NO CLEAN SINGING

STUFF WE PROBABLY SHOULD HAVE WRITTEN ABOUT EARLIER: FLUISTERAARS, VAMPIRE, WINDHAND, BARONESS

Sep 062015

(Leperkahn rejoins us with a round-up of new songs that have struck a chord.)

We cover a lot of stuff here at NCS. Hell, I can barely keep up with it myself. However, even more goes on in the wide world of metal than the busy staff could ever hope to cover (and normally, I’m too lazy to move my arse and actually put fingers to keyboard). Alas, here are a few tracks that I’ve been really hyped up on, though sadly lack of time has prevented us from giving them proper coverage.

FLUISTERAARS

Early last year BadWolf published a review of Dutch black metal band Fluisteraars’s debut album Dromers. That review was my introduction to the band, and my, what an introduction it was – three extended tracks of harrowing, melodic lo-fi black metal (and I’ll be damned if “De Doornen” didn’t stick in my head like one of Frankenstein’s bolt things). “De Doornen” ended up earning a spot in the Most Infectious Songs list for 2014, and also ended up on my year-end list.

Luckily for us, Fluisteraars have returned, with a new album entitled Luwte (apparently Dutch for “Lee”, though I’m not sure what that could signify) due out on Eisenton on September 25th. At the Bandcamp page for the album a track is currently streaming, an eleven-and-a-half song entitled “Stille Wateren” (“Still Waters” – three quarters of college-level German prepared me to figure that one out without the services of Google Translate). The track is anything but still in its first half, however, as Fluisteraars have unleashed another torrent of scathing melodic BM riffs, shifting from one to the other seamlessly, all punctuated by some soul-cleaving rasps on the vocal front and drums that are evidently try to stir up a tsunami. Continue reading »

THE REARVIEW MIRROR

THE REARVIEW MIRROR 4 Responses »

Sep 062015

It seems that Immortal are no more. Last year Abbath declared the band at an end, and having lost a legal battle to secure rights to the name, he is forging ahead under his own. Meanwhile, Demonaz and Horgh announced last month that Immortal will continue without Abbath, and that the two are at work on a new album to be released by Nuclear Blast.

Who knows whether these now separate formations will create music worthy of the band’s past glories. Rather than engage in fruitless speculation, let’s listen to some of those instead. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: INTO DARKNESS — “THRONE OF A THOUSAND MISERIES”

Premieres 3 Responses »

Sep 052015

Germany’s Into Darkness trace their roots to the mid-’90s. Their debut album, Misfortunal Odes in D Minor, was released in 1997. The next full-length, an album named Dysphoria, appeared in 2012 — and now, 20 years after the band’s original formation, they are releasing a third album. The new one bears the title Sinister Demise, though the album reveals in striking fashion that Into Darkness are very much alive and as ferocious as ever. As an introduction to what Into Darkness have now wrought, we bring you the premiere of the album’s third track, “Throne Of A Thousand Miseries“.

The new incarnation of Into Darkness is still anchored by founding vocalist/guitarist Sebastian Längerer, but he is now joined by two newer faces — drummer Robert Witzel and bass-player Andreas Rigo. Together they form a well-oiled machine, and a very wicked one — and on this album they are joined by guest appearances from members of Necrophagist, Obscura, Blotted Science, and Nervochaos. Continue reading »

SINKING: DEAD TO A DYING WORLD, HELLLIGHT, IJSRIJK, MESARTHIM, THE CLOISTERS

RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC 26 Responses »

Sep 052015

I have some round-ups of new and newly discovered music to send your way today and tomorrow. By coincidence, much of what I found yesterday that hit me hard were songs that in very different ways lay the mantle of doom upon your shoulders, and those are all collected here. The music pulls you in, and draws you under; the light recedes while the surface grows more distant. There’s a lot of heaviness (and wretchedness) in what follows, and a lot of sublime beauty as well. The final song in the collection, while not metal except perhaps in spirit, may be the most beautiful of all.

DEAD TO A DYING WORLD

I’m not sure how we reached the 5th day of September, 2015, without ever previously featuring Dead To A Dying World on this site. We hang our heads in shame. It’s time to make amends.

Four years after their debut album, this seven-piece Dallas band have a new full-length named Litany that will be released on October 16 by Gilead Media and Tofu Carnage Records in the U.S. and by Alerta Antifascista in Europe. It features cover art by the talented Sera Timms.

Yesterday, Decibel premiered a 16 1/2 minute song named “Beneath the Loam”, and the title tells you something about the atmosphere of the music — but far from everything. Continue reading »

SHADOW WOODS METAL FEST: AN UPDATE

Metal News 6 Responses »

Sep 042015

Way back in April of this year I discovered the Shadow Woods Metal Festival, an open-air and camping festival then being planned for the Mountain Lake Summer Camp in Fannettsburg, Pennsylvania, in the heart of the Appalachian Mountains. Apart from the attractive setting, what really spiked my interest was the phenomenal line-up of bands who were scheduled to appear. I’m writing now to provide a few updates — the dates are the same, the line-up is even more impressive, but the venue has been changed. It’s still something I would damned sure attend if I weren’t on the other side of the continent.

Now the festival will take place — on September 25-27, 2015 — in White Hall, Maryland, about 30 minutes north of Baltimore. The exact street address will be provided to ticket purchasers. Camping and workshops on topics such as runes, guitar maintenance, and yoga will still be offered without additional charge, and artists and record labels will also have merch areas alongside several onsite food stands.

There aren’t a lot of tickets left. The festival will only sell 350 tickets, three-quarters of those are gone, and there will be no sales at the gate. This is a 21-and-over show, and it’s BYOB. To get advance tickets online, go here:

www.shadowwoodsmetalfest.com

Now, let me remind you about the line-up, which has evolved since I first wrote about it. Continue reading »

SHADES OF BLACK: ALL HELL, SHADOW OV FENRIS, OSMOSE, VELUM

Album Reviews, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC, SHADES OF BLACK, SHORT BUT SWEET 6 Responses »

Sep 042015

My trip to Alaska for my fucking day job proved to be a quick one. I got back home to Seattle late last night, about 36 hours after I left. If I’d had any sense, I would have gone right to bed. Instead, I spent time listening to new music, following up on links that friends sent me. And now here I am, five hours of sleep later, pecking on my keyboard about what I heard. By chance, what I enjoyed the most were songs in the vein of black metal, and so we have another Shades of Black collection. As usual, the music is quite diverse.

ALL HELL

My friend and NCS contributor Leperkahn messaged me about the promo of a new album by a band named All Hell that he had just received, with these words: “Trust me when I say stop whatever you’re doing and listen to it, or at least the track at this link, immediately”. Continue reading »

PLAYING CATCH-UP: UNDER THE PLEDGE OF SECRECY / MAAHLAS / SHELL FROM OCEANIC

Album Reviews, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC 6 Responses »

Sep 042015

(Andy Synn looks back at three albums from 2014 that we sadly neglected to review.)

Despite what you all clearly think, even your humble Metal overlords here at NCS aren’t completely infallible. Try as we might, sometimes even we miss out on stuff amongst the hustle and bustle of this thing we call life.

Case in point: I’m still discovering albums from last year (and the year before that… and the year before that…) which we failed to adequately cover properly, and which I’m metaphorically kicking myself for having missed.

So, in the interest of correcting such heinous oversights, I’ve decided to wax lyrical about three albums which went cruelly unappreciated here at NCS during the chaos and confusion of last year, each of which offers something very different to tease your musical tastebuds! Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: ZILLAH — “MADE FLESH AND BONE”

Premieres 4 Responses »

Sep 042015

(Austin Weber introduces our premiere of a song by a Scottish band we’ve been following for a while — Zillah.)

Scotland’s dissonant death metal juggernauts Zillah are a band Islander has written about several times here at NCS, and I’ve been a fan of them as well for many years. They are about to release their third full-length record entitled Serpentine Halo in early October through Sea Of Corruption Records. It’s especially exciting for me because it’s their first record since 2006 when they released an absolutely insane album called Substitute For A Catastrophe.

That record was way ahead of its time, and you should probably check it out as a further primer into the weird world of Zillah. If you enjoy “Made Flesh And Bone”, which is streaming below, check out their prior works at their Bandcamp: https://zillah.bandcamp.com/album/substitute-for-a-catastrophe Continue reading »

THE HORN AND NEKRASOV: “VOLUME 13”

Album Reviews 5 Responses »

Sep 042015

This review began as what I thought would be the final installment in a Shades of Black collection of new songs that I will post later today. But by the time I finished, it had become long enough that I thought I should post it separately.

I knew nothing about this album when I started listening to the first song, which is the album’s centerpiece. It will require some dedication to get through it — not because the music is dull or tedious, but because the song (“Spell 1 / Spell 1b”) is almost 20 minutes long. That song is the product of a collaboration between two prolific Australian musicians who call themselves The Horn and Nekrasov. The album on which it appears is named Volume 13, a three-track work inspired by ancient Egyptian funeral texts. It was released via Bandcamp on September 1. Continue reading »

SCHEDULE ANNOUNCED FOR BLACK SABBATH’S FINAL TOUR

Metal News 6 Responses »

Sep 032015

I’m interrupting the work I’m supposed to be doing for my fucking day job because this seemed like important news: Black Sabbath have announced that their farewell North American tour, The End, will begin in January in Omaha and end in February at New York City’s Madison Square Garden. The band will do a leg in Australia and New Zealand in April and will be announcing more shows next month.

The lineup will consist of Ozzy Osbourne, Tony Iommi, and Geezer Butler — but not drummer Bill Ward, of course. Here’s the schedule announced today: Continue reading »

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