DRAGGED INTO SUNLIGHT

 Album Reviews  8 Responses »
Jan 292011
 

Last year, Prosthetic Records made its first signing of a UK band — a mysterious foursome called Dragged Into Sunlight — and last week the label reissued the band’s debut album, Hatred For Mankind, which was originally released in more limited distribution more than a year ago by Mordgrimm Records (Anaal Nathrakh, Covenant).

The album, was produced by Tom Dring and Billy Anderson — who has also produced groundbreaking albums by Eyehategod, Neurosis, Melvins, Weedeater and many more — and it features the striking cover art of Justin Bartlett (shown above, with the CD booklet unfolded to show the front and back as a single piece).

Now, you wouldn’t be visiting this site if you didn’t have a taste for extremity in your metal, but even so, we may be pushing the envelope for many of you by promoting this music. Listening to it is a harrowing but remarkable experience. It’s a cataclysmic, corrosive, chaotic, cathartic, crushing cavalcade of cacophony. It’s one of the most disturbingly brilliant albums we’ve ever heard. 

And there’s a weird footnote to this story, which involves YouTube banning the band’s one official video yesterday, not because it’s extremely disturbing (which it is) but because — blasphemy of blasphemies — it shows a penis. (more after the jump, including a song that will gut you like a fish . . .) Continue reading »

THE SYNN REPORT, PART 3: EXTOL

 Album Reviews, THE SYNN REPORT  8 Responses »
Jan 272011
 

Our UK contributor Andy Synn returns with another edition of The Synn Report.

A band with a profound, and vastly underrated, influence on many of today’s bands, Norway’s Extol were in many ways the epitome of counter-culture in metal circles at one time. Whereas the majority of their countrymen were quite happy to worship Satan and live out their darkest black metal fantasies, these 5 individuals decided to play a progressive form of technical death/thrash metal with a lyrical bent covering their own shared Christian spirituality. Blasphemy!

Over the course of their career this Norwegian five-piece were never afraid to push the envelope with their sound and playing, their technical skills and song-writing prowess a real testament to their dedicated pursuit of musical perfection and progression. Difficult to precisely define in terms of sound and scene-affiliation, the band is most broadly described as a Progressive Metal band; at times (particularly in the early days) the band were notably extreme.

(more after the jump, including sample songs from Extol’s discography . . .)

Continue reading »

BRUTALLY DECEASED

 Album Reviews  14 Responses »
Jan 262011
 

If you’re the sort who experiences an adrenaline surge when you hear the name Dismember, then read on. If all the blood drains from your head when you see the names Entombed or Carnage or Grave or Interment, and surges into the parts of your body (male or female) that swell when in a state of arousal, then read on. If you’re getting creeped out reading this, even though you don’t know what we’re talking about, you have our permission to move on with your usual web-surfing.

What we’re talking about is the kind of Swedish death metal that mimics the internal combustion engine in its most rudimentary state, the kind that sounds like a massive machine that’s never had a tune-up, with holes gouged in the muffler, running hot, rough, and loud, and polluting the ecosystem with massive clouds of petrochemical effluent.

What we’re talking about is a near-perfect tribute to those bands named above, as expertly executed by an outfit from the Czech Republic called Brutally Deceased (named for the song by Grave from 1992’s You’ll Never See…, of course) on their debut album Dead Lover’s Guide. If you’re stifling a yawn and thinking, “not another old-school Swedeath revival act”, then this may not be your thang. But if the drool is starting to drip down your chin, then read on. (more after the jump . . .) Continue reading »

MISCELLANY NO. 20

 Album Reviews, MISCELLANY  8 Responses »
Jan 222011
 

A month has passed since we ran our last MISCELLANY post. A month between these posts is way too long. With that kind of lag, we’re even more behind in checking out new bands. We may have to run a bunch of these posts next week in an effort to catch up.

For any new readers out there, here’s the drill: NCS keeps a running list of bands who look interesting based on band e-mails or MySpace friend requests, reader recommendations, press releases, or news blurbs, and then every so often I pick a few names off the list and go listen to a song (or sometimes two). In these MISCELLANY posts, I write about what I heard and give you a chance to listen, too.

Because we don’t know the music in advance, there’s no guarantee about the results, but we’ve had good luck in the past.  For today’s installment in this series, I listened to music from Achren (Scotland) and Giant of the Mountain (The Republic of Texas) — and was blown away by both. (more after the jump . . .) Continue reading »

QUICK TAKES: THE EVIL AMIDST

 Album Reviews  4 Responses »
Jan 212011
 

(Here we have the fourth installment in our week-long effort to catch up on albums we like with shorter-than-usual reviews.)

Light the torches in a cave deep underground, let the cavern fill up with black smoke, tread carefully through the decaying skulls of those who were not worthy, and bow down at the altar of irresistible convulsion in the shrine of double-bass and the blackened riffing that cannot be denied. All ye acolytes of Immortal, Immolation, Incantation and Behemoth, take heed: The ceremony is about to begin, with the Lords of the Nine presiding.

That’s the name of the debut album by The Evil Amidst — Lords of the Nine. It was released in late September 2010, but we only discovered it recently. It’s a concept album about demon mythology in the realms of dark fantasy. It’s also so well-attuned to our tastes that it could have come out a decade ago and we’d still be writing about it.

The members of The Evil Amidst are well-practiced in the black arts of bone crushing: the line-up includes two members of Malevolent Creation – Gio Geraca on lead guitar and Gus Rios on drums; Kult ov Azazel‘s Xaphan on guitar; HatePlow‘s Lenny Warmbrandt providing the vocals; and Kamelot‘s Sean Tibbetts on bass. But from what we’ve read, this band isn’t just a one-off side-project, but a group that apparently intends to stay together, tour, and continue recording notwithstanding the members’ commitments to other projects. And well they should.  (more after the jump . . .) Continue reading »

QUICK TAKES: HAT

 Album Reviews  21 Responses »
Jan 202011
 

(This is the third installment in this week’s run of brief album reviews – or at least brief by our usual standards.)

Five days ago we posted a review of a forthcoming album by a long-running Polish death metal band called Hate. At roughly the same time as we were listening to that album, we were also listening to a new album by a band called Hat, which is the Norwegian word for . . . wait for it . . . hate. Actually, it’s the word for hatred, but close enough. So, you could say it was a hate-filled week at NCS, except what we’re feeling for the music of Hat is far from hatred.

The Norwegian word hat is pronounced like the English word “hot”, and that’s a good word for Hat’s forthcoming album, Vortex of Death: It’s hot. That is, if you like your black metal extremely old school and chilled down to the temperature of liquid nitrogen.

Hat is a two-man horde originally formed in 1993 by Nevresch and Undertrykker under the name Ravner. They were inactive from 1996 to 2006, and then reunited under that Norwegian name for hatred. They released a demo in 2008 called Livet Ebber ut (“life ebbs away”) and then a debut record in 2009 called The Demise of Mankind. Perhaps you’re beginning to get the sense that in the world of Hat, there is no sweetness and light. But the album has hooked us, and one unusual song in particular.  (more after the jump, including a track . . .) Continue reading »

QUICK TAKES: ERIMHA

 Album Reviews  8 Responses »
Jan 192011
 


Yesterday’s installment in our week-long attempt to catch up on album reviews by being atypically brief was a blast of bleak brutality from Contaigeon. Today, we’re swinging the pendulum back over to the more melodic end of the metal spectrum with an unsigned band from Montreal called Erimha, whose music we heard after getting a MySpace friend request from them.

Every band has to start someplace, but some bands (few of them) start fast. With their debut album, Irkalla, Erimha bolts from the starting blocks like they’ve been shot from a gun. Irkalla is an epic blend of melodic black-death metal — dramatic, haunting, memorable, and remarkably assured both in the songwriting and in the execution.

If references help you, the music reminded me at different times of Insomnium, Keep of Kelessin, and even Behemoth. There’s a grim grandeur to the musical style. It achieves dramatic power through its dark melodies without ever veering into cheese, and it manages to retain an icy edge despite its often panoramic sweep. I could be justly accused of excessive enthusiasm over many things, so you may have to take this with a grain of salt, but I’m completely taken over by this music.  (more after the jump . . .) Continue reading »

QUICK TAKES: CONTAIGEON

 Album Reviews  7 Responses »
Jan 182011
 

New albums have been stacking up here at NCS at a rapid pace, and lots of gems have been sparkling in that pile. However, it’s become obvious that as much as we’d like to write full reviews of all those gems, there just ain’t enough fucking time. So, rather than just give up and say nothing, over the next four days we’re going to write briefly about four of the albums that have grabbed our attention in the last couple of weeks.

Don’t be misled by the brevity of our verbiage — these albums are worth your close attention, and there should be something in here to almost everyone’s liking, because the genres in play cover a goodly spectrum of extreme metal. For today, we have something for those of you asylum-dwellers who like your metal especially brutal, scalding, sometimes dirge-like, and gloriously, atmospherically evil from end to end.

CONTAIGEON

One of our readers highly recommended Contaigeon to us within the last 60 days. I usually make a note of where music tips come from so we can provide approprite acknowledgments, but I failed do it this time, and now I’ll be fucked if I can remember. Whoever you are out there, I owe you a big thank-you because this band is just crashingly brilliant.  (more after the jump . . .) Continue reading »

THE SYNN REPORT, PART 2: THE GREAT DECEIVER

 Album Reviews, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC, THE SYNN REPORT  No Responses »
Jan 172011
 

Our UK contributor Andy Synn returns with another edition of The Synn Report.

Hello everyone. For those of you who enjoyed my last column, I’m back again with another band recommended and dissected – this time it’s the turn of THE GREAT DECEIVER.

The band have been active since the late 1990’s and feature in their ranks two particularly famous men from the Swedish metal scene. Whilst you may well recognise the name Tomas Lindberg (vocals) quite easily, you may not be aware that guitarist Kristian Wåhlin is also known by the name “Necrolord” and has famously produced cover art for many of metal’s elite, from Dissection, At The Gates and Emperor, to newer bands such as The Black Dahlia Murder and Becoming The Archetype.

With a musical foundation in both the Swedish hardcore and melodic death metal scenes, coupled with an intense fascination for the moody post-punk atmospheres of Joy Division (of whom vocalist Tomas Lindberg has claimed to be an avowed fan), the sound of The Great Deceiver is difficult to precisely pigeon-hole.

Whilst the guitars have a distinctly metal edge to them, the song structures and tempos lend themselves more towards the hardcore-leaning listener, albeit coupled with a distinctly odd use of twisted melody. The use of heavy tremolo-pedal distortion on the guitar leads and ringing chords is perhaps the most distinctive and consistent motif throughout the band’s work, on a par with the distinctive vocal delivery of Mr Tomas Lindberg himself. (more after the jump, including sample tracks from the band’s discography) Continue reading »

HATE

 Album Reviews  5 Responses »
Jan 152011
 

It’s January, not December, so many months will pass before we turn again to compiling a list of the year’s most infectious extreme metal songs. But if we were to do it now, ten songs on the list would come from Hate‘s new album, Erebos. It’s death metal heroin, a charged syringe of addiction, a heatseeking missile headed for the hottest part of your brain.

Hexen can flat-out fly on the drums, creating an aura of chaos without losing control, rumbling and rocking, inflicting the blasts and the double-bass at just the right moments, jolting you hard as he marks the time signatures.

Adam the First Sinner and Destroyer are galvanizing guitarists — dextrous, fiery, capable of generating a variety of tones with a variety of techniques, applying hacksaws to your spine, triggering helpless convulsions, swarming, swirling, sawing, whining, but never veering far from a foundation of industrial-strength hammering.

Mortifer‘s playing is taut and icy, his bass running underneath in a rumbling thrum and then syncing up with the guitar rhythms to infect those quasi-industrial riffs that won’t let you stay still.  (more after the jump, including a track . . .) Continue reading »

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