LAIR OF THE MINOTAUR: “I HAIL I”

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May 262026
 

(This is Todd Manning’s review of the first new album from Chicago destroyers Lair of the Minotaur in a very long time, and it’s out now on The Grind-House Records.)

It’s difficult this time of year for me to find time to write about music, but I couldn’t let a new Lair of the Minotaur record go without comment. I Hail I is the first full-length they’ve released in sixteen years, and it is a fabulous return. Lair of the Minotaur is the brainchild of guitarist/vocalist Steven Rathbone. He’s always managed to bring in top-notch talent to complete the lineup, this time reuniting with longtime drummer Chris Wozniak and bringing in bassist/producer extraordinaire Sanford Parker.

If any metalheads have been unlucky to overlook this killer band in the past, it is worth saying that Lair of the Minotaur sound like their name, like a minotaur let loose in the proverbial china shop. They deftly combine sludge and thrash influences, along with a talent for mixing in limitless hooks and memorable riffs. Their classic debut, Carnage, seemed to emphasize the sludge over the thrash, while most have emphasized the thrash a bit more. I Hail I returns to the burly sludge sounds of the debut. Continue reading »

SCUMBAG: “SCUMLORD”

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May 262026
 

(Our writer DGR obviously had a shit-ton of fun listening to Scumbag’s new EP, and probably just as much fun coming up with the word salad needed to describe the experience. See for yourselves. And listen for yourselves.)

Every year while questing in the wilds of heavy metal we find ourselves discussing a new death metal discovery out of New York. It goes without saying that New York as a state and its surrounding areas have a deep, deep, deep history with death metal and has long codified its own regional flavoring of it with mega-sized headlining bands that seem to inspire everyone nearby. You could name the greats for days but it’s likely you’ve known your chosen few already.

One of the reliable things about the area though is that for as boneheaded and dumb as death metal can be, New York, through its adaptations of brutal death and slam, has created something that exists on polar opposite ends of the spectrum, equal parts insanely technical and impressive and just about as brain-dead as a boulder. The megalopolis city on its own is a hive of activity. Continue reading »

PRO-PAIN: “STONE COLD ANGER”

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May 252026
 

(This is our friend Gonzo’s review of the first new album in 11 years from Pro-Pain, out now on Napalm Records.)

Eleven long years have passed since we last heard from New York’s Pro-Pain. And not unlike other groove-laden crossover heroes from the early ’90s — Helmet, Merauder, and Prong come to mind first — their influence has quietly given life to an entire movement of others who follow in their footsteps.

Since they first appeared on the map in 1992 with the seminal Foul Taste of Freedom, Pro-Pain has been a band that’s been more comfortable flying under the radar and delivering punishing riffs, anthemic choruses, and a raw, uncompromising sound. More than 30 years later, they’ve carried that energy with aplomb into Stone Cold Anger, an aptly titled record if there ever was one. Continue reading »

THE MACHINIST: “TOWERS”

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May 232026
 

(Due to Islander being off in Baltimore doing Maryland Deathfest things, we will not have his usual weekend columns, but we do have (at least for today) another vivid review by DGR, who this time takes on a new EP by the crafty UK sonic terrorists who call themselves The Machinist.)

On the shorter and sweeter side of things we find ourselves landing upon the shores of the UK again with a new EP from the group The Machinist entitled Towers.

The Machinist are a self-defined industrial black metal band who cite Anaal Nathrakh and The Berzerker as being close comparisons to their sound. They are a three-piece consisting of a dual-vocal attack, walls of guitars, and enough programmed drums rattling about that it sounds like a hailstorm happening outside.

Towers is a three-song EP, arriving a year after their second full-length album Contempt For Life. And indeed, The Machinist have an overarching theme of dislike for humanity as a whole – as British bands tend to be experts in, disdain ranks fairly high – and if you did not have enough of it with Contempt For Life, Towers is the band on the offensive once again for another about twenty-five minutes worth of music dripping with dislike for the fact that you as a human being dare to exist. Continue reading »

VENTHIAX: “RITES OF RA”

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May 222026
 

(DGR continues to do the heavy lifting at our site while many of us (and him) are off at Maryland Deathfest, and today’s it’s a vivid write-up about a new EP from the Swedish old-school thrashers Venthiax, out now on Dying Victims Productions.)

Every year inevitably sees a smorgasbord of EPs released throughout the year. It’s enough that our own archive of them gets broken out into its own year-end post and usually runs just as long as our collection of album ratings.

EPs are often a realm of discovery, experimentations, and teasers of upcoming albums. This is something I personally enjoy quite a bit, because all of these snack-sized previews of groups and what sorts of headspace they may be in means you can sample so many groups in the same way a kid can go plowing through the sample segments of a candy shop. To be fair, I probably approach it with the same amount of joy.

It also allows room to explore genres that aren’t normally in your wheelhouse, not necessarily full-blown pig-ignorance but close enough. Old school throwbacks and thrash metal are definitely part of that on this end and the combination of the two have resulted in a fountain of bands that sound as if they’re time travelers from a bygone and especially kvlt era in heavy metal’s sound. Continue reading »

MELVINS / NAPALM DEATH: “SAVAGE IMPERIAL DEATH MARCH”

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May 212026
 

(A group of us NCS scribblers, including DGR, are currently at Maryland Deathfest. DGR wrote a bunch of reviews in advance so we’d have something to post while partying. The one below is one of those, and it seemed fitting to post it today since DGR ventured out last night in time to catch Napalm Death’s performance at the MDF pre-fest. He hasn’t been seen today, so far.)

Of the many releases that have hit within the first half of the year one of the ones that has been the most curious to me has been the release of the collaboration album Savage Imperial Death March among members of The Melvins and Napalm Death.

While it had been released as part of their tour together at the time of recording, this year’s digital unleashing of the album alongside a few added tracks is likely the first time many metalheads and those of us unfortunate enough not to live in a big touring market will get a chance to hear this combining of the brain-stems between the two bands. Continue reading »

MORTUARY: “GREAT BLACK EARTH”

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May 202026
 

(This is a guest review of a new EP by the veteran Mexican band Mortuary (released last month by HPGD Productions) written by Jason Kiss, also known as Lonegoat from Goatcraft and Lord Abyss from Amorphophallus Titanum.)

As I have grown older, my patience for speed metal has waned substantially. Nevertheless, I continue to hold an affinity for proto-death metal expressions in which speed metal is driven beyond the confines of its own limited logic and, through excess, transforms into something altogether more menacing and expansive.

One might argue that Morbid Angel on Abominations of Desolation, alongside Necrovore’s Divus de Mortuus and Possessed’s Seven Churches, were among the first to exemplify this rupture; they produced the conditions for death metal to emerge as its own original coterie unshackled to its speed metal roots. What compels me not is speed metal in itself, but rather this fractured threshold where the spirit of extremity in metal is nourished and an Aristotelian potentiality is actualized; where speed metal dies so that something more sinister can take its place.

Continue reading »

FADING AEON: “FADING AEON”

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May 202026
 

(DGR prepared the following extensive review of the third album, self-titled, by the German epic melodic death metal band Fading Aeon, which was released in March of this year.)

It seems if nothing else, 2026 is going to be the summoner of old ghosts for yours truly as we find ourselves once again cycling back to review a band that we started covering over seven years ago. Now, if you’ll please ignore the part that we’re coming up on the site being nearly-seventeen as well, a few of us are going to stand up and listen to our knees pop louder than the thunder and lightning shows that’ve been happening outside our windows recently. Is it any wonder we seem to attract groups that’ve taken long hiatuses between albums for new premieres?

Germany’s Fading Aeon are one of a fleet of three-piece melodeath groups that’ve appeared in the past decade – apparently they have little time for the bullshit of your standard four-to-five piece lineup – although they occupy a different musical sandbox than most, favoring epic tales of battle and heroism instead, with the song lengths to match. It hasn’t been uncommon for the Fading Aeon crew to release an album consisting of five songs and yet still have a run time sailing well over forty-minutes in range.

The group’s newest self-titled album, which saw release in mid-March, is no different in that regard. As the band have matured, so too has their songwriting ability, and while they started out incredibly ambitious, what has made Fading Aeon something to watch is how they’ve grown into the role that they sought out to start with. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): KUR•NU•GI•A — “CARMINA INFERORUM”

 Album Reviews, Premieres  2 Responses »
May 192026
 

(written by Islander)

Prepare to jump off your usual beaten tracks, indeed off the tracks of the world altogether, as we present Carmina Inferorum — Latin for “Songs of he Underworld”. This is the debut album of the mysterious Polish avant-black-death-metal band KUR•NU•GI•A (not to be confused with the Ohio death metal band Kurnugia or the Finnish black metal band Kurnugia). It will be released by Godz Ov War Productions on May 22nd.

Curious about the band’s rendering of the name and what it refers to, I found a source (here) that includes this description:

Kurnugi, also called Kur-nu-gi-a, was the Sumerian underworld. It was dark, vast, and final. It lay beneath the earth, beyond the Mountains of Sunset. Souls descended here after death, stripped of light and joy. The dead ate dust, drank from mud, and lived in shadows…. Kurnugi was not punishment; it was fate.

Those words increased my curiosity about the music before hearing a single note, as did a Lovecraftian chant that appeared in the announcement of the album by Godz Ov War on social media (a chant that’s interpreted to mean “In his house at R’lyeh dead Cthulhu waits dreaming”):

Ph’nglui mglw’nafh Cthulhu R’lyeh wgah’nagl fhtagn…

But the album’s cover image and KUR•NU•GI•A’s band photos made me even more curious. Continue reading »

BEST OF BRITISH: RELIQUIA / SILO / TYRANNUS

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May 192026
 

(Andy Synn returns to his homeland, in spirit at least, for another edition of the Best of British)

I’m still over in the good ol’ US of A at the moment, gearing up for this year’s edition of Maryland Deathfest, and while I’ve loved my time here – as always – I’ll admit that I’ve been feeling the occasional pang of homesickness every now and then.

So to help quell my longing for the green and pleasant lands of my birth I thought I’d put together another carefully-curated collection of British bands, from a variety of styles and sub-genres, to remind us all of what’s waiting for me when I get home.

Continue reading »

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