AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): CLOUDS — “DESPRINS”

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Jan 132025
 

(written by Islander)

Today the Romanian/UK band Clouds are releasing their sixth album, Desprins, and we’re helping spread the word by sharing the premiere of the entire record.

From “Disguise” through “The Fall of Hearts,” Desprins includes seven new songs, plus two bonus tracks — “Sorrowbound” and “Chasing Ghosts,” which were released as stand-alone singles in 2022 and 2023, respectively. The band describe the album as “a fearsome journey into the darkness of consciousness, an introspective reflection upon the human existence.”

The lyrics of the new songs are poetic, which is what we’ve come to expect from songwriter Daniel Neagoe. As we have also come to expect, they are expressions of the crushing disappointments, pain, and hollowness of life (“this mockery of hope”) — dark reflections filled with acrimony, loss, regret, and the realization of delusion. Insanity and rage also mark the narrator’s bleak memorials, but not joy or hopefulness; life has extinguished those. Continue reading »

SHADES OF BLACK: PLAGUEWIELDER, FROSTNATT, SAMIARUS, SCHATTENFALL

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Jan 122025
 

(written by Islander)

Here we are again in the very early part of another new year. In these dawning new days with a long stretch of more days looming ahead I’ve thought about why I continue toiling away on this blog after so many years despite the mental pressures and time demands it imposes. I think there are two main reasons.

The first is a continuing fascination with the music we cover and how it has changed and continues to change. If all the numerous sub-genres had stagnated, boredom would have set in. Repeatedly listening to newer generations of musicians doing basically the same thing as older generations might not have been completely fruitless, but I doubt I would have wanted to keep writing about it.

The second reason is the challenge of the writing, the challenge of not saying the same kinds of things over and over again. Repeating the same methods of describing audio sensations would also have become boring. Falling into a rut and not trying to get out would have been easy; trying to do better is frustrating, a mission of only incremental gains beset by recurring feelings of failure and backsliding. But so far, that mission has seemed a better alternative than just giving up.

These thoughts have been on my mind today because I decided to devote this Sunday’s column mainly to a small group of complete releases. Writing about entire albums or EPs is harder for me than introducing individual songs — a bigger challenge. And on the other hand, I thought the records I chose represent, in different ways, a resistance to stagnation. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): GRAVE ALTAR — “SHRINES OF HATRED”

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Jan 092025
 

(written by Islander)

To cut to the chase: You are about to hear one of the most thoroughly exhilarating, constantly surprising, and utterly devilish albums this baby of a new year has yet given us. We will be lucky indeed if the rest of the year gives us anything else that’s this much fiendish fun.

What we’re referring to is Shrines of Hatred, the second full-length of Grave Altar from South-West UK that’s coming out on January 13th via the Vicious Witch label. “Black/Thrash” is the genre label that will be affixed to it, but it’s better called Black Magic. Continue reading »

EX DEO: “YEAR OF THE FOUR EMPERORS” (AND A HISTORY ESSAY)

 Album Reviews, SHORT BUT SWEET  1 Response »
Jan 082025
 

(In the following article our contributor Didrik Mešiček provides not only a review of Ex Deo‘s new EP, which will be out on Friday of this week via Reigning Phoenix Music, but also a history lesson.)

There’s no band that bridges the gap between ancient history and metal quite as much as Ex Deo. I think it’s not a very contentious opinion to say that the side project of Kataklysm’s frontman Maurizio Iacono has musically surpassed the main band, even though the reach of Ex Deo‘s audience is much smaller. Ex Deo will be releasing a new EP called Year of the Four Emperors, which continues the story from their last album, on January 10th. Let’s hope 2025 goes a bit better than the year 69 CE went in the Roman Empire.

So because this is a release very tightly linked with history and because I’m a history nerd, we’re going to be doing something slightly different and that means including a lot of history into what’s meant to be an article about an EP. Who’d have thought you can come to NCS to learn about things other than music, eh? Continue reading »

AM I IN TROUBLE? – SPECTRUM

 Album Reviews  4 Responses »
Jan 072025
 

(Andy Synn officially kicks off a new year here at NCS in colourful style)

The big question at the start of every new year is… where do we start?

Should I tell you what I think about the new one from The Great Old Ones? Or This Gift Is A Curse? Maybe Imperial Triumphant?

All big names, in their own way, and ones which I’m sure we’ll get to cover at some point in the near future (I’m definitely going to be writing something about the latter two myself) but our modus operandi here has always been to favour the unsung artists first and foremost.

And so, I thought, why not kick things off with something a little bit more provocative – though, I’d imagine, much of that will depend on how restrictive your view of the term “Black Metal” is – from a brand new artist attempting to put their own artsy, avant-garde spin on a genre more famous for its monochromatic malevolence.

Continue reading »

SHADES OF BLACK: SKALDR, STELLAR FOREST, JZOVCE, SPECTRAL LORE

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Jan 052025
 

I had a decision to make that I knew would have a significant impact on how many new releases I could cover in this Sunday column. That decision is discussed in the intro to today’s last item. I made the decision in a way that forced me to cut down the total, and leaves a lot of other songs buzzing in the back of my head as if clamoring for the attention I didn’t give them.

But I better truncate this opening verbiage before I have to further truncate the selections. In short, I’m beginning with three singles, and then moving to a very long demo at the end.

SKALDR (U.S.)

The first single today is a song from this Virginia band’s new album Saṃsṛ (their second full-length overall). I’ve been meaning to include it in one of these columns for weeks, but one thing or another has kept delaying the follow-through on my intentions. The song’s name is “The Crossing.” Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD ON A SATURDAY: SABHANKRA, ANDE, HOLY DEATH, MEGATON COMMUNION, CRACKWHÖRE, GASH FAITH, THE FALL OF MOTHER EARTH, ЧЕРНОПЛОДЬ

 Album Reviews, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC, SHORT BUT SWEET  No Responses »
Jan 042025
 

 

We’ve reached the end of a long holiday period and that left me feeling glum last night, morose over the realization that the rat race will resume on Monday. I felt much better after going through a big batch of songs I wanted to consider for this Saturday roundup.

Apart from enjoying the music, I’m enjoying the idea of how wobbly these eight selections will leave people who make it through all of them; there are many twists and turns along the way.

I arranged the choices in four two-band blocks. This doesn’t mean the selections in each part sound alike, but I did perceive some connections, except in the final two. Those two are together at the end only because I didn’t want to leave them out. Continue reading »

TWO MORE FOR 2024: FRONTIERER AND SACRAMENTO

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Jan 032025
 

(Though we’ve turned the corner into 2025, DGR has a couple more records from 2024 he wants to recommend, through the reviews below.)

Ah, it’s the most wonderful time of a website’s year. That brief breather where we get to both get started on stuff coming out in 2025 and kick ourselves in the shins over stuff we missed over the course of the previous year – usually in about equal measure.

It is imagined then, that I shall not be the only one with a few demons still resting on my shoulders that I felt compelled to acknowledge before fully launching myself into the inevitable shitshow that will be the new year. This time around, I’ve managed to dig up two more – one which saw very late release at the end of the year and another that I am in awe I did not come across during my many bandcamp and youtube music rabbit hole tumbles.

So, I shall attempt at the very least to see that they get some sort of spotlight here lest the guilt overwhelm me to the point where I become locked in a paralysis unknown to man up to this time. Continue reading »

THINGS YOU MAY HAVE MISSED (BUT SHOULDN’T)

 Album Reviews  1 Response »
Jan 022025
 

(Andy Synn isn’t quite ready to say goodbye to 2024 just yet)

Well, here we are. It’s 2025 and time to start looking towards what this new year has to bring.

Or, should I say, almost time… because first I want to highlight a quartet of releases which – for various reasons (namely that either they hadn’t actually come out, or I hadn’t stumbled across them yet) – I didn’t have chance to include in my annual “List Week”, but which all definitely deserve some extra attention before we finally consign 2024 to the gaping maw of history.

Continue reading »

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