BECAUSE WITTY YEAR-END LIST TITLES ABOUT RUINING THE HOLIDAYS ARE FOR SUCKERS — THE DGR YEAR ENDSTAVAGANZA PART FOUR: 20-11

 LISTMANIA 2024  8 Responses »
Dec 192024
 

(We’ve made it to the fourth installment of DGR‘s Top 50 year-end list, with another block of 10 releases being ranked, and one more section slated for arrival tomorrow.)

You ever do something constantly even though you’ve known for a while that it is taking a lot out of you and driving other people insane? I have habits that I can’t break and sometimes think that long ago we evolved past yearly ‘tradition’ and into something in the warehouse of yearly ‘ritual’ instead.

This YE list series is my closing act in a way, the final signing off, tying of the bow and boot out rifling out the door of my writing for 2024. The final summation in many ways of everything up to this point even though it’s the one time I allow my writing to really veer off the officious sounding mark and into casual territory, as if we’re sitting across the table from one another, and I – in my incredulously drunk state – have achieved inebriated Buddha status and am ready to guide along my vision of the eight-fold path of heavy metal and wild-eyed lunacy.

The realer reason of course is that it helps break up the daily routine and gives me reason to sit cross-legged in front of the computer and just type endlessly, laughing about how I’ve never learned how to type properly and am of the school of ‘whatever finger is closest, thumb is for space bar and I use my pinky if I’m feeling fancy’ yet am still somehow in the one-hundred words per minute range. It’s stupid, but it helps break up the end of the year when I feel like I’m just running in endless loops. Continue reading »

FINITE BUT SACCHARINE — GLASS BEAMS, VAELRAVYN, JEAN MARAIS, SKALLABRAK, TUMBLEWEED DEALER, DAX RIGGS

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  1 Response »
Dec 182024
 

(Our South Africa-born but Vietnam-resident NCS contributor Vizzah Harri decided to wade into a batch of seriously ear-worming music that generally isn’t as harsh on the ears as much of what we, and he, typically traffic in. We hope you’ll still enjoy what he presents here, as well as the enthusiastic presentation.)

If you follow this page diligently and try keeping up with each post and release, you’ll have more diotic islands of dreams at your disposal than the hours you delude yourself of having woken. Here are 6 new(ish) offerings of divergent persuasions.

I’ve got an authentically fiendish cornucopia of un-listened content in my meta saved folder as well as other bits I haven’t gotten even a second’s worth of ear-time towards because for a long time the only solace I had was the receding sound of foam expanding in the acoustic meatus neighboring my eardrums. Earplugs to drown out the near-constant barrage of construction, horns from flower delivery drivers, and the steel factory next door that works odd hours of the night. I moved recently though, and plugging in the external hard drive full of ‘golden oldies’ has really helped. As well as an insane YouTube wormhole researching a highly acclaimed album from them retrogressive prog ‘upstarts’ of death that I’m yet to finish writing. Continue reading »

JESUS CHRIST WILL HE JUST GO AWAY? NEILL JAMESON’S 2024 LISTS PT I

 LISTMANIA 2024  No Responses »
Dec 182024
 


photo by Hillarie Jason

(One of the perennial highlights of our year-end LISTMANIA series are the articles Neill Jameson has contributed, and we’re very happy that he’s doing so again this year. This one is the first of three four installments we’ll be publishing. To be clear, Neill wrote the title of this feature himself.)

What a fucking ridiculous year. Between wars, threats of wars, the election, that fucking girl who’s famous for a joke about dick spittings and whatever new allegations your favorite band has against them it’s just been an exhausting twelve months. What better way to cap that off than by reading a bunch of assholes telling you what you should have listened to this year instead of whatever meandering bullshit you actually did. Unless it was Krieg’s split with Withdrawal, you obviously have exquisite taste. 

After all, it’s the most wonderful time of the year, right?

Last year I skipped the genre format for my lists and just threw everything together, with the obviously subjective “best” saved for last. I did this mostly out of laziness but I think we’ve built a new tradition, like picking out who not to send Christmas cards to this year because they did something to publicly shame the family, like supporting RFK. 

Sure the comments section will be measured and forgiving after that one.

So this’ll be a few parts, depending on how much I can write while tucked away in my office hiding from my employees. Here’s part one: Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: ONIROPHAGUS — “BLACK BREW”

 Premieres  No Responses »
Dec 182024
 

(written by Islander)

First impressions of just about anything can often be lasting impressions, not necessarily indelible, because further experience can result in reevaluations, but still significant. Which is why parents the world over try to teach their kids the importance of making good first impressions when meeting people for the first time.

For many of you, the first impression of Onirophagus might be Paolo Girardi‘s ghastly eyeball-filled cover art for their new album Revelations From the Void. Odds are, it will be a lasting impression, even though it isn’t the kind of impression that doting parents have in mind when trying to school their children. They don’t tell them to be as hideous as possible. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): MOONDARK — “THE ABYSMAL WOMB”

 Album Reviews, Premieres  No Responses »
Dec 182024
 

(NCS contributor Zoltar wrote the following introduction to our full streaming premiere of the long-awaited debut album by Sweden’s Moondark, which will be released on Friday by Pulverised Records.)

Her name might not matter that much anymore but boy oh boy did she have the look. Yeah, you know what I’m talking about don’t you? That one gorgeous looking girl, for whom you had a not-so-secret crush all high-school years long. She filled your dreams and even to this day, although three decades have passed and you’ve moved to greener pastures with a ring on your finger, three kids, a mortgage, and a beer belly, you can’t seem to be able to get rid of, you can’t help but think of her from time of time, like a lost relic of bygone times when things seemed simpler and funnier.

And then, totally by random, you bump into her on your way to the supermarket. And boom, without warning, all your teenagers’ fantasies are ruined in a nano-second as this once seemingly goddess-like figure turns out to now be ugly, fat, ridden with bad skin problems, and utterly obnoxious.

So yeah, I so wanted Moondark not to be that girl geddit? Continue reading »

BECAUSE WITTY YEAR END LIST TITLES ABOUT RUINING THE HOLIDAYS ARE FOR SUCKERS – THE DGR YEAR ENDSTAVAGANZA PART THREE: 30 – 21

 LISTMANIA 2024  No Responses »
Dec 182024
 

(This is the third installment of DGR‘s year-end Top 50 list, counting down the third group of 10, with the next two groups slated for the next two days ahead.)

I’ve been doing these lists long enough that I’ve developed a genuine fear that I might be repeating myself. I console myself with the fact that no one else seems to have noticed so far since every one of these has been a fantastic exercise in breaking out the thesaurus and learning new words every day – or reminding myself that I used to not be so dumb. I have yet to work “lugubrious” into one of these but you better believe I’m going to damned well take a swing at it at some point.

But it’s the fear of repeating myself that drives me to such inanity, because I am worried that it might seem like I’m wasting your time. I don’t want these to be the ‘if you’ve read one, you’ve read them all’ of the year-end lists. I even gut-checked myself by archiving them all together at one point just to make sure that each stood as its own artistic statement – or at the very least the authorial equivalent of changing the food for the dog every once in a while.

But like I said (twice already), repetition is a big fear of mine. Well, that and accidentally putting releases from last year in here or playing my hand early and putting something that comes out next January on here. Luckily I haven’t been at risk of doing that last one yet, as I don’t think I have any promos from that timeframe in hand nor would I likely acknowledge them. At this point I feel like I’ve taken a round off of the reaper just by making it to next week. Continue reading »

LISTMANIA 2024: A YEAR-END LIST FROM SEB PAINCHAUD (TUMBLEWEED DEALER)

 LISTMANIA 2024  10 Responses »
Dec 172024
 

(Montréal -based Seb Painchaud‘s unusually varied year-end lists have always been a popular highlight of our YE LISTMANIA series, and the one below for 2024 won’t be an exception. But unlike other years, when we’ve voiced a futile hope that his band Tumbleweed Dealer would come out with a new album in the New Year, this time they really will do it!)

Another year, another list! And what a god damn year it was. Wasn’t sure it’d make it to the end at times. But here we are.

I`ve greatly modified my listening habits, trying to be less obsessive compulsive about NEEDING to listen to every new release out there. Sometimes it’s okay to throw on a Slayer record you’ve heard a thousand times when you’re stuck in traffic.

I still managed to discover some gems amongst the revisiting of classics this year, and here they are: Continue reading »

AN NCS EP PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): DREAMING DEATH — “SINISTER MINISTER”

 Album Reviews, Premieres, SHORT BUT SWEET  No Responses »
Dec 172024
 

(written by Islander)

Band name: Dreaming Death. Record title: Sinister Minister. That lovely queasy-green cover art festooned with tentacles and claws. That should be enough to lure you into the music on the debut EP we’re streaming in this post. If it isn’t, you’ll soon see a photo of the band ready and eager to beat you to death with a shovel. That ought to seal the deal.

But just in case, we’ll add that Dreaming Death‘s lineup incudes Pahl Hodgson (guitars, vocals) and Ross Duncan (bass, vocals), known for their work with Beyond Mortal Dreams and Oath Of Damnation, plus drummer Matt “Skitz” Sanders, and further add that their EP lured Lavadome Productions into releasing it this coming Friday — the label’s only release in 2024.

You need any more reasons to listen? Nah, you probably don’t, but providing reasons is the reason for my existence, so you’re going to get some more whether you need it or not. Continue reading »

NIGRUM: “BLOOD WORSHIP EXTREMISM”

 Album Reviews  No Responses »
Dec 172024
 

(Our Oslo-based contributor Chile prepared the following review of a new album by the now-Sweden-based black metal band Nigrum. The album was just released last month by Iron Bonehead Productions.)

Multiculturalism, what a concept. Joining two (or more) different cultures in a fusion of varying elements of traditions, customs, and human existences to achieve a new state of equilibrium and a richer tapestry of life for everyone to enjoy. Anyway, where else would that be more true and visible than in that melting pot of postmodern lunacy, namely metal. 

Such is the story of Nigrum, originally hailing from Mexico, but settling in Sweden, thus bringing some of the southern madness into the insanity of the darker parts of the world. Coming off their well-received debut album Elevenfold Tail, which was a fantastic accomplishment in itself, Nigrum have wasted no time in recording a follow-up to keep the momentum going. Two years have passed, and with some minor personnel changes, Blood Worship Extremism is now before us, courtesy of Iron Bonehead Productions. Continue reading »

BECAUSE WITTY YEAR-END LIST TITLES ABOUT RUINING THE HOLIDAYS ARE FOR SUCKERS — THE DGR YEAR ENDSTAVAGANZA PART TWO: 40-31

 LISTMANIA 2024  3 Responses »
Dec 172024
 

(Here we have the second installment of DGR‘s year-end Top 50 list, counting down the second group of 10, with the next three groups slated for the next three days ahead.)

While we have not achieved critical mass yet in terms of writing for the year-end list, we’re definitely making progress down the line. This is still an area of the list where I often tell people that rankings – useless as they may be since this could be best viewed as ’50 albums DGR liked’ – don’t really start to crystalize in any sense until you start reaching the mid-30’s. So you’re reading the last vestiges of the albums I felt must be spoken about just so I can feel good about saying something about them and also starting to see the ones that I really sunk my teeth into.

They’re not a perfect representation by any means and I guarantee that come January 1st I’ll likely be kicking myself for leaving something off – especially with a late December drop of Frontierer‘s new EP looking like a contender to really fuck things up for me – but at least there’s some confidence in the ten collected before you today.

Tomorrow’s genre-spread will likely be just as silly but you’ll definitely start to see some old favorites popping up there since, much like one of the groups that appears in this collection, I too am a hallmark of consistency. I’m just not nearly as attractive. Continue reading »

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