(written by Islander)
Only five selections today, but there’s still a lot here — three EP-length records and a complete album, in addition to a lead-off song by a respected Balkan band from their next full-length. (Having more time to pursue my own perfidious activities is one silver lining to the personal cloud of enduring my wife’s absence while she’s off partying with one of her two sisters in Nevada this weekend.) Continue reading »
(written by Islander)
Life outside the doors of NCS reminded me again that there is life outside the doors of NCS. Which is to say that unforeseen occurrences pushed back the time I wanted to spend listening to and writing about new metal for this roundup, so I’m late finishing it. No need to go into detail but, well, a baseball playoff game last night and needing to get my wife to an early ferry boat this morning had something to do with it.
There’s no baseball playoff games today and my spouse is now out of town, just me and the cats holding down the homestead, so there’s a decent chance I’ll have a more on-time roundup of black(ish) metal ready for tomorrow. As for today’s selections, I think they’ll keep you off-balance as you move through them. Continue reading »
(written by Islander)
Those of you who follow our weekend roundups of new music are aware that I’ve made many discoveries (and then shared them) through perusing the recommendations of Rennie Resin‘s starkweather Substack. His most recent collection of recommendations included thoughts about a new album from a band named Zabus that’s principally the work of Jeremy Moore from Washington, D.C. He followed that offering with these words about a band whose song we’re premiering today:
Zero Swann is another splinter from Jeremy Moore and Benefactor comes two years after the Amon Zonaris release. This project has similarities to Zabus in its approach to sound, using copious amounts of reverb and delay and vocals forward in the mix. While Zabus is decidedly post punk given the psyche treatment, Zero Swann is its more sinister, noisier, atavistic twin. Almost free form and nightmarish in approach where songs are spasms and rattles rather than crafted and honed into shape.
That was my introduction to Zero Swann, framed as only Rennie can do, and one thing led to another… the other thing being today’s video premiere of “Grave Wax Horticulture” from Zero Swann‘s Benefactor album — which is being released today on the Saccharine Underground label. Continue reading »
(written by Islander)
The story behind Sakna’s forthcoming album De Syv Dødssynder, and the reasons why it is both the first and last album by this Canadian project, are fascinating (maybe even jaw-dropping, given the quality of the music) but also deeply sad. We should begin with that story.
As we’ve been told, Sakna is the solo work of Canadian multi-instrumentalist Solemn, a work that began in 2006, when Solemn was only 14 years old, as a musical adaptation of Dante Alighieri’s The Divine Comedy. By the age of 18, he had recorded all of the album’s vocals, guitars, bass, keyboards, organs, and drums himself, drawing on such varied influences as Windir, Mournful Congregation, Emperor, Wolves In The Throne Room, Cor Scorpii, and more.
In 2011, Solemn took his own life, before anything was done to release the album other than Solemn leaking an early preview single (“Del I – Helvete”) to YouTube in 2009. Continue reading »
(written by Islander)
As we sometimes do, we’re going off most of our well-beaten paths with the song and video we’re about to premiere. No shrieking or guttural growling this time, but only singing. No blast-beats or brutality, but only the blues. But lest you think we’ve completely lost our way, these blues are very heavy — just as promised by the title of the album that includes the song — and very devilish too.
The name of the song is “Occult 5“, and it’s the latest single to be disclosed by the Denver band Malkasian from their new album Heavy Blues, which will be out on October 22nd. Continue reading »
(written by Islander)
In case anyone is still puzzled by the meaning of the Finnish band DET‘s name, they’ve spelled it out in the title of their forthcoming debut album: Destructive Elite Terror.
The album is set for release by Dying Victims Productions on that most metal of dates, October 31st. It follows up DET‘s 2022 demo Death Night, their 2023 demo Vengeance, and their 2023 split with Krusifoitu. What we bring you today is the opportunity to hear — and get revved up by — the entire album. Continue reading »
(Andy Synn encourages you to check out three of his favourite EPs from the last month)
As always I’ve been a little lax in covering the various EPs and related short-form releases which have been put out over the last 10-ish months.
But I’ll hopefully be able to sneak a few more in before the end of the year (when, as always, I’ll be putting together a round-up of all the things I’ve listened to, including those I didn’t get to write about), beginning with today’s trifecta of auditory abuse from Head of the Baptist (Belgium), Themata (Finland), and Underneath (USA).
all photos by Eva Tusquets
(We present our Comrade Aleks’ recent interview with John Paradiso, vocalist/guitarist of the long-running U.S. funeral doom band Evoken, whose first new album in seven years [reviewed here] will be released tomorrow by Profound Lore Records.)
While funereal death-doom has never been (and never will be) a popular genre, there are bands that know how to squeeze the most out of its dry rulebook and present their vision creatively and with a spark. American pioneers of this genre, Evoken, are generally considered to have formed in 1994, although the band had existed under other names since 1992. Of that original lineup, only two remain in Evoken today: Vince Verkay (drums) and John Paradiso (vocals, guitar). However, the rest of the band are no newcomers either: Don Zaros (keyboards), David Wagner (bass), and Chris Molinari (guitar) have been elevating this slow and agonizing funeral doom to the level of true art for over fifteen years.
I respected Evoken, albeit not fanatically, but their latest full-length Mendacium resonated with me, reflecting a lot of things happening in the world right now. And objectively, this moderately original, distinctive, and mature album is interesting not only from an artistic perspective, but also as a metaphor for a deeply ill world. A world in which we still live. Continue reading »
(written by Islander)
This band from the Pocono Mountains region of Eastern Pennsylvania aren’t trying to fool anyone. They call themselves Pile of Knives. They named their first EP No Light. The name of their new one is Driven By the Blade, and its cover art is a photo of meat cleavers and a gutting knife on a blood-soaked backdrop.
Their music is also unabashedly bludgeoning and brutal, and when they’re not trying to beat the living hell out of listeners, they’re furiously cutting them up and spraying the remains with acid.
Well, that’s one way of trying to capture Pile of Knives‘ amalgam of slam, death metal, beatdown hardcore, and deathcore, which invokes the legacies of such bands as Skinless, Dying Fetus, Internal Bleeding, Origin, and Through The Eyes Of The Dead, but also the likes of Crawlspace, Final Resting Place, Shattered Realm, and No Zodiac.
We’ll try out some other ways of capturing the experience in print as we discuss a song from Driven By The Blade that we’re premiering with a video today. Its name is… “LACERATION“. Continue reading »
(Andy Synn provides four, rather than his usual three, fantastic examples of British steel for you to enjoy)
Looking back at the year so far it appears that while I’ve been pretty regular with these “Best of British” articles I haven’t quite managed to do one a month, hitting January, but not February, then publishing one each in March, April, May,and June, before skipping July, and then just about squeezing one in during August and September.
For this edition (which might not be the only one in October, if all goes well) however, I’ve slightly mixed things up a little, including one album released all the way back in June (which, to my chagrin, I didn’t even get around to listening to until last month), one from the end of last month, and two from this month, one of which was already released, the other coming out next week.
So let’s see what delights this extended edition has to offer, shall we?