SHORT BUT SWEET: GODFLESH — “DECLINE AND FALL”

 Album Reviews, SHORT BUT SWEET  2 Responses »
Jul 012014
 

 

(DGR wrote the following review of the new EP by Godflesh.)

When a band like Godflesh decide to put out new material after an extended hiatus it is an important moment. Like At The Gates, Carcass, and Meshuggah as well, Godflesh have put put albums that have launched whole genres and sounds. Vast numbers of bands could trace their geneologies back to these bands based on their chosen genre. In the case of Godflesh it is a tree whose branches are many and whose roots run deep. They in particular have affected many bands who may not even be able to pinpoint the source of the influence. I’m not the hugest follower of Justin Broadrick, but even I recognize the name, as well as the work he’s done with Jesu over the years and his stint in Napalm Death, among his many other projects that have always landed on the periphery of my music listening’s vision. That’s why, when bands like this reform with new material, it is important.

There is a sense of the elder band showing the upstarts how it’s done, but there’s also the more anthropologically sound idea that you’re revisiting the very start of something big, something that feels pure. You know you’re hearing the music of a band whose sound inspired so many other groups years ago, the sound that launched a genre or two, the sound that so many bands latched onto, which over time was watered down or hybridized by others. In cases such as this, you really do hope that the progenitor group’s new material holds up. Not only that, you hope it holds up a mirror to the bands who have descended from them and were inspired by them, with the wish that it will either define or redefine a sound that has been lost or long since changed. Continue reading »

VIDEOGRAPHY: WRETCHED, EASTERN FRONT , DOMINIA

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  6 Responses »
Jul 012014
 

Yesterday I posted three videos that I liked despite the fact that they weren’t exactly in our wheelhouse or down the middle of the NCS fairway or [insert other sports cliches]. For those of you who might have wanted something mo metal, I have the following three videos that appeared since I wrote that earlier post.

WRETCHED

The first video is for the song “Wetiko” from the album Cannibal by North Carolina’s Wretched. DGR praised the album in his review for us earlier in June.

The well-made video (directed by Eric Richter) focuses on the band performing (as well as some self-satisfied assholes behind a pulpit). It effectively combines slo-mo footage with seizure-inducing bursts of speed. Also, frontman Adam Cody looks really, really pissed-off. Also, lots of skulls.

The music, of course, is a blast of manic intensity. Catch it next. Continue reading »

SOMETHING WICKED THIS WAY COMES: NEW ALBUMS FROM CANNIBAL CORPSE AND ELECTRIC WIZARD

 Metal News  3 Responses »
Jul 012014
 

Details about the release of two albums I’m looking forward to were revealed over the last 24 hours…

CANNIBAL CORPSE

Since Cannabis Corpse released a new album this year, it seems only fitting that Cannibal Corpse will, too. Word emerged yesterday that its name will be A Skeletal Domain and that its release is expected in mid-September via Metal Blade. As you can see, the album art also surfaced. I haven’t yet seen the name of the artist since I haven’t yet seen an official press release, but it sure is an eye-catcher.  Update: thanks to a comment below, we’ve learned that the album cover was painted by Vince Locke.

And finally, we have the track list, which of course is half the fun of a new Cannibal Corpse album.  UPDATE: Plus, we now have the stream of a brand new song Continue reading »

THE SYNN REPORT, PART 48: SEND MORE PARAMEDICS

 Album Reviews, THE SYNN REPORT  No Responses »
Jun 302014
 

(In this 49th edition of THE SYNN REPORT, Andy Synn reviews the discography of Send More Paramedics.)

Recommended for fans of: Municipal Waste, Suicidal Tendencies, Exodus

The early part of this new century wasn’t exactly my favourite period when it came to the underground metal scene here in the UK. Not that there weren’t some great, hard-working bands out there doing their own thing (and doing it well!), but it seemed like every other band I encountered was desperately trying to be a sub-standard version of either As I Lay Dying, or Converge, but without an ounce of originality or integrity (while also essentially trying to be as dumb and needlessly confrontational as possible).

Now, that’s not the whole scene by a wide margin, but most of what was out there just wasn’t really clicking with me. However, there were definitely a few exceptions, and one of those was the sheer bloody-minded, self-declared “Zombiecore” madness of Send More Paramedics.

Part thrash, part punk, all crazy… Send More Paramedics rose from the grave in 2001, and were sent back into their deathless slumber in 2007, leaving behind a strange legacy of blood, brains, and bile… set to a soundtrack of rabid thrash riffs and punked-up aggression. The band actually reformed for a few reunion shows earlier this year, but unfortunately I couldn’t make any of them. So, instead, here is my tribute to the heathen masters of undead disaster. Continue reading »

AN NCS INTERVIEW: ATARAXIE — “WHEN SARTRE MEETS DE SADE”

 Interviews  1 Response »
Jun 302014
 

photo by Yoshima Photography

(Our Russian contributor Comrade Aleks brings us this interview he conducted with Jonathan Théry of the French band Ataraxie, whose most recent album was 2013’s L’Être et la Nausée, as well as the bands Funeralium and Void Paradigm.)

As you’ll be able to tell, it took a bit longer than usual to finish this interview with Jonathan Théry, vocalist and bass-player of Ataraxie, who released their new album L’Être et la Nausée in September 2013, but it was worth to wait. Here we have detailed insights into the world of a compelling funeral / death doom band, as well as Jonathan’s other projects.

 ********

Hello Jonathan! I’m glad that you’re with us after these New Year holidays. How many days of vacation do you have in France during December – January?

Greetings Aleks. Actually it depends on your job. Fulltime workers have at least 25 days of holidays per year (that’s what is written in labour law) so that’s up to them to book these days off during the year. As far as I’m concerned, I booked 2 weeks in total ’cause my last holidays were in July and I needed a well-deserved break.

 

May I ask you – what were your best presents for Christmas and the New Year? : )

As a real metalhead, I was offered everything required to slay all hipsters and goths from my town: a new horse, armor, and obviously an axe! hahaha Continue reading »

ALLEGAEON: “ELEMENTS OF THE INFINITE”

 Album Reviews  10 Responses »
Jun 302014
 

 

(In this post TheMadIsraeli reviews the new album by Colorado-based Allegaeon, which is out now on the Metal Blade label.)

I really fucking like technical melodic death metal. I like melodic death metal in general, but when you’ve also got technical guitar showpieces that call to mind melodic lines written by great classical composers of old, it’s just a trip. Allegaeon have been on top of this particular game, as far as newer American blood is concerned.

I’ve really enjoyed the way these guys have played with their sound since they first began putting out music; the evolution they’ve undergone has been interesting to watch. Their self-titled EP was simply a solid, excellent tribute to the melodic death metal style as a whole, with the band wearing their influences on their sleeves. Their debut Fragments of Form and Function was a technical marvel for the style, while Formshifter took a grittier turn and turned up the focus on groove.

I have to admit, however, that while I loved Formshifter, I was slightly turned off by the heavier groove direction. While the music still had the signature Allegaeon tech-melodeath style going on, that aspect of the music was diminished to accommodate the magnification of groove. Which is why I am glad that Elements of The Infinite now exists. It proves that a band who I had honest fears might be stagnating into groove-driven drudgery were merely revealing a different shade of their sound. Returning with the technicality and full-frontal speed, Allegaeon have stormed back this time, not as a MELODIC death metal band, but as a melodic DEATH METAL band, if that makes any sense. Continue reading »

VIDEOGRAPHY: BESTIAL MOUTHS, MORNING MODE, OAK

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  7 Responses »
Jun 302014
 

Here are three videos that caught my eye yesterday. In each case the music is different from what we normally cover here; those of you, for example, who are into the kind of aural terrors I posted in yesterday’s two Shades of Black offerings will probably turn away quickly. I’m normally just like you, though the three songs featured here have grown on me as I’ve watched the videos more than once. Yet the main reason I’m posting them is because I thought the films were very well done and made for interesting and effective interpretations of the music.

BESTIAL MOUTHS

I saw this group described as “one of Los Angeles’s premier goth/ darkwave/ synth punk bands”.  Not an enticing description. But then I saw an article on CVLT Nation that called the video “stellar” and the best one the author had seen all month. I admit that I was also intrigued by the still photo from the video (above) that accompanied the CVLT Nation article. Plus, the band’s name is metal.

An Italian visual artist named Francesco Brunotti directed the video. On the one hand, it just shows a woman (contemporary dancer Valentina Jalali) moving to the music in an abandoned building. On the other hand, she looks a lot better in corpse-paint and spikes than this guy:

 

 
Continue reading »

SHORT BUT SWEET: VOLTURYON — “HUMAN DEMOLITION”

 Album Reviews, SHORT BUT SWEET  1 Response »
Jun 302014
 

 

(DGR wrote this review of the new EP by Sweden’s Volturyon.)

Volturyon are one of those groups I came to incredibly late. I had heard the name before, but my attention wasn’t directed toward them until the guys who made up the band started appearing in other projects I had been listening to — in this case, drummer Christian Netzell, who at the time was playing in In Mourning, and vocalist Alexander Högbom, who turned up in October Tide. Later, bassist Oskar Pålsson from Coldworker would join their lineup as well, but I don’t know if he contributed to Human Demolition. It was, however, one of those coincidences that make the band seem like a death metal explosion built out of the most volatile chemicals that they could find.

The timing of my discovery would prove fortuitous because the band had started hinting at new material, yet I still had enough time to explore, and genuinely enjoy, their earlier works — just so I knew what I would be in for. However, what I hadn’t expected was that when Volturyon took just enough time to put out an EP, they were going to condense the very best of their sound down into four songs and a real quick intro — and genuinely surprise me with some of my favorite material to date.

Long story short, I knew Human Demolition was going to be good, but I did not think it was going to be this good. It’s one of the few discs this year that has left me with whiplash because I couldn’t resist whipping what is left of my glorious mane up and down in rapid-fire sync with the music. Continue reading »

SHADES OF BLACK (Part 2): INTO DARKNESS, SABBATIC GOAT, SERPENTRANCE, TREPANATION

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC, SHADES OF BLACK  8 Responses »
Jun 292014
 

This is Part 2 of a round-up I began earlier today (here). The new songs collected in both parts of this post are the result of my recent submergence in the deepest, dankest pits of black, death, and doom, from which I’ve surfaced with some kind of necrotizing disease that I feel the need to communicate to my fellow lepers. Enjoy!

INTO DARKNESS

After only one listen, I proclaimed the debut demo by Italy’s Into Darkness “one of the best death/doom releases of 2012″. After a line-up change, they then followed that auspicious start with a 7″ EP entitled Transmigration of Cosmic Creatures Into the Unknown (reviewed here), which proved that the 2012 demo was no fluke.

In between those two releases the band produced another demo named Cosmic Chaos (2013) (discussed here and available on Bandcamp), which included a rough mix of a song entitled “Shifted To the Red End of the Spectrum”. Finally, that song is going to be released on a vinyl split with San Diego’s Ghoulgotha, and today it became available inn revised form on Bandcamp. Continue reading »

SHADES OF BLACK (Part 1): DEATH VOMIT, EASTERN FRONT, FŌR, FÓRN

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC, SHADES OF BLACK  2 Responses »
Jun 292014
 

This is another weekend round-up of recommended new music. A particular kind of new music. The kind that will wreck your head on the shoals of savagery and cast your soul into outer darkness. This collection turned out to be so large that I divided it into two parts; the second part will appear soon. The bands are presented in alphabetical order, which is about the only kind of order you’ll find here.

DEATH VOMIT

NCS supporter Utmu pointed me to the first song presented here. It comes from Gutted By Horrors, the debut album of a Chilean band named Death Vomit that’s due for release on July 1, 2014, by the Spanish label Xtreem Music. The song is “Indestructible Abominations”. It’s a noxious cloud of utterly destructive black/death war metal, whose gargantuan grinding riffs spread a morbid melody like the plague while the vocalist renders inhuman echoing howls and soul-devouring roars. Attractively obliterating music.

I’m including a stream of the song in two different players. The album will be available for order on CD at the Xtreem Music site. Based on past experience, I’m guessing Xtreem will eventually put the album on their Bandcamp page (here) as well. Continue reading »

 Older Entries  Newer Entries