AN NCS PREMIERE: SHAPE OF DESPAIR — “DESCENDING INNER NIGHT”

 Premieres  6 Responses »
May 062015
 

 

A decade has passed since the long-running Finnish funeral doom band Shape of Despair released their last album, 2004’s Illusion’s Play. Finally, they have emerged again with a new full-length work entitled Monotony Fields, which will be released by Season of Mist on June 16 in North America. The title track has already premiered at Decibel, and now we bring you another — “Descending Inner Night”.

The band have commented as follows about this new song:

“We have played this song under its working title ‘Unresolved’ only in the Ukraine and Russia so far. To complement the existing live recordings, we are now presenting the album version ‘Descending Inner Night’. This was the second track that emerged for the new album and combines both the old and new elements of Shape of Despair.” Continue reading »

GODLESS ANGEL INTERVIEWS… NECROS AND KING OSCUROS OF UNDEAD

 Interviews  2 Responses »
May 062015
 

 

(Our Kansas-based friend Derek Neibarger — the man behind the Godless Angel death metal project and the inventor of the Cat Hand Rest©, returns to NCS with this interview of two members of the mysterious Undead.)

 

My introduction to Undead came by way of their first single, “Voices Within”. The blog entry that accompanied the track only had a brief excerpt from Undead’s press release. It revealed some of the legendary metal acts that have influenced the band but not much else. In a time when we’ve become so accustomed to being given lengthy band bios, Undead has chosen to share very little about the band’s creation. The faces of the band members are hidden under ominous hoods, their identities a mystery. Their country of origin was omitted. The video for “Voices Within” even broke with tradition by not including the lyrics for the song. And so it fell upon the music to do the talking, and it most definitely delivered.

“Voices Within” is a sinister dose of old school death metal, rising up from the darkest depths to claw its way out your speakers with vicious riffs and demonic growls. For me it was love at first sight. I had to interview this band. My prayer to the dark lords of the underworld did not go unanswered. I was granted an interview with Necros and King Oscuros, shortly before the release of their debut album, False Prophecies. Continue reading »

CONTROLLING THE NARRATIVE

 Mosh Pit  6 Responses »
May 062015
 

photo by Mitch Dobrowner, near Galatia, Kansas

(Storm clouds have been building in Andy Synn’s mind, and now comes the downpour in this opinion piece.)

Human beings are storytellers. That’s undeniable. It’s part of our nature. We construct stories around our world in order to make sense of it.

You see it in everyday life, in times of comedy and tragedy. You see it in everything from politics to personal relationships, and in the way we act and present ourselves to the world at large.

Whether consciously or unconsciously we’re always constructing some sort of narrative, putting the pieces together in a way that allows us to get a grasp on things.

And it happens in music too, both in obvious and more subtle ways. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: MIDNIGHT ODYSSEY — “STARLIGHT OBLIVION”

 Exceptions to the Rule, Premieres  6 Responses »
May 062015
 

 

At the very end of last year we had the pleasure of premiering “Hunter of the Celestial Sea”, an advance song from the new album by Australia’s Midnight Odyssey, Shards of Silver Fade, and today we’re equally delighted to bring you another. What you’re about to hear is “Starlight Oblivion“. It will require more than the usual amount of your time for a single song, but the time you invest will be repaid with handsome dividends. And I can pretty much guarantee that you won’t emerge from the experience in the same frame of mind and mood as when you begin the journey.

The song is more than 18 minutes long, one of eight in a double-album release that includes more than 2 hours and 20 minutes of music. It fully merits the adjective “immersive”. It’s a sweeping celestial voyage of shimmering ambient sounds, galvanizing rhythms, melodies that tug at the heart, and an array of vocal expressions that are all mesmerizing. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD: PARADISE LOST, PRIMORDIAL, DE PROFUNDIS

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  8 Responses »
May 062015
 


Photo by Ewan Cawood

 

A flood of new music and videos appeared yesterday. I found a dozen of them I’d like to recommend, but I’m squeezed for time at the moment, so I’ve made some hard choices and picked three for this post. Perhaps I’ll be able to collect a few more later today — though it’s likely that as this day wears on even more good new music will appear. Anyone who thinks there’s something wrong with the state of metal in 2015 is just WRONG.

PARADISE LOST

My Facebook news feed blew up with friends posting about the new Paradise Lost video yesterday. Most of the links were accompanied by exclamations of surprise and praise. To those I’ll now add my own.

The song is “Beneath Broken Earth” and it appears on the band’s forthcoming album The Plague Within, due for release on June 1 by Century Media. The video was directed by Ash Pears. Here’s a quote about the song and video by the band’s guitarist Greg Mackintosh (who we hope has recovered from his recent mishap on stage in Seattle with Vallenfyre): Continue reading »

INTER ARMA, YAUTJA, AND HORNSS AT THE BOTTOM OF THE HILL (MAY 2, 2015)

 Concert Reviews  2 Responses »
May 062015
 

 

(Guest writer Ben Manzella returns to NCS with this review (and his photos) of performances by Inter Arma, Yautja, and Hornss in San Francisco on May 2, 2015.)

Saturday night in San Francisco; if this peninsula of a city doesn’t already feel crowded during the week, you feel it on the weekends. This weekend was interesting, though, considering that in one Saturday night you had to clearly define whether live music was your priority or instead stay in keeping with the modern culture and hype. Basically, sit at home or in a bar eating overpriced food for an overpriced event that ended up being underwhelming (the Pacquaio-Mayweather fight) or go see a metal show. For me it was never a question, the metal show was always going to win; but then it came down to which one?

See, 924 Gilman (a non-profit, volunteer-run, all-ages club beloved by the punk and hardcore scene) was hosting The Body and Full of Hell along with an assortment of what I assume was mostly local support, including Kowloon Walled City; Septic Flesh and Moonspell were incanting their darkness in Oakland; and then Bottom of the Hill in San Francisco (a bar turned venue as of almost 25 years ago) was hosting Inter Arma and Yautja with local support from Hornss. You see the choice I made. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: POSSESSION — “CEREMONY”

 Premieres  7 Responses »
May 052015
 

 

“Belgium’s Possession are moving from strength to hideous strength. They began precociously with their 2013 demo (His Best Deceit), took forward steps with their 2014 EP (Anneliese — reviewed here), and have made even more progress with their second EP, 1585-1646. Equal parts morbidly atmospheric and  rifftastically raging, it’s an unholy union of black, death, and thrash metal that’s well worth adding to your musical arsenal.”

And that’s how I began my review of 1585-1646 in the middle of last month. I heaped more words of praise on top of this blazing pyre of music, but the main point of this post isn’t to see my own words again (no matter how thrilling that may be), it’s to let you hear another new song from this EP.  Continue reading »

DENDRITIC ARBOR: “ROMANTIC LOVE”

 Album Reviews  3 Responses »
May 052015
 

 

(Austin Weber reviews the new album by Dendritic Arbor, which is out as of today on Grimoire Records.)

Both black metal and grind share quite a bit of common ground when you think about it; both styles revolve around creating ugly fucked-up music that traditionally lacks any sense of conventional melody, but more importantly, are the two styles of metal most often referred to as “noise” by people who aren’t fans. While black-metal-infused hardcore/grind/etc has become quite a thriving trend these days, up until now I never felt impressed by almost all of it, save for last year’s Plebeian Grandstand record and very few others. However, when I first heard of Dendritic Arbor last year courtesy of their track “Genie” through Islander, I knew these guys were something special, a band who had finally married the two styles in a way that benefits both, and more importantly as creators with their own unique compositional style. Their sarcastically titled new record, Romantic Love, is one of the best albums you’ll hear this year. I goddamn guarantee it.

Romantic Love starts out entrenched in hellfire and contempt for all life with album opener “Murmuration End”, a merciless patchwork of blackened sonic plagues and thundering, complex grind, schizophrenically fighting each other for control of the song’s direction. This is a trait common to many of their tracks — switching from grind-fueled black metal, to black-metal-fueled grind. I’ve yet to hear anyone else do it as well or as memorably as Dendritic Arbor. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: THE DEAD GOATS — “DON’T GO IN THE TOMB”

 Premieres  8 Responses »
May 052015
 

 

About 10 days ago I enthusiastically praised a new EP entitled Don’t Go In the Tomb by a Polish band named The Dead Goats, and today I have the pleasure of bringing you a full stream of the EP.

I’ll resist the urge to just re-print every word from my review, and tell you this instead: This EP doesn’t wear out its welcome. I’ve found myself going back to it repeatedly since first hearing it. It’s become my new-found fix when I’m in the need for a jolt of high-energy rampaging, accompanied by the sweet tones of chainsaw guitar and skin-flaying vocals. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD: GESPENST, ORTHODOX, PYLAR, ARCH ENEMY

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  9 Responses »
May 052015
 

 

Here’s an assortment of new music I discovered over the last 24 hours with some help from friends. Needless to say, I urge you to give all of it a listen.

GESPENST

Gespenst is a new Danish black band with some experienced members — vocalist/bassist Galskab, for example, is also a member of Woebegone Obscured, Dwell, and Black Dementia, as well as a former member of Horned Almighty and a live performer with Glorior Belli.  Gepenst have recorded a debut album named Forfald (Danish for “Downfall”), and yesterday they uploaded for streaming an excerpt of one of the album’s songs that blew me away when I heard it (it comes with some eye candy on YouTube).

The song’s name is “Life Drained To the Black Abyss”, and it’s a long one. Even the excerpt is more than 7 1/2 minutes long; as I learned from the band, the complete track runs more than 12 minutes. The album as a whole includes over 40 minutes of music, but only four tracks, so each of them is likely to be a long-form piece. Continue reading »

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