026 with some combination of fear, loathing, and maybe glimmers of hope, I hope you’ll enjoy what follows. Continue reading »

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