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ANTAEUS: “CONDEMNATION”

Nov 162016

(Andy Synn reviews the eagerly anticipated new album by the French black metal band Antaeus.)

With so much being written recently about the molten new release (is it an EP? is it an album?) by a certain bunch of radical French firebrands, it would be easy, all too easy, to overlook what some of their countrymen are doing.

Which would be a mistake of practically biblical proportions, because this week sees the long-awaited release of Condemnation, the fourth album from Satanic savages Antaeus. Continue reading »

SERPENTINE DOMINION: “SERPENTINE DOMINION”

Album Reviews 3 Responses »

Nov 152016

(TheMadIsraeli wrote this brief recommendation of the self-titled debut album by Serpentine Dominion.)

Serpentine Dominion is a curious side project for Adam Dutkiewicz of Killswitch Engage fame to be engaging in. This debut release is a great album, a shattering hammer blow to the back of the skull of caustic death metal, combined with metalcore’s melody and energy in only the way Adam D knows how to do best. With the weight of drummer Shannon Lucas and vocalist George “Corpsegrinder” Fisher alongside him, the album should certainly raise eyebrows and magnetize people toward this self-titled debut with a great deal of force — and as far as I can tell, it has.

While the music is excellent, and this is an adrenaline-rush-inducing gut-punch of a record that everyone who likes metal in general should pick up, I also can’t shake the feeling that it should’ve been just a KSE album. It would’ve worked just as well. Continue reading »

KHONSU: “THE XUN PROTECTORATE” (SECOND REVIEW)

Album Reviews 10 Responses »

Nov 142016

(Earlier this month we published a review by Andy Synn of the new album by Norway’s Khonsu, and now we present a second one, written by TheMadIsraeli.)

I had this review already written, then Trump won the election and I thought I needed to take a step back and re-evaluate music and its significance to us, especially in the coming time. Things have changed, more than likely for the worse, and metal has a newfound place in my heart and soul in light of this. I’m angry, I’m pissed, and I wish I lived in a different world or dimension altogether, but here we are. It’s albums like Khonsu’s The Xun Protectorate that provide the kind of metallic excess of rage, sorrow, and apprehension that help quench my current emotional turbulence and leave me finding peace. It is also the closest it gets this year to transporting me to a different dimension.

And it’s also the best album of 2016. Continue reading »

SHADES OF BLACK: DRAUGSÓL, SROGOŚĆ, CANCER, LASHBLOOD, SHRINE OV BELIAL, INFAMOVS

Album Reviews, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC, SHADES OF BLACK, SHORT BUT SWEET 5 Responses »

Nov 132016

Once again I find myself drowning in attractive new black metal. I’ve assembled some of my new discoveries in this post and have in mind pulling together a second round-up for tomorrow — but yes, I do remember how foolish it is for part-time, half-witted metal bloggers to make forecasts of what they’ll do in the future. I’ll just say… maybe.

This is one of those times when all of the underground bands featured here are newcomers to our site, and I’ve bent the framework of this series a bit with the last band, which is more in the vein of death than black metal. Hope you find something to like…

DRAUGSÓL

Oh look! Another Icelandic black metal band! There seem to be more of them than there are snowflakes in Iceland, but on the other hand, I haven’t yet been disappointed by any of them. I was particularly unable to resist the lure of Draugsól (as if I wanted to) when I saw the fantastic cover art by Moonroot Art for their debut album, Volaða Land. Continue reading »

THE REARVIEW MIRROR (ENSLAVED)

Album Reviews, THE REARVIEW MIRROR 1 Response »

Nov 132016

(Andy Synn wrote this Sunday’s edition of our regular look-back at metal’s earlier days.)

2016 marks Enslaved’s 25th anniversary as a band, and 22 years since they released their first album, Vikingligr Veldi, which is the subject of today’s post.

Originally released on the now-defunct Deathlike Silence Productions (which was founded by original, and now deceased, Mayhem vocalist Øystein Aarseth, a.k.a. Euronymous, to whom the album is also dedicated), Vikingligr Veldi has recently been given a fresh coat of paint and a spiffy new remaster for its long-awaited release on vinyl.

And although the original version still sounds pretty damn good for its age (yes, it’s a little buzzy in places, and occasionally the keys can get a little overbearing, but there’s a pleasing amount of clarity and depth to the overall sound, and each instrument, including the oft-neglected bass guitar, is given a good amount of room and space to breathe), the remaster just gives the album that extra bit of polish and shine, without detracting from the raw energy or rough and ready sensibilities of the album as a whole. Continue reading »

BEHOLD THE ARCTOPUS: “COGNITIVE EMANCIPATION”

Album Reviews No Responses »

Nov 122016

Six years ago I conducted an experiment on some music that happened to be experimental to begin with. I took a song called “Scepters” from Skullgrid, the debut album by Behold the Arctopus, and slowed it down by a factor of three, extending its length from 3:43 to more than 11 minutes. It still sounded fast, with discernible rhythms and pulsing guitars. Remarkably, the blowtorch guitar solos still sounded like badass solos, which is a sign of just how fast Colin Marston and Mike Lerner were playing the original. Same thing with Charlie Zeleny’s drumming — it was so ridiculously fast in the original that even dragged down by a factor of three, it still sounded like what you’d expect to hear on a “normal” metal recording.

So I slowed the song down again, more than 10 times slower than the original, extending the length of “Scepters” to more than 41 minutes. Even at that ridiculously dragged-out pace, the song could still pass as music — albeit music with a demented, demons-on-the-loose quality, the kind of thing you’d risk your sanity to hear for 41 minutes straight. Continue reading »

HANGING GARDEN: “HEREAFTER”

Album Reviews 2 Responses »

Nov 112016

(DGR wrote this detailed review of the new EP by Finland’s Hanging Garden.)

I will be the first to admit that I absolutely missed the bus on Hanging Garden’s 2015 release Blackout Whiteout. Not only did I miss the bus on last year’s album, while that bus is likely in another state by now, probably delivering the mail in rural counties on its cross-country trip, I have just now reached the bus stop, blissfully unaware the such an event had even taken place and now standing at the bus stop impatiently tapping my foot and staring in the oncoming direction wondering “just when will that goddamned thing get here….”

While I may have missed the bus on Blackout Whiteout, I did not do so with the band’s followup EP Hereafter, thanks in large part due our esteemed editor who has somehow, in between the mountain of premieres and news items he has written about, found a way to send along a note that basically boiled down to, “You need to check this release out. It’s so far in your wheelhouse that it is almost comedic”. Though the edgy, angsty teen rebel in me wants to shout, “You don’t define me! You can’t predict me!”, and go back to wearing all black like all my friends do, I’ve walked the Earth long enough to know when I’ve been pinned down because goddamnit, Hereafter is one of those releases that feels near tailor-made. Continue reading »

THE BEST OF BRITISH 2016, PART 4: VENOM PRISON / THE WOUNDED KINGS / TERRA

Album Reviews 2 Responses »

Nov 112016

(In this post Andy Synn combines a trio of reviews, focusing again upon releases from the UK.)

Grouping bands by their nationality, rather than by their sound, style, or ideology, is a remarkably lazy way of doings things.

Which is why I do it. Obviously.

But, on a more serious note, they do say that variety is the spice of life, and one of my big hopes for this series of columns (along with the usual aim of exposing our readers to bands they might not have discovered otherwise) is that established fans of band [X] might also find something to love in band [Y], fans of band [Y] might find something to love in band [Z]… and so on, and so forth.

Anyway, if you want to check out some of my previous efforts, which run the gamut from Deathcore to Doom to Black to Groove, you can have a gander at Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3 of this year’s crop by clicking the appropriate link.

Otherwise, onwards you go, for a triple-header of deathly, doomy, blackened delights! Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): BARBARIAN SWORDS — “WORMS”

Album Reviews, Premieres No Responses »

Nov 092016

There is some risk that when you look at this band’s name, their album art, and even some of their song titles, you’ll get the wrong idea about their music. My first thought was, “throwback speed metal, or maybe filthy black thrash”. That was wrong — very wrong — and the surprise turned out to be a big and stunning one.

The album’s name is Worms, and it’s the second full-length by the Spanish band Barbarian Swords. It will be released on November 11 by Cimmerian Shade Recordings and Satanath Records. We have for you a full-stream of the album in the player below. Continue reading »

DGR’S BIG OL’ MESS O’ REVIEWS (ONE): CHRONOLYTH, MALEVOLENTIA, KINNEFRET, OVARYROT

Album Reviews 3 Responses »

Nov 092016

I know it has been a pretty hefty amount of time since I last touched bases here at NCS. I’ve found that the queue of reviews continues to build up and I fell victim to it, allowing the tremendous amount of stuff that I wanted to talk about to become absolutely paralyzing, to the point where I just couldn’t cohere thoughts anymore. In this case, it was because a handful of releases were clogging up the works — discs that I had been enjoying for the better part of half a year now but for some reason or another we just never got around to talking about.

So, this collection of smaller reviews is an experiment, an opportunity to try writing something briefer and more concise. Much as I love to dissect an album and romp around in its innards until I’m a gore-soaked mess from time to time, I also feel like this is a collection of discs that I need to get out there, especially as we draw closer and closer to the year-end collections, when there’s a good chance that some of these discs will be popping up on there. At the very least, I want to get these bands out there for people to listen to, as some of these are flying under the radar and absolutely shouldn’t. Continue reading »

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