AN NCS DEMO PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): BEZDECH — “TAM, GDZIE GNIJEMY POD POMNIKAMI”

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May 162023
 

Almost two years ago we encountered Duhkha, the debut EP by the Polish band Bezdech, summarily describing it as “a hair-raising and head-spinning alchemy of avant-garde black and death metal”, and then adding these words:

This Polish duo paint their disturbing but often electrifying sonic portraits with colors of mind-abrading dissonance, thoroughly unpredictable fretwork maneuvers, and rapidly veering tempos. But the music is just as likely to become cloaked in shrouds of haunting gloom or to dip into streams of soul-shaking misery as it is to spin like a centrifuge of technically impressive lunacy and riotous savagery. And holy shit, the vocals are stunningly rabid and possessed.

Since then Bezdech have expanded their line-up from a two-man studio project to a full four-man band, and have managed to get a few live gigs under their belts. They’ve also been working on new music for a debut album, but have decided to give the world a glimpse of what they’ve been working on via a demo named Tam, gdzie gnijemy pod pomnikami that we’re gratefully premiering today. Continue reading »

AN NCS EP PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): THE END OF SIX THOUSAND YEARS — SELF-TITLED

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May 152023
 

Today we have another tale of slumber and revival. In this case it’s the Italian band The End of Six Thousand Years. Their inception occurred nearly 20 years ago, and by 2012 they had released two albums, in addition to some shorter releases. But then a long silence befell them, interrupted only by a single (“Angelus Errare“) that emerged in 2020.

Well, they weren’t actually sleeping, more a case of “life getting in the way”. Yet the desire didn’t die, and although line-up changes have occurred, the band is now returning with a new EP that will be released by Hypershape Records on May 18th. As a sign of the rebirth, and it’s fair to say a reinvention, the new EP is self-titled. It includes four tracks, concluding with a cover of “The Man Who Loves to Hurt Himself” by Today Is The Day, and we’ve got all four of them for your listening pleasure today. Continue reading »

SHADES OF BLACK: BURY THEM AND KEEP QUIET, FEMINIZER, SOMBRE CIEL

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May 142023
 

Happy Mother’s Day. I felt the need to say that because a few of you might be mothers and others might have been born of mothers, as opposed to some other form of spawning.

I’m typing this with one hand. The other hand is around my own throat, trying to choke off my tendency to explain why I haven’t accomplished more with this column today. It’s a struggle, so I should get on to the music before my choking hand succumbs to fatigue.

BURY THEM AND KEEP QUIET (U.S.) / FEMINIZER (U.S.)

The 2023 debut demo by the German band Kuolevan Rukous quickly became one of my favorite black metal releases of the year. I might never have listened to it if the Spanish label Vita Detestabilis hadn’t asked if we might premiere it — which I eagerly did here after listening to it. If you still haven’t checked it out, I urge you to bookmark this Bandcamp page and make time for it soon. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD ON A SATURDAY: ERDVE, ADVERSVM, COFFIN MULCH, KORPVS, KILL DIVISION, THE NEANDERVERBS, MNAJDRA

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May 062023
 

Less than a week into May and it’s already damned hot in many places around the world, even in some far northern latitudes. A news report yesterday said that at least 78 wildfires are burning across the Canadian province of Alberta, 19 of which are burning out of control, and that more than 13,000 people have already been evacuated from where they live.

Where I live, near the 47th meridian in the Pacific Northwest (and about 800 miles southwest of the Alberta fire zone), it’s now 47° F and the gray sky is drizzling rain, as it did all day yesterday. I love it. It might have influenced some of the picks in this large roundup of new songs and videos, though some sonic firestorms and a few vigorous beatings found their way into it too.

Actually, I’m very proud of how varied this collection turned out to be. Which means you probably won’t like all of it.

ERDVE (Lithuania)

Despite my opening commentary about the weather, the new single from Erdve sounds like a different natural phenomenon — like a mid-paced avalanche of stone, with giant boulders rumbling down. Along with all the jarring jolts, the sizzling riffage is also frightful, creating tension and fear, while the raw yells channel rage. Continue reading »

ENCOUNTER TRUTH: “PANSPERMIA”

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May 012023
 

(Encounter Truth hail from Bogotá, Colombia, and what follows is DGR‘s enthusiastic review of their debut EP Panspermia.)

Truth be told: Colombia’s Encounter Truth and their new EP Panspermia – released at the tail end of March – are kind of at a perfect cross-section of where yours truly has been positioned musically at the moment. At a little over twenty-six minutes in length, five songs, full of tech-death noodling that could challenge a ramen shop in terms of production and plenty of blue/purple colorization about science fiction topics, Encounter Truth have laid their entire formula out on the table before you even hit play.

Across those five songs Encounter Truth are showing that they’re likely never going to let off the accelerator once, and the constant hammering is going to come from all ends – whether it be a surprisingly prominent bass guitar or a never-ending drum section wherein the double-bass rolling is the foundation upon which many of the songs are built.

If this is the “proof-of-concept” release for the current incarnation of Encounter Truth, then perhaps this is a band to keep an eye on in the future, because Panspermia makes it clear that they have the fundamental nature of the genre locked down by the time they’re rocketing well into the EPs second song “La Alianza”. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD ON A SATURDAY: KRYATJURR OF DESERT AHD, OXBOW, BALMOG, SARVEKAS, HOST, ÚZKOST

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Apr 292023
 


Balmog

Happy Saturn’s Day (and good wishes to the dead Romans who named it.). For me, paying work was all-consuming during the first part of this past week, but it was sheer laziness that kept me from compiling a roundup of new music in the closing days. Those two phenomena were connected of course. After some NCS editorial work and some premieres during the days when the paying work relented, I felt like I’d earned the right to stop scurrying and attempt a mind-meld with sloths.

With no head-start behind me, here I am with a giant slag-pile of new music and videos to go through, and great risk of cutting myself followed by infection as I try to paw through it. But paw I did (thankful for band-aids), and the results are presented below. It doesn’t include everything that grabbed me, but to include everything would have left me still writing come sundown. I don’t want that. I want time to go outside and enjoy the warmest day of the year so far here in the Pacific Northwest, or more likely just take a nap.

As if I didn’t have enough picks already, this morning brought a new installment of Renni Resmini’s starkweather substack, and as usual I hadn’t heard the majority of those selections, and as usual his writing compelled me to check out some of those, which has made this roundup even longer. Continue reading »

SHORT BUT SWEET: DEMONICAL — “INTO VICTORY”

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Apr 242023
 

(Here we have DGR‘s review of a new EP released by the Swedish band Demonical, which has been out since the end of March on Agonia Records.)

There have been a string of singles and EP releases in the past couple of months and the grouping of them has been all over the place — many consisting of bonus tracks that were on international editions or ultra-exclusive songs, others being odd experiments, and some being the more traditional “yes, we are working hard on new stuff, here’s what we’ve been up to recently”.

Demonical‘s newest EP release is along the lines of the third one, although part of the reason we’re checking in with them is due to Demonical changing vocalists, so its partly that the band are still going (which is good news, given that 2022’s Mass Destroyer was pretty strong) and partly “here’s what we’re going to sound like now” with new vocalist Charlie Fryksell at the helm.

Not to shock anyone, but the two songs present on Into Victory – the title track and a cover of The Ramones‘ “Somebody Put Something In My Drink” that plays it remarkably straight – continue Demonical‘s pattern of being particularly strong and very capable of bringing the earth-rumbling gallop that you come to this style of death metal for. Continue reading »

SHADES OF BLACK: DIONE, IDOLOS, THE ARCANE ORDER, DÉMONOS

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Apr 232023
 

I probably went way overboard with yesterday’s 11-band roundup of new songs and videos. I could have done the same today, but decided to show a little restraint. There’s still a lot of music to be found below, with two complete EPs as well as two advance songs from forthcoming albums.

I’m also happy with the way this came together, because in very different ways (some more adventurous than others) all the music is head-spinning.

DIONE (Poland)

The debut EP of the solo black metal project Dione seemed to appear out of nowhere when it was released yesterday. No previous releases under that name, though M-A does point to its creator’s previous involvement in a few other projects (which themselves don’t have many releases to their credit). This just makes the appeal of the four songs on Cosmosphere even more startling. Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: FIAT NOX — “OPIUM TO INSIDIOUS SLUMBER II”

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Apr 172023
 

In 2021 we had the honor of premiering In Contemptuous Defiance, a new EP by the German black metal band Fiat Nox, which followed their 2021 debut album The Archive of Nightmares. In an accompanying review we wrote that the EP “further elevates the place of Fiat Nox as a band capable of creating marvelously dynamic and multi-faceted music that gets the blood racing with its muscular, hard-charging aggression but also creates wholly enthralling atmosphere through its emotionally powerful melodies”. In Contemptuous Defiance was also home to a song (“Amok Hymn“) that we named to our list of the year’s Most Infectious Extreme Metal Songs.

Allowing no grass to grow beneath their iron-shod hooves, Fiat Nox followed that EP with another one in 2022 — Demanifestation (Hymns of Destruction and Nothingness). Unfolding across three tracks and 30 minutes, it provided a bracing amalgam of blistering and blasting blackened fury, engrossing melodies, and frightening, esoteric atmosphere worthy of the record’s magnificently hellish cover art.

With their creative fires still burning hot, Fiat Nox have readied yet another EP for release later this month. Entitled Opium To Insidious Slumber, it consists of two songs, and today we’re premiering a lyric video for the second of those — “Opium To Insidious Slumber II“. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD ON A SATURDAY: TORTURE RACK, INFERNAL CURSE, STRAHOR, MISMATCHED, SHADOWS, SCHEITAN, DRUNK MOTHERFUCKERS, FLORES Y FUEGO

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Apr 152023
 

I don’t know where you live. If I were some tech-savvy spook I might be able to find out, but I’m not one of those. I only know where I live. Where I live spring is valiantly trying to become sprung. Leaves and blossoms are gradually appearing on deciduous trees, some faster than others, but when the rains come again tomorrow they may regret that.  A few flowers have blossomed, but not many. I hear a lot more birds at sunrise.

However, the overnight lows are still in the 30s F, the daytime highs still mired in the 50s, and the sun is either pale or obscured by clouds. Spring will have to fight harder. Mind you, I’m not complaining. The last few unbroken links of winter’s chains have made it easier to connect to the some of the music I picked for this Saturday’s recommendations. And of course, delirium and rage are not seasonal, but ever-present, as is alcohol.

TORTURE RACK (U.S.)

Death metal, foul and hulking and savage, seemed like the right way to begin. “Decrepit Funeral Home” will put you on the torture rack and a roaring monster will turn the crank until your bones groan and sinews stretch in agony. You know you deserve it. Continue reading »

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