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SEEN AND HEARD: BÖLZER, INSULTERS, PANZERGOD

RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC, Reviews, SHORT BUT SWEET 2 Responses »

Oct 272016

I’ve been racking up the airline miles lately. I got back to Seattle late last night after a whirlwind trip to New York for my day job, one in which I probably spent as much time in airport security lines and on airplanes as I did in New York. Beautiful time of year to be there, though.

You may also have noticed that we’ve had a flood of premieres this week. Four more are coming today. Between traveling and writing all those premieres, I haven’t had time to pull together round-ups, and man, this has been a week when multiple round-ups would have been justified. With so much to choose from, I’ve impulsively picked these three bands. The plan is to put together more round-ups for tomorrow and Saturday in an effort to catch up.

BÖLZER

A few days ago the mighty Swiss juggernaut Bölzer released another song from their new album Hero, which will be released on November 25 through Iron Bonehead Productions. The first song that appeared, “I Am III”, was more than 10 minutes long — a dramatic, majestic, dark, brooding, esoteric, and triumphant piece in which the band moved in some dynamic new directions. The latest track, “Spiritual Athleticism“, is a more compact affair and perhaps more in line with what we were expecting based on Bölzer‘s previous releases. Continue reading »

OBSCURA / REVOCATION / BEYOND CREATION / RIVERS OF NIHIL – LIVE AT THE CORPORATION, SHEFFIELD 24/10/16

Concert Reviews 3 Responses »

Oct 272016

(Andy Synn turns in this review of the live performances by Obscura, Revocation, Beyond Creation, and Rivers of Nihil in Sheffield, England, on October 24, 2016 — along with videos of the performances.)

Our readers in the UK who play guitar or bass will probably have noticed something rather peculiar over the last couple of days. Riffs that they used to be able to play turning into a mangled, lumpen soup of glitches and errors… Fluid solos that they used to rip out with ease skittering away from stumbling fingers… even, in the most extreme cases, a complete inability to even lift their instrument anymore, as if they were no longer “worthy” to wield its power.

And I know why.

You see on Monday night I was there when Obscura, Revocation, Beyond Creation, and Rivers of Nihil selfishly used-up the entire country’s supply of notes and riffs, leading to a crisis of near biblical proportions amongst the string-slinging section of the UK metal community.

Thankfully, however, I’ve been informed that a fresh shipment is being piped in from the mainland, and so normal proceedings should be resumed by the weekend or thereabouts. Continue reading »

ANAAL NATHRAKH: “THE WHOLE OF THE LAW”

Album Reviews 3 Responses »

Oct 272016

(DGR reviews the new album by the UK’s Anaal Nathrakh, which will be released by Metal Blade on October 28.)

Few bands out there these days have weaponized music like Anaal Nathrakh has. The long-running project now has an immense collection of albums in its discography — all of which are some combination of abrasive noise, destructive instrumentation, and annihilation on the lyrical front.

Anaal Nathrakh are a band whose very formation is based around the idea of being as noisy as possible. If heavy metal is to be treated as a form of catharsis, then the aims of Nathrakh are to be the ultimate form of that in rage. For all of this talk of destruction, however, there are the occasional signs of where this anger comes from (considering this is a band that doesn’t provide lyrics to its albums and even then could probably save ink doing so since half of its vocal lines seem to lack consonants), which has been largely driven by a disgust with humanity and where the species is headed. Continue reading »

WARDRUNA: “RAGNAROK”

Album Reviews, Exceptions to the Rule 5 Responses »

Oct 252016

(Our long-time supporter and occasional contributor Booker returns to NCS with this review of the new album by Norway’s Wardruna.)

Wardruna are an exception to the rule here. On the one hand, because of the singing, which is not only “clean”, but is often chanted, whispered, or spoken-word, as well as being in a language few of us would understand. And the foreign-ness of it means that the significance of the vocals – the message, or meaning — is simply the rhythm and emotion the vocals produce, rather than the what the words signify – arguably, in that respect, perhaps not too far off a lot of the metal we listen to.

But they’re an exception, too, as you won’t find any distorted guitars here, nor any traditional drum kits, blast beats, breakdowns, or sounds belonging to the mosh pit. But what’s on offer will hopefully move and entice you all the same. Continue reading »

WINTER DELUGE: “DEVOLUTION – DECAY”

Album Reviews No Responses »

Oct 242016

(New Zealand writer Craig Hayes (Six Noises) returns to NCS with this review of the forthcoming second album by NZ’s Winter Deluge.)

Changes within a band can lead to creative uncertainty or even outright artistic collapse. But that’s clearly not an issue for New Zealand black metal outfit Winter Deluge. Last time we heard from the group was back in 2012, when they released their hate-fuelled full-length debut, As the Earth Fades into Obscurity. Since then, Winter Deluge have cycled through a few bassists, and lost and gained both a guitarist and a vocalist. But none of those changes has dented or derailed Winter Deluge’s malevolent mission in the slightest. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): CHIRAL — “GAZING LIGHT ETERNITY”

Album Reviews, Premieres 1 Response »

Oct 242016

Chiral is the solo musical project of a man named Matteo “Teo” Gruppi from the countryside near Piacenza in northern Italy. The project began at the end of 2013, and since then Chiral has recorded two demos, two splits, and two albums — and today we bring you a full stream of the third Chiral album, Gazing Light Eternity, which will be released on October 27.

This new album is about Time — about “the evolution and perception of the perpetual flow of time on men, places and memories”. It’s a musical narrative in four Parts. The flow of the album takes the listener through two long atmospheric black metal tracks (“Part I (The Gazer)” and “Part III (The Crown)”), each of which is followed by a comparatively shorter ambient piece (“Part II (The Haze)” and “Part IV (The Hourglass)”). Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): BLASPHEMER — “RITUAL THEOPHAGY”

Album Reviews, Premieres 1 Response »

Oct 242016

Ritual Theophagy is the second album by Blasphemer, a death metal band from Muggiò in the Lombardy region of northern Italy. It follows by eight years the band’s first album, On the Inexistence of God, and a 2010 EP named Devouring Deception that we praised in a review (here). Ritual Theophagy is already available through the band and Comatose Music, but we’re now bringing you a full public stream of the album for the first time.

Blasphemer throw 11 songs at you in the space of about 28 minutes, with only one of the songs reaching the three-minute mark. And from that, even if you’re unfamiliar with Blasphemer‘s take-no-prisoners approach to death metal, you might deduce that Blasphemer traffic in speed… and you would be right. Continue reading »

SHORT BUT SWEET: MONTE LUNA — “THE HOUND”

Album Reviews, SHORT BUT SWEET 2 Responses »

Oct 212016

(Todd Manning provides this review of a debut EP by the Texas band Monte Luna.)

Austin, Texas duo Monte Luna have just released their debut two-song demo on Bandcamp at the name-your-price level, and it would be best if you didn’t sleep on this one. Mixing equal parts Doom, Sludge, and Dark Psychedelic vibes, they create an atmosphere of tasteful heaviness, full of subtle menace.

“Father Arbitor” kicks things off with bits of noise swirling around while a sample invokes the dark spirits overseeing the material. James Cl’s guitar is distant and striking, heavy but not overtly so. The gravity of the track comes from Phil Hook’s immense beats, slow and tectonic. The vocals sound like they blew in on the wind, ghosts creeping at the edge of the campfire. While it would be mistake to say this isn’t heavy, atmosphere seems to take center stage. Continue reading »

VERBERIS: “VEXAMEN”

Album Reviews 1 Response »

Oct 202016

(We welcome back New Zealand writer Craig Hayes (Six Noises), who wrote this review of the debut album by Verberis, which has recently been released by Iron Bonehead Productions.)

The roster of German record label Iron Bonehead Productions reads like a who’s who of pre-eminent cult metal bands. That’s certainly true when it comes to bands who reside in the far-flung isles of New Zealand. Indomitable underground New Zealand bands like Vassafor, Sinistrous Diabolus, Veneficium, Witchrist, Diocletian, Creeping, Prisoner of War, Solar Mass, and Heresiarch have all had storming works released under Iron Bonehead’s banner. And next on the label’s list of uncompromising releases from the southern latitudes is Vexamen: the debut full-length from blackened death metal band Verberis. Continue reading »

40 WATT SUN: “WIDER THAN THE SKY”

Album Reviews 3 Responses »

Oct 202016

(Grant Skelton reviews the new album by the UK’s 40 Watt Sun.)

On October 14, 40 Watt Sun birthed an album that has proven difficult for me to review. Part of this is because the music on Wider Than The Sky is just about the complete opposite of what we cover here at No Clean Singing, though surely we’ve covered many bands that exclusively employ clean singing, as an exception to our “rule.”

But there are other reasons why reviewing Wider Than The Sky has been an atypical experience for me. In a recent interview with Sarah Kitteringham for Noisey (here), 40 Watt Sun’s Patrick Walker expressed his distaste with the band’s previous record label promoting them as “doom metal”. Continue reading »

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