CANNIBAL CORPSE / THE BLACK DAHLIA MURDER / HOUR OF PENANCE – NOTTINGHAM, ROCK CITY – MARCH 8, 2013

 Concert Reviews  2 Responses »
Mar 132013
 

(Andy Synn weighs in from England with a review of the live show by Cannibal Corpse, The Black Dahlia Murder, and Hour of Penance in Nottingham.) 

Pretty badass line-up, right? I definitely count myself lucky to have caught this tour, as not only have I never seen HoP live before, but I never miss a Black Dahlia show if I can help it, AND I’d been hearing awesome things about Cannibal Corpse’s form this time around.

I count myself doubly lucky because the damn doors to the show were scheduled for half freaking 5, with Hour Of Penance hitting the stage at the ungodly time of 5:45 pm, a time when a huge number of people were either still in work, or still stuck in traffic. In fact I know several people who came from surrounding cities who missed the first two bands entirely, and barely made it in time to see Cannibal Corpse!

Bad form Rock City, bad form… Continue reading »

MESHUGGAH, ANIMALS AS LEADERS, INTRONAUT: LIVE IN SACRAMENTO, ON MARCH 1, 2013

 Concert Reviews  3 Responses »
Mar 132013
 

(DGR turns in this review of the live show by Meshuggah, Animals As Leaders, and Intronaut in Sacramento on March 1.)

This may be the third sold-out show that I have gotten the chance to attend at Ace Of Spades. That seems nuts considering that I have gone to a ton of concerts there since the venue opened up in downtown Sacramento – but that venue is huge. I admit that when I checked the site on the day of the show to make sure none of the bands had cancelled (a lesson that I learned after The Ocean had to flake out on the Job For A Cowboy/Between The Buried And Me show that hit there), seeing the SOLD OUT tab next to the show was exciting.

Seeing a band that you’ve never gotten the chance to see before is great, but seeing it with the hum and excitement of a ton of other people has such an effect on shows that it’s hard to describe. You often hear performers talk about how they will feed off of an excited crowd in front of them, but it seems there’s something about being in a packed venue that has that effect on the people watching as well.

I also still get a laugh out of seeing that giant swath of people standing in line across the street when the other side has a pool bar, then the venue, a burger restaurant, and then another bar – basically the type of place where a bunch of metalheads outside across the street seems weird. Continue reading »

MINUSHUMAN: “BLOODTHRONE”

 Album Reviews  3 Responses »
Mar 132013
 

(In this post, NCS guest contributor Booker reviews a 2011 album by a French band we-ve written about before — Minushuman.)

The land of France once again shows its cred for putting out some solid metal with Minushuman’s 2011 release Bloodthrone. Part melodic death, part hardcore, part thrash, they bring a stripped-down but full-throttle sound that’s bound to get heads bobbing. Sometimes you just want to forgo complex time signatures and proggy song structures, and just crank up some heavy sounds with a driving beat… and if you’re in that mood, here’s some Bloodthrone to reach for.

I first came across these guys from a random day spent checking out the Season Of Mist catalogue. Minushuman? Wasn’t that a song written for Metallica’s S&M? Well, whatever the inspiration for their name, according to their bio they toured around under the moniker ‘Dark Poetry’ until rebranding themselves for their debut album Watch the World Die in 2008, released by the obscure record label MH Prod. They obviously managed an upgrade to Season Of Mist for their sophomore effort, Bloodthrone, released way back in 2011. Continue reading »

BANDS YOU NEED TO HEAR: CROW BLACK SKY

 Album Reviews  6 Responses »
Mar 122013
 

(NCS writer TheMadIsraeli, who is not exactly an ardent fan of black metal, has found a black metal band from South Africa that has captured his affections.)

Black metal, I think it’s safe to say is one of THE most over-saturated sub-genres of metal EVER, or at least that’s what my personal experience tells me.  I’m sure those of you who pirate can agree with me. Go on any torrent site that deals in music specifically, and under metal you’ll see five black metal albums for every album of a different genre.  That may be understandable, considering that most of it is plain boring dreck that’s only been made possible by the advent of home recording.  We live in the age of the bedroom musician; sometimes it hurts my soul even thinking about it.

Don’t get me wrong, sometimes those projects turn out to be good, even great.  However, for me nothing beats a unit of musicians uniting to create wondrous audio ecstasy.  Black metal is a style that, in my estimation, especially benefits from the organic nature of a BAND writing the music, especially given the last decade where the best black metal seems to have relied on an intense layering of textures — when the bands aren’t taking an outright savage approach.

This is all by way of preamble to Crow Black Sky, an interesting discovery that I’m pretty sure the NCS readership will be able to get behind. Continue reading »

A DGR ROUND-UP: THE OCEAN AND ROBOTS PULLING LEVERS

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  6 Responses »
Mar 122013
 

(NCS writer DGR brings us a round-up of new music from The Ocean and Robots Pulling Levers.)

Here’s a couple of things that caught my eye over the weekend and yesterday.

A couple days ago The Ocean premiered a new song off of their upcoming two disc album Pelagial (one with vocals – the other an instrumental version) entitled “Bathyalpelagic II: The Wish in Dreams”, and it is a solid piece of metal for those who enjoyed the group’s heavier aspect from their two-part release Heliocentric/Anthropocentric back in 2010.

It’s been three years since those two discs hit, and so far this intro song proves that the band have not decided to rest on their laurels during this passage of time. It’s not as moody and introspective as the stuff on Heliocentric – instead going for the much more straightforward bombast and powerful chorus work of something like “She Was The Universe”. Continue reading »

THORNGOTH: “SCHWARZ-KARG-KALT”

 Album Reviews  4 Responses »
Mar 112013
 

As an enthusiastic admirer of this German band’s 2010 album Leere (reviewed here), I welcomed the chance to hear their newest work Schwarz-Karg-Kalt (“black-barren-cold”), which is due for release next month. In a word, it’s excellent.

Uniting elements of black metal, death metal, and doom, Thorngoth have delivered a monster of an album that’s both massively powerful and mesmerizing, both harrowing and ethereal. It’s atmospheric music, but unlike some forms of metal labeled with that term, it doesn’t rely on ambient sounds, prolonged repetition of motifs, or songs of extended length. Instead, Thorngoth build an aura of enveloping darkness and doom through the accumulated weight of the music across the space of nine tracks.

The title song, which opens the album, is an effective introduction to Thorngoth’s plan of attack. It employs huge distorted bass and guitar riffs and compelling drum rhythms, creating a titanic low end that radiates power as a result of the superb production of the recording. As happens on other songs, shimmering keyboard effects and layered, reverberating guitar notes provide a counterpoint and a contrast. Continue reading »

MISCELLANY NO. 53: DARKENING, MONTE PENUMBRA, AND BOVINE

 Free Shit, MISCELLANY, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  2 Responses »
Mar 102013
 

Today is Day 14 of me being away from home for my job. Since last night was a Saturday night, I got a break from the usual day-and-night grind. Carousing with my co-workers, I ate too much, had a few drinks, and then lost an hour of sleep because of daylight savings time beginning here in the U.S. But before collapsing into bed I did play the MISCELLANY game for the first time since last December.

For those people who are new to the site or have forgotten, here’s how this works: I randomly pick an assortment of bands whose music I’ve never heard (usually bands with new releases who are relatively unknown). I listen to one or two songs, not knowing what the music will be like, and I write my impressions. And then I stream for you what I’ve heard so you can make up your own mind.

For this session, there really was no rhyme or reason to what I picked. The music is from Darkening (U.S.), Monte Penumbra (Portugal), and Bovine (UK). Continue reading »

A TASTE OF EYECONOCLAST’S NEW ALBUM: “DRONES OF THE AWAKENING”

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  1 Response »
Mar 092013
 

Within the shantytown of Blogville, we were relatively early supporters of Italy’s Eyeconoclast, reviewing their 2011 EP Sharpening Our Blades On the Mainstream here. Last July, Prosthetic Records announced that they had signed the band and that Eyeconoclast would be entering the studio to record their first album for Prosthetic. We wrote about that, too.

And now the album is finished. It has a name — Drones of the Awakening — and a cool album cover (by Fabio Listrani), and it’s scheduled for release in NorthAm on April 16. And yesterday Prosthetic released a teaser reel of excerpts from each track on the album. Before offering a few potentially incoherent thoughts about the teaser, I want to make sure you know who is in this band.

It includes former Hour of Penance drummer Mauro Mercurio, bassist Paolo “Urizen” Ballarotto (who used to play with Malfeitor), guitarist Stefano Morabito (who is also a very talented record producer at his 16th Cellar Studios — he recorded the new album), guitarist Alessio Cosenza, and vocalist Giuseppe Di Giorgio (Black Therapy). In other words, Eyeconoclast is loaded with talent. Continue reading »

UNDERDOGS IN THE UNDERGROUND: ROUNDABOUT ROUND-UP (PART 2)

 Free Shit, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  2 Responses »
Mar 092013
 

(This is Part 2 of a two-part post, in which NCS contributor Austin Weber puts the spotlight on six underground bands. In this part the subjects are Terracide, Fields of Elysium, and In Human Form.  Part 1 can be found here.)

The new age of music has been creeping into a higher plane of existence for some time, due to more inexpensive and accessible sound-recording equipment intertwined with the development of  many new exciting avenues for independent distribution. Combined with the ability to raise funds without label support, this has leveled the playing field for the creation of new music. But this is a dual-edged sword because it can mean a lack of promotion for many groups who truly are doing great things. This is an article for those kinds of bands.

Terracide– Primordium

If Iron Maiden taught us anything it’s that melodies and metal rule, and I am a huge fan of anything from power metal to melodic death metal. Terracide are a new group from Washington, DC, playing a high-voltage combo of energetic power metal, thrash, and death metal. This is a step up from both your average melodic death metal, due to the huge power metal influence and flashes of thrash inherent in their music. Continue reading »

GOROD HEADLINE BLOODLETTING NORTH AMERICA 9, POLYPHIA MAKE WAVES, AND BETHLEHEM PLAN THEIR NEXT ALBUM

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  2 Responses »
Mar 082013
 

I just took a short break from the work grind, flitted around the interhole and the NCS e-mail inbox like a blowfly in search of a raw wound, and came across three items I wanted to pass along. Two are news items, one is new music.

TOURISM: BLOODLETTING NORTH AMERICA 9

I saw that a new North American tour has just been announced. It begins May 3 and runs through June 1. It made my already bulging eyes bulge further from their sockets, sort of like what happens to frogs when you inflate them with a bicycle pump.

The headliner is Gorod. I could stop there, but the rest of the line-up is cool, too: Inanimate Existence, Kamikabe, and Vale of Pnath.

But that’s not all.  On selected dates, the tour will also be joined by Fallujah, Pyrexia, Applaud, The Impaler, River of Nihil, The Kennedy Veil, Cognitive, and Archspire. Continue reading »

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