SEEN AND HEARD (PART 1): GODS FORSAKEN, KĀLA, SAMHARA, TARGET, SIELUNVIHOLLINEN, ULTRA SILVAM

 Album Reviews, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC, SHORT BUT SWEET  4 Responses »
Feb 052019
 

 

Yesterday I learned of the postponement of an album premiere I had expected to write for today. If I had a less obsessive personality, I would have used that unexpected free time to go for a walk through the uncommon snow that turned the forested area where I live into a wonderland (because most workplaces, including mine, were closed down yesterday — because a little snow works like a paralytic agent on the City of Seattle). Instead, I spun my way through a couple dozen new songs… while occasionally staring out the window at the brilliance of that uncommon snow.

As you can already tell, since this is Part 1 of something I worked up, I liked quite a lot of what I heard, and thought you might too. I’m confident there will be a second Part… but not sure about a third… it depends on whether the snow melts and the paralysis loosens.

GODS FORSAKEN

What a very nice coincidence. Almost exactly one year ago we were anointing a song from this Swedish band’s debut album (In A Pitch Black Grave) as one of 2017’s Most Infectious Extreme Metal Songs, and a year and a day after that event they released the first single from their second album. And damned if it isn’t already a contender for the 2019 edition of that list. Continue reading »

DESCRAVITY: “ANATHEMA”

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Feb 052019
 

 

(This is Vonlughlio’s review of the new album by the Japanese band Desecravity, recently released by Willowtip Records.)

It’s been quite a bit since my last small review here at NCS. Nonetheless, I now have the opportunity to write about one of my favorite acts from Japan. That band is Desecravity, and they released their third album entitled Anathema via Willowtip Records this past 25th of January.

This band was formed back in 2007 but it was not until 2012 that they released their debut effort, Implicit Obedience. I was fortunate to discover that release the same year thanks to a review that popped up in my newsfeed (my apologies, I don’t recall from where), and the cover art and name caught my attention. Continue reading »

DOWNFALL OF GAIA: “ETHIC OF RADICAL FINITUDE”

 Album Reviews  1 Response »
Feb 042019
 

 

(This is Andy Synn’s review of the new fifth album by Germany’s Downfall of Gaia, which will be released on February 8th by Metal Blade.)

One of the best, and most memorable, gigs/tours of the last several years for me was the absolutely mind-blowing co-headliner of Downfall of Gaia and Der Weg Einer Freiheit in 2015, which saw both bands putting on an absolute masterclass (not a word I use lightly) in power, precision, and raw emotion that still, even now, shines incredibly brightly in my memory.

It certainly helped, of course, that both bands were touring behind albums that were (and still are) widely considered to be the best of their career, with Aeon Unveils the Throne of Decay actually earning itself a much-coveted spot on my Critical Top Ten of 2014 (and Stellar only just missing out on the following year’s list).

But while neither band’s immediate follow-up was able to fully replicate the impact and intensity of their predecessor(s), I think you’ll be pleased to hear that Ethic of Radical Finitude comes pretty darn close to recapturing the pure magic of Aeon Unveils… even if that album still remains the band’s magnum opus. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): TELÜMEHTÅR — “THE WELL”

 Album Reviews, Premieres  1 Response »
Feb 042019
 

 

Ten years ago the French one-man black metal project Telümehtår made its debut with a self-recorded and self-released demo named Blåck. Now, a decade later, Telümehtår has re-surfaced with a new album entitled The Well, which is set for release on February 16th. Today we present a full stream of its nine tracks, preceded by the following impressions.

Drawing inspiration from the spirit of such early black metal bands as Emperor, Darkthrone, and Ulver, but without slavishly aping them, Lord Telümehtår has created an extravagant, blazing tumult of moodiness and despair, creating the sounds of terrible madness born of pain, yet glorious in their devastation. In one sense, the songs are minimalist in their composition, yet they are wholly engulfing both in their sound and in their emotional impact, creating an air of scarring pageantry, like the surround-sound scores to mythic sagas of impassioned striving and inevitable, calamitous tragedy. Continue reading »

RIPARIAN: “RIPARIAN”

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Feb 042019
 

 

(Todd Manning wrote the following review ofthe impending self-titled debut EP by Pittsburgh’s Riparian, which will be released by Grimoire Records on March 1st.)

Not to split hairs, but in the sweet spot between Grindcore and Death Metal there seems to be a small niche of what one might consider Death-Grind, a movement that may have reached its apex in the early aughts and was best exemplified by such acts as The Red Chord, Misery Index, and Cephalic Carnage. Pittsburgh’s Riparian are mining this same vein of brutal goodness on their self-titled debut EP, due out on March 1st courtesy of Grimoire Records.

To be clear, the alchemy that Riparian utilize is a sound that might eschew the most technical corners of the Death Metal world, but also isn’t nearly as primitive as most Grindcore acts nor their OSDM counterparts. What we are left with instead is a pulverizing blend of grind beats and mid-tempo muscular riffing. Occasional solos and Doomier passages that also pepper the proceedings give the EP an unpredictable quality as well. Continue reading »

SHADES OF BLACK: ELLENDE, MESZAROTH, OMINATION, ULTIO, SULDUSK, MALHKEBRE

 Album Reviews, Exceptions to the Rule, SHADES OF BLACK, SHORT BUT SWEET  5 Responses »
Feb 032019
 


Ellende

There’s quite a lot of new music I’m recommending in this Sunday’s column — three full EP streams (one of which is an EP-length single composition), plus advance tracks from three forthcoming albums. Coincidentally, four of the featured bands are essentially solo projects.

As usual, I picked these selections in part to provide some listening variety, though there’s certainly more than a fair share of melancholy and grandeur to be found herein, along with a fair share of ripping and tearing. I also positioned one selection to provide a bit of a diversionary interlude through its interweaving of Neo-Folk elements (and clean singing) among heavier sounds.

ELLENDE

I discovered this Austrian atmospheric/post-black metal band through a 2016 video of the title track from their 2014 EP, Weltennacht. I couldn’t get the song out of my head, and the video was hard to forget, too, since it included film of the 1987 public suicide of a Pennsylvania politician (Budd Dwyer) at a press conference he conducted the day before he was to be sentenced to prison following a conviction for bribery. Continue reading »

AN NCS EP PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): ÚIR — “ÓENACH TAILTEN”

 Album Reviews, Premieres, SHORT BUT SWEET  2 Responses »
Feb 012019
 

 

Roughly two years after the appearance of their debut recording, Tein-Éigin, the Edinburgh-based atmospheric black metal band Úir are returning with a new EP named Óenach Tailten. It will be released by Pest Productions on February 18th, and today we present a full stream of its three shattering tracks.

“Shattering” is not an exaggeration. There is so much tension, torment, and pain in the music, and it comes through with such authentic passion and unwavering intensity, that it puts any sense of well-being a listener might have in dire peril. Yet paradoxically, there is an almost dreamlike quality to the music as well, a conjuration of haunting loss that crosses a dark border between flesh-and-blood and some intangible realm where ancient spirits still loom in twilight shadows. Continue reading »

ASTRONOID: “ASTRONOID”

 Album Reviews  2 Responses »
Feb 012019
 

(Here’s Andy Synn‘s review of the new album by Boston-based Astronoid, which is being released today by Blood Music.)

It’s a pretty widely-held (and widely-accepted) opinion that those gaudy golden idols of the film world, aka The Academy Awards, aren’t necessarily won on merit… or, at least, they aren’t necessarily won on the merits of whatever film or performance they’re being given out for.

No, a lot of the time the ultimate winner of Best Film, Best Director, Best Actor/Actress, etc, often receives the award not because of the quality of the work for which they’ve been nominated, but because they’ve built up enough cultural cache with their prior work(s), or been overlooked enough times, that they’re deemed to “deserve” it.

And, as I’m sure some of you are aware, the same thing happens in the music world too, particularly when the larger sites and magazines feel like they might have missed out or been a little behind the curve when (dis)covering an unexpected underground sensation, such that they tend to majorly over-compensate with their subsequent coverage in an attempt to reassure their readers just how “with it” they are.

Which brings us to the new, self-titled, album from Astronoid. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): SAMMAS’ EQUINOX — “PILGRIMAGE / BOAHJENÁSTI”

 Album Reviews, Premieres  No Responses »
Jan 312019
 

 

On February 1st — tomorrow — Signal Rex will release a compilation of the two demo tapes previously released by the Finnish black metal project Sammas’ Equinox. This new edition, which combines the names of the demos — Pilgrimage / Boahjenásti — includes remastered sound courtesy of Moonsorrow’s Henri Sorvali, and has been captured on CD and vinyl LP formats, with artwork and layout by Álex Tedín at Heresie Graphics.

Today we’ve got a full stream of the compilation, beginning with the four tracks from Pilgrimage (2016) and concluding with the three from Boahjenásti (2017). If you’ve not previously encountered these creations, prepare for an unusual and arresting combination of haunting, horrifying, and hallucinatory atmosphere, primal physical thrust, and affecting strands of melody, with the excursions overlaid by a voice that’s nasty as hell. Continue reading »

THE SYNN REPORT (PART 105): SAOR

 Album Reviews, THE SYNN REPORT  1 Response »
Jan 312019
 

 

(The January 2019 edition of THE SYNN REPORT is devoted to the releases of the Scottish band Saor, and includes Andy Synn‘s review of Saor’s newest album, Forgotten Paths, which will be released on February 15th by Avantgarde Music.)

Recommended for fans of: Panopticon, Alcest, Dawn Ray’d

There’s been a lot of discussion recently – much of it intriguing, much of it ignorant – about what Black Metal “should” or “shouldn’t” be.

And while the whole issue, and all its many facets and factors, is far too complex for me to address here, the various conversations and arguments I’ve had with people – some like-minded, some less so – have helped crystallise in my mind that the most important thing any Black Metal artist needs… is passion.

Case in point, Saor (the solo project of one Andy Marshall) is absolutely brimming with passion and primal vitality, and each of the band’s albums (the fourth of which will be released within the next few weeks) marries energy and emotion, atmosphere and artistry, in a way that clearly comes right from the heart. Continue reading »

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