DYING FETUS: “REIGN SUPREME”

 Album Reviews  25 Responses »
Jun 252012
 

(In this post, TheMadIsraeli reviews the new album from Dying Fetus.)

Let’s just face it: Dying Fetus are the shit.  I mean, this band has it all:  bestial vocals, explosively propulsive drum work, and utterly punishing grooves and riffs that drive listeners into every possible brain-suffocating convulsion imaginable.  Everything that good death metal should be has always been contained in the package that is Dying Fetus.

We all know this band has endured some membership changes, of course. John Gallagher has had a hard time maintaining a consistent lineup to assist in his brutality crusade.  The only member who’s been long-standing since the departure of the Destroy The Opposition lineup has been bassist, and now also high-end vocalist, Sean Beasley, who joined the band at Stop At Nothing and has soldiered on since.  Gallagher and Beasley have really become the focal point of Dying Fetus.  Trey Williams, drummer on Descend Into Depravity, is still here as well, the first drummer Gallagher has managed to keep for more than one album since Kevin Talley.

I admire Gallagher’s iron will to press on and persevere; the music he writes is still some of the most technically apt, precision-guided, hammer-to-the-skull death metal I’ve ever heard.  I don’t think there is a single Fetus album I would tell you is bad, mediocre, or even merely good.  They’re all excellent. But Reign Supreme is, in few words, a perfect album. Continue reading »

THE STRANDED: “SURVIVALISM BOULEVARD”

 Album Reviews  5 Responses »
Jun 252012
 

(In this post, DGR reviews the debut album by The Stranded, which is available on Coroner Records.)

The Stranded are an interesting proposition from a musical standpoint. They’re a new group, formed by the two men responsible for Disarmonia Mundi, an Italian melo-death/groove metal project alongside keyboardist Allesio NeroArgento and pro skateboarder Elliot Sloan. Elliot plays guitar and bass on this record, with the two DM gentlemen (Ettore Rigotti and Claudio Ravinale) taking responsibility for the vocals, drums and guitars. You can pretty much figure out why I jumped onto this group’s bandwagon early on, considering my deep and abiding love for DM’s Isolation Game release. It has also been close to three years since that disc hit.

The story behind how this band formed has to be interesting. I wonder who contacted whom when this band was just beginning, and how Elliot found himself involved with this specific group of guys. They are still a melodeath band, but the addition of a dedicated key player has brought them closer to what most people are familiar with after listening to groups such as Dark Tranquillity. They announced their formation late last year, and for a while it was a pretty slow drip feed of information. However, we now have a full release from The Stranded, and it is interesting, to say the least.

Survivalism Boulevard is an album that ping-pongs back and forth between various styles, while still staying somewhat familiar at its core. The presence of someone new in a full keyboard position does quite a bit to change things up. Many of the hooks on this album are delivered via the keyboard, a couple of them cheesier than all get out and others fitting in perfectly with the music. They produce the strange effect of making this project sound a little less ‘mature’ (probably a poor choice of words, maybe ‘refined’?) than what the guys in The Stranded are involved in usually. Continue reading »

SHORT BUT SWEET (AND FREE): VOID FORGER – “RUINED”

 Album Reviews, Free Shit, SHORT BUT SWEET  1 Response »
Jun 232012
 

Void Forger are a relatively new three-person band based in Bucharest, Romania, who contacted us recently with a request that we give their music a spin. They have a three-song demo called Ruined that’s available for streaming and free download at Bandcamp — and it’s a very pleasant surprise. The music has gravity, in two senses: (a) it’s heavier than a semi-truck loaded with concrete girders; and (b) both in its compositional elements and in its performance, it’s serious work that’s worthy of respect.

The music is also difficult to categorize. It’s a dark storm of doom and sludge punctuated with flashes of up-tempo grind, crust, and freaked-out noize, with the bleak atmospherics enhanced by cavernous, roaring vocals that barely sound human.

“Pointless Media” moves from doomy pound and crash to a rolling gait, interrupted by a flaming burst of grindcore-like mayhem before settling back into that black, grungy roll, the distorted guitars moaning  a diseased melody.

I’m a sucker for a heavy-assed bass solo, and we get one right near the beginning of “Relief” and then again later in the song. The music staggers and lurches and erupts in whirling frenzy, with a variety of guitar leads and solo’s enhancing the changes in momentum. It’s the most melodic of the three songs, and has become my favorite. Continue reading »

VINTERSORG: “ORKAN”

 Album Reviews, Exceptions to the Rule  11 Responses »
Jun 222012
 

(In the following review, Andy Synn assesses the new album by Sweden’s Vintersorg, which is set for North American release on July 10 by Napalm Records.)

A new Vintersorg album? Already? Well that’s always good news. And what’s even better is that Orkan continues the blackened folk vibe re-established first on Solens Rotter and then carried over to Jordpuls.

To be brutally honest with you, back when Vintersorg announced his participation in Borknagar (for 2001’s Empiricism) I was becoming concerned that the line between the two bands was starting to blur – the shinier, proggier stylings of Cosmic Genesis (still one of my all-time favourite albums) and its two successors weren’t all that far removed from the sounds of Empiricism and Epic. It didn’t help that Mr V’s vocals are amongst the most instantly recognisable in metal, often dominating proceedings and serving to tie the two groups a little too tightly to one another, giving neither the necessary room to breathe.

But all that changed with the release of Solens Rotter. A three-year break between albums saw the duo of Vintersorg and Marklund redefine their priorities to produce the first in what has turned out to be a return to the more rustic, folk-ish melodies and earthen black metal atmosphere of their earlier works,  musical miles away from the soaring, Pink Floydian blackened prog of Borknagar. Last year’s phenomenal Jordpuls continued the trend, actively improving on Solens Rotter in nearly every way, and now we are once more gifted with a new piece of blackened folk art in the form of Orkan. Continue reading »

ASHENCULT: “BLACK FLAME GNOSIS”

 Album Reviews, Free Shit  31 Responses »
Jun 212012
 

(Credit for all photos in this post: Alyssa Lorenzon.)

 

(Listen up: BadWolf presents his favorite black metal album of 2012 to date.)

2012 has been a great year for metal so far, can we agree on that? Unlike 2011, several strong acts, veteran and green alike,  took initiative in releasing powerful works of doom and death metal. On the other hand, the black end of the spectrum has yet to blow me away (although rumor has it that Hell’s Headbangers‘ summer lineup will slaughter). Dodecahedron deserves a second look, and the new Abigail Williams collected strong accolades, both here and elsewhere, but other than that I’m drawing a blank.

Rather, I was drawing a blank until Doug Moore of InvisibleOranges referred me to Ashencult. The Philadelphia PA 4-piece outfit released their debut album, Black Flame Gnosis, on May 31 through Bandcamp. I’ve listened through twice today, and it’s giving me the fever (aye aye).
 


Continue reading »

U CAN HAZ GRINDZ!

 Album Reviews, Free Shit, Phro's Posts  3 Responses »
Jun 202012
 

(It appears Phro has taken the early results of the NCS Reader’s Poll to heart. Not the part about hand jobs or using more polite language. The part about writing more shit for NCS. Below, Phro reviews new releases by Strong Intention (U.S.), Wake (Canada), Dephosphorus (Greece), and Chemical Tomb (UK).)

Hi. It’s morning. I’m pissed about that. Also, I have three things I’d like to shove in your ear hole. Don’t worry, it won’t be a pleasant experience. Least of all for the cockroaches. Probably you’ll have the second worst time of it. Unless you’re one of these girls. Don’t worry, that’s totally safe for work if you work in the vomit porn industry. Or a daycare. Very informative for children. Teaches them the dangers of not listening when Daddy tells not to touch the drugs. (Bad Phro, no touching Daddy’s drugs.) But Phro wants to play!  Phro wants…

Umm…

First up! Strong Intention’s Razorblade Express!
(http://www.facebook.com/STRONGINTENTION)

Daddy…uh…I mean, Islander sent me some albums for review. The first one was the Rumplestiltskin Grinder album from last week. (Great album, isn’t it?) The other two were short grindcore releases. Usually, when I think of grindcore I think of stuff like Wormrot and Circle of Dead Children. Strong Intention wear their hardcore influences a bit more prominently. In fact, like a lot of hardcore, you can actually almost make out the lyrics. I think. Pretty much all I can accurately catch is “Hate this life!” (Which is incredibly apropos this morning.) It sounds as if there’s a screaming, howling, angry wood-chipper fronting the band. (Daddy says not to play with the wood-chipper or he’ll shove my arm in to teach me a lesson.) Continue reading »

GREEKS BEARING GIFTS: TARDIVE DYSKINESIA AND LORD IMPALER

 Album Reviews, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  1 Response »
Jun 182012
 

I should probably apologize for using that overworked Homeric phrase in the post title, but those really were the first words that popped into my addled head when I heard the music featured here over the last 24 hours. I listened to songs from both bands back-to-back, and by coincidence they’re both from Greece, and by further coincidence the music from both is really good — though tremendously different from each other.

TARDIVE DYSKINESIA

We’ve written frequently about Tardive Dyskinesia and various side projects of their members after first being grabbed in a bear hug by the fast-paced, infectious barrage of technically sophisticated music captured on their 2009 album, The Sea of See Through Skins. At long last, 2012 will see the release of their follow-up album, Static Apathy in Fast Forward. In late March, they started streaming a rough mix of a new song called “Prehistoric Man” (featured here), and today brings us an animated lyric video for yet another track, “Time Turns Planets”.

Plunging almost immediately into a neck-wrenching groove, the song lurches and punches its way through a cycle of syncopated riffs and off-beat rhythms, but smooths out in a memorable melodic chorus, blending the ethereal and the heavy quite effectively. Fans of Texture’s 2011 album Dualism ought to pay particular attention to this fusion of piston-driven machine complexity and soaring ambience. The video is fun to watch, too (right after the jump). Continue reading »

KREATOR: “PHANTOM ANTICHRIST”

 Album Reviews  18 Responses »
Jun 182012
 

(To start off our week, TheMadIsraeli reviews the lucky 13th studio album from Germany’s Kreator.)

Why the fuck do I seem to be in the minority for liking thrash metal in today’s scene?  I think people have gotten too spoiled on pretentious, boring, modern metal like post-SYL Devin Townsend and Between the Buried and Me to realize what brutality or savagery is any more.

Thrash metal IS metal at its very core.  It captures the essence of it, quantifiably, in such a way that I don’t understand how anyone could dislike it.  The dislike of the vocals especially baffles me.  Yeah, thrash vocalists who actually try to do bullshit like sing need to get the fuck out, but it’s beyond me when people fail to see the rabid ferocity in, like, you know, SCREAMING AT THE TOP OF YOUR LUNGS AT THE RISK OF COMPLETELY DESTROYING YOUR VOCAL CHORDS!

Anyone who is willing to put their voice on the line for metal earns my seal of approval.  What thrash vocalists such as Tom Araya do can’t be buffered all that much by technique.  It’s the very reason he and some others sound like shit nowadays.

Mille Petrozza, though, has somehow managed to keep shrieking like a banshee without an end in sight and has never lost a bit of the venom in his voice.  On the riffing front, his sword has also not dulled one iota either.  He’s persisted against all odds with Kreator, who really, at this point, are just Mille and company in my view. Continue reading »

SHORT BUT SWEET (AND FREE): LIVARKAHIL – “WRATH OF GOD”

 Album Reviews, Free Shit, SHORT BUT SWEET  12 Responses »
Jun 172012
 

Something about the isolated dual guitar harmony at the beginning of Livarkahil’s new Wrath of God EP sounds a warning, despite the fact that the tone is relatively clean and the melody mournful and memorable. Eventually, the dam bursts and the flood comes, the warning fulfilled. “The Eternal Sun” may start harmoniously, but it soon wrenches necks, and the vocals scald, sear, and melt flesh right down to the bone.

Falling somewhere in the No Man’s Land between Immortal and Behemoth, Livarkahil’s brand of blackened death metal strives for a feeling of martial might, with the sound of massive armies of the night surging across blasted landscapes, implacable and unstoppable. The songs are harsh, stern, infernally imperial, with a titanic low end and a distorted bass and guitar tone that crackles with indigo energy.

That militaristic quality is enhanced by martial drum patterns that emerge here and there in between bouts of blast-beats and thundering double-bass. The riffs hammer like industrial-strength nail-drivers, with the bleak melodies carried by chords that moan and groan and by skittering tremolo-inflicted leads that rise above the crushing barrage that thunders below. The bass delivery is also absolutely pulverizing, like the hammering of giant chains into place, from which there is no escape. Continue reading »

DEATHTRACK

 Album Reviews, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  4 Responses »
Jun 162012
 

I’m writing this on Friday afternoon. I don’t know for sure what I’ll feel like on Saturday morning when this post goes up on the site, but the odds are I’ll have an eye-watering hangover and my blood will be moving through the veins at the speed of sludge. I figure I’ll need something to get the blood pumping, something that will make me feel happy to be alive instead of contemplating the least painful way of killing myself. And as a trained medical professional, I have just the prescription for myself, and for any other Friday-night miscreants in the audience: Deathtrack. Or deathtrack, as the band seem to prefer.

deathtrack are from Norway. I discovered their existence two days ago via a report on the Facebook page of Svölk, with whom deathtrack share a band member (Halstein), that deathtrack were releasing a new EP with a free song download as enticement. So, impulsive creature that I am, I listened to that song (“Demon Cowboy”) plus one other that I found from the new EP (“True Blood”) — and I was SOLD. So sold, in fact, that I went and bought the band’s self-titled debut album on iTunes, in part because it includes a song called “Friday Night’s (All Right For Fighting)”, which seemed like good timing.

This music comes with a CLEAN SINGING! warning, but I’ll tell you what, Harry Hellriffer can sing, with a good, strong, clear voice, which he degrades with a little abrasion at the right moments. I’ll tell you another thing: These fuckers can lay down some heavy riffs and rhythms that make it impossible to sit still. Continue reading »

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