DIVERSITY: A.M.S.G., DREAMSHADE, MENDEL

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  20 Responses »
May 202013
 

I concede that I may get more excited about metal on a daily basis than most fans because my tastes are perhaps more wide-ranging than average. The diversity of metal is one of its great attractions to me, and so today I’ve gotten excited about the three items in this post that are dramatically different from each other. As the French say, Vive la différence.

This post includes two new songs (one captured on video) and one new video for a song released earlier this year. The bands are A.M.S.G. (Canada), Dreamshade (Switzerland), and Mendel (The Netherlands).

A.M.S.G.

A.M.S.G. (“Ad Majorem Satanae Gloriam”) are a “Holocaustik Canadian Terrorist Black Metal” band from Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. If you couldn’t guess already, they are not your friend.

The mastermind behind A.S.M.G. is Angelfukk Witchhammer, a member of Gloria Diaboli as well as the now-defunct Rites Of Thy Degringolade and Ouroboros, and the band also includes drummer Kaos Abhorrer. I happened upon them last fall and reviewed (here) their 2010 EP, The Principle Of Evil Becomes The Ideal Of The Promethean, which I liked a lot. Continue reading »

FIN: “FATED BY WILL AND IRON”

 Album Reviews  No Responses »
May 202013
 

In the spring of 2012 a four-man Chicago black metal band named FIN self-released a demo album entitled Fated By Will and Iron. The album is now going to get the attention it deserves because it’s scheduled for an official label release on June 11 by Disorder Recordings, a relatively new imprint established by Jeff Wilson, guitarist for Chrome Waves, Wolvhammer, and formerly Nachtmystium. In this post, we’ve got a review of the album and a song stream of the title track.

At a very high level, FIN combine a variety of styles, mixing them to varying degrees within each song and transitioning from one to the next in a way that gives the music vibrancy. One of those strains (perhaps best exemplified in “Guilty of War Crimes”) is a bestial, warlike assault that’s in keeping with the martial themes of the song titles. Distorted, swarming tremolo riffs mix with thunderous double-bass, crashing cymbals, and a seething acid-bath of vocal expression to unleash a holocaust of hellfire. During these passages, listening is like being caught in a hurricane.

There are rarely any genuinely subdued moments on the album, but FIN do shake things up by transitioning within songs into squalling chord progressions and thumping drum rhythms. In these decelerated “black ‘n’ roll” segments, guitarist M.K. delivers some juicy riffs (still distorted and still vibrating with unholy energy), and heads will bang. Continue reading »

METAL ON BANDCAMP: A NEW MILESTONE

 Metal News  22 Responses »
May 202013
 

Bandcamp has hit a new milestone. Thanks to our blog brother MaxR of Metal Bandcamp, we learned this morning that there are now 80 labels who have established beachheads on Bandcamp, with a total of 3,715 albums featured.

No one follows metal happenings on Bandcamp like MaxR. In addition to publishing reviews by a growing cadre of writers, he has methodically been assembling a list of all the metal labels who have availed themselves of the platform. Even better, he has compiled all the labels, alphabetically arranged, into a table with links that will take you to each label’s offerings. We’ve reproduced that table after the jump. This is a work in progress, and if you’d like to be notified by e-mail when he updates the listing of labels, go HERE and click the “Subscribe by email” link at the bottom

I suppose every true metal fan knows about Bandcamp by now, but I’ll say again what I’ve said many times before since discovering the existence of Bandcamp when it was in its infancy: Every band and every label needs to be there, at least for the purpose of streaming music, if not for selling it. Doesn’t mean you can’t or shouldn’t have your music available elsewhere — it’s not an exclusive option. But it’s a very good one, and in this day and age, if you’re not giving fans a chance to hear your music before they buy, then you’re going to miss sales (wherever you sell your releases) and you’re inviting piracy even by some people who consider themselves scrupulous. Continue reading »

AN NCS INTERVIEW: ERIC CUTLER OF AUTOPSY (and NECROSIC)

 Interviews  4 Responses »
May 202013
 

(On June 24 [July 2 in the U.S.], Peaceville Records will release The Headless Ritual, the second full-length album recorded by the legendary Autopsy since their revival in 2009. NCS supporter KevinP had the chance to conduct a wide-ranging interview with Autopsy’s co-founder Eric Cutler, and we’re proud to bring it to you right now.)

 

K:  Not that you’ve kept this a secret, but I’m not sure how many people actually know that you were diagnosed with Avascular Necrosis in 2008. The last update I saw (via Brooklyn Vegan in Dec 2012) was you had nearly recovered. Can you give us all any further update?

E:  Yep, I am healed and building up strength in my hip. A lot of physical therapy, swimming, and exercise!

 

K: This caused you to get 2 hip replacements over the years, correct?

E:  Yes, once in 2008 and again in 2010. I should be good now for 15-20 years. I will have to have replacements again and I am not looking forward to that, except for the morphine!

 

K:  Any idea what caused or brought this on?

E:  We don’t know why, I don’t fit any of the criteria. They don’t know a lot about the disease, there are many things that can cause it. My son recently was diagnosed with it as well. His condition is not related to mine though. He has a disease called Legg-Calve Perthes. He will be having the first of at least two surgeries very soon. He is 6 years old and the news devastated my wife and I. Continue reading »

A NEW GORGUTS VIDEO!

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  5 Responses »
May 202013
 

When it comes to technical death metal, Gorguts occupies a place in rarified air. It has gone through several iterations divided by long periods of inactivity, with legendary vocalist/guitarist Luc Lemay being the only constant.  The band’s last album, From Wisdom To Hate, was released 12 years ago, but word surfaced about four years ago that Lemay was reviving Gorguts yet again — this time with the line-up filled out by drummer John Longstreth (Dim Mak, Origin, The Red Chord, Skinless, etc., etc.); bassist Colin Marston (Dysrhythmia,  Indricothere, Behold… The Arctopus, Krallice); and guitarist Kevin Hufnagel (Dysrhythmia, While Heaven Wept).

And then in February of this year we learned (and reported) that Gorguts have signed with Season of Mist and will be releasing their extremely long-awaited fifth studio album later this year.

And then last night I found a video that had just been posted on YouTube. It’s a performance by the current Gorguts line-up at their only Canadian show in 2012 — the Trois–Rivières Metalfest at the Bâtisse Industrielle venue in Quebec on October 12. The song is “Stiff and Cold”, from the band’s 1991 debut album Considered Dead.

The video was filmed with 6 cameras, and it looks and sounds really good. If you want a taste of what this combined line-up of all-star talent is capable of doing, watch it next. You’ll be glad you did. Continue reading »

IN DREAD RESPONSE

 Free Shit, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  3 Responses »
May 192013
 

In Dread Response are an excellent New Zealand metal band that we’ve mentioned a couple times in the past, but not recently — and it’s past time that we checked in with them again. TheMadIsraeli reviewed their debut album From the Oceanic Graves in August 2011 (here). We miserably failed to review their second full-length, Embers In the Spiritless Void, but our NZ blog sister Steph Metal did name that release as one of the 10 best 2011 metal albums from Down Under in a guest feature we published in January 2012. Here’s what Steph had to say about it:

Aggressive death metal with overarching melody and faultless musicianship, In Dread Response have been building a steady following in New Zealand since the release of their debut album in 2008. Songs like “Through Chasms” demonstrate their attention to details – lyrics that weave graven images in your mind, relentless double kick and layers of riffs that create drama and tension, and almost classical solos that deliver exactly what they promise.

Thanks to a tip from NCS supporter Booker, I’m pleased to tell you that as of yesterday In Dread Response made Embers available as a free download in a .zip file that also includes hi-res images of the entire CD album booklet (and it’s a feast for the eyes that includes paintings by the stupendous John Martin). But that’s not all . . . Continue reading »

GIVE LIFE BACK TO MUSIC

 Mosh Pit  22 Responses »
May 192013
 

(After a six-month absence, guest writer Tyler Lowery is back with some thoughts that I suspect will draw some disagreement.)

I’m going to start by referencing a band that may or may not be appreciated in these hallowed halls. Recently, EDM titans Daft Punk released their highly anticipated follow-up to 2005’s Human After All, titled Random Access Memories. The album opens with a phenomenal song called “Give Life Back to Music.” At first listen it sounds like what you would normally expect from Daft Punk, but as you go along, you notice that everything sounds a bit crisper, more organic. The entire album is performed on live instruments, using no loops, programming, or anything of the such. Now, I promise this isn’t an attempt to slip an album review in here, so just bear with me. In a recent interview, Daft Punk stated that they believe music has no soul anymore. I think that “Give Life Back to Music” is a plea not only to the realm of EDM, but to all genres of music…including metal.

Now I can honestly say that metal music has so many excellent releases each and every year that it’s hard to conceive the idea of it becoming a dying genre, but there are signs in the tea leaves everywhere. Metal, much like EDM, is subject to fads that spread like wildfire. Once something comes along that is remotely successful, countless bands, both new and established bands, latch on and quickly drive it into the ground. Sometimes it’s for the better, but that may not always be the case. In addition, once a band finds something that worked for them, many of them assume that they can settle down and crank out just that, until they’re fat enough to retire happy. Again, sometimes this weeds out a number of false starts from the get-go, but more than a couple of bands come to mind who had a good idea but let it ruin them in the end. Continue reading »

NOW AVAILABLE: “HEART OF GOLD: A TRIBUTE TO WOODS OF YPRES” (AND A NEW CANOPY RECORDING)

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  5 Responses »
May 182013
 

On December 22, 2011, David Gold died in an automobile collision near Barrie, Ontario, at the age of 31. With his death, so died Woods of Ypres — the doom/black metal band that he co-founded and of which he was the sole consistent member over the course of five albums and assorted other releases. But of course the music of Woods lives on in the lives of the band’s passionate fanbase.

As we reported last July, a woman named Steph LeDrew organized a musical tribute to Gold and Woods, recruiting a large number of bands to record covers of Woods songs. Yesterday, the tribute album — Heart of Gold: A Tribute To Woods of Ypres — was finally released and is now available for purchase on Bandcamp as a digital download for $10. At one point the project was soliciting PayPal donations to that gave donors the option of receiving a 2-CD physical version of the album, though the option to buy a physical format doesn’t currently appear on the Bandcamp page.

The album was mastered by Dan Swanö in Sweden and includes cover songs by 19 different bands or band members, including Novembers Doom, Panzerfaust, Amaranth, and members of Woods, Thrawsunblat, and Into Eternity. The full track list and album stream appear later in this post. But I first want to highlight one song in particular, because it was recorded by a long-time favorite of this site — Sweden’s Canopy. Continue reading »

SUFFOCATION / CEPHALIC CARNAGE / HAVOK / FALLUJAH — NQ LIVE, MANCHESTER, MAY 15, 2013

 Concert Reviews  3 Responses »
May 172013
 

(Our man in the UK, Andy Synn, witnessed a night of death metal fun in Manchester on May 15 and files this report, with video.)

Tonight’s show was courtesy of my good friend Gary of Bite Radius Designs, who recently did some work for Cephalic Carnage on their Crucifreak t-shirt design. Thanks to him we were both put on guestlist and got a chance to enjoy a night of heavy, techy, thrashy, grindy, pummelling death metal fun.

FALLUJAH

Opening band Fallujah were the youngest and most inexperienced band on the bill, but still gave it their best shot at warming up the steadily growing crowd. Unfortunately, although their spacey, technical death metal works incredibly well on record, it lacks a little something live.

The mix didn’t help their cause, with the rhythm guitar and bass almost entirely inaudible, leaving the band to contend with a mix consisting purely of vocals, leads, and drums. Thankfully, the proggy, cosmic guitar leads are one of the band’s biggest strengths and offer a captivating glimpse of the band’s future potential. They just need to work on a bit more of a distinctive identity for themselves beyond this one aspect of their sound. Continue reading »

CHILDREN OF GOD, VULGAR TRADE, AND DRUG CHURCH

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  1 Response »
May 172013
 

I’m no social anthropologist, but there still seems to be something of a divide between punk and hardcore, on the one hand, and metal on the other. Decades ago, the divide was like an ocean between them — a storm-tossed ocean marked by outright hostility. I saw that first-hand. As time passed, of course, there’s been a lot of cross-polinization, the lines have blurred, and I don’t sense that the hostility has survived. But I still don’t know many people who are equally avid fans of all three genres.

I’m as guilty as anyone. I listen mainly to metal and only dabble randomly in those other genres; I definitely don’t feel well-educated any more on what’s happening there. But every now and then I’ll come across bands with crossover styles, who lean more toward the punk or hardcore side of things than what I usually listen to, that really get my blood racing. By sheer chance, that happened to me yesterday with three bands . . . and here they are. In order, they move from more metal to less . . .

CHILDREN OF GOD

I have CVLT Nation to thank for this discovery. They recently premiered this Orange County band’s official video for “Unrelenting Storm” off their 2013 debut album We Set Fire To the Sky. The video is really well-executed — a beautifully filmed black-and-white band performance interspersed with images of death and destruction. And as for the song itself, “Unrelenting Storm” is an apt title. It’s kind of a Converge-Meets-Neurosis blend of vitriolic hardcore and groaning sludge, with a segment that’s almost atmospheric and meditative, too. I like it a lot. Continue reading »

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