LIVE IN SEATTLE: GOJIRA, THE DEVIN TOWNSEND PROJECT, AND THE ATLAS MOTH – Jan 20, 2013

 Concert Reviews  16 Responses »
Jan 222013
 

On Sunday night, January 20, the current tour headlined by Gojira and also featuring The Devin Townsend Project and The Atlas Moth rolled into Seattle, and a good-sized group of friends and I showed up at Studio Seven to bear witness.  We had bought tickets in advance, which was fortunate, because although we arrived about 45 minutes before doors, the show was already sold out.

I was still trying to process the fact that we were getting to see Gojira and DT together on the same tour, and in a venue the cozy size of Studio Seven. I’m a huge fan of both, and I also really enjoyed the last album by The Atlas Moth (An Ache For the Distance), so this had the makings of a stupendous experience. And so it proved to be.

A couple of us grabbed perches up against the rail in the balcony bar overlooking the stage and never left those spots. I wanted a place where I could take some photos of the show, and I didn’t really feel like being smashed inside a high-pressure, breathless, sweaty mass of humanity on the floor for this show anyway.

After the jump, some impressions of what I saw and heard, plus a fuckload of amateurish pics. Continue reading »

GET YOUR SATANIC RITUALS RIGHT HERE: NEW OFFICIAL VIDEOS FROM WEAPON AND LIGHTNING SWORDS OF DEATH

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  6 Responses »
Jan 222013
 

Today has brought us new official videos from two infernally good bands: Canada’s Weapon and L.A.’s Lightning Swords of Death.

Weapon’s video is for the title track to their excellent 2012 album Embers and Revelations, a seething but quite memorable fusion of black metal and death metal. The LSOD video is also for a title track, in this case the band’s third album Baphometic Chaosium, which was released today by Metal Blade. To learn more about that album, check out Andy Synn’s detailed review, which we posted earlier today at this location.

Given the subject matter and the genres in which the two bands toil, it’s not terribly surprising that both videos are built around Satanic rituals. Both also briefly include nudity, so be forewarned if you plan to watch these in a public setting. Also, goats, skulls, and the quaffing of unseemly fluids. Continue reading »

KVELERTAK: “BRUANE BRENN”

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  2 Responses »
Jan 222013
 

Norway’s Kvelertak have a new album (Meir) coming in 2013 via Sony Music. Last fall they performed one of the new songs, “Bruane Brenn”, for the first time at a live show in Oslo. This past weekend it appeared on Spotify and as of yesterday it’s also now available as a download via iTunes in Scandinavia, accompanied by Seldon Hunt artwork, though it won’t become available on other iTunes sites worldwide until January 28.

You may once again scratch your heads over the logic of record labels in making staggered releases of music in the modern digital age. Something appears in Country X, and in no time at all it appears on YouTube everywhere else. And then we often see the game of YouTube Whack-A-Mole in which the labels demand that YouTube take down the leaks, only to see them surface again.

And so, “Bruane Brenn” is now on YouTube, and after the jump we’ll have that song clip for however long the particular link we found may exist, along with video of that live performance in Oslo (which is pretty fuckin’ cool in its own right).

Oh my, is this a catchy motherfucker of a flailing, upbeat punk rock romp, with juicy guitar chords, a hook-y chorus, a blend of scarred and clean vox, and a sweet, slowed-down guitar solo. This is more a road-burning, sing-along rocker than anything infected by the black metal virus that seeped into songs from the band’s debut album. Very nice way to start this Tuesday. Continue reading »

LIGHTNING SWORDS OF DEATH: “BAPHOMETIC CHAOSIUM”

 Album Reviews  7 Responses »
Jan 222013
 

(In this post Andy Synn reviews the new album by L.A.’s Lightning Swords of Death. At the end of the post you’ll also see the band’s official music video for the album’s title track, which premiered today.)

Where exactly to start with this one? While LSOD have been pillaging the American underground for years now, their exposure to a wider audience has been relatively/extremely limited (depending on your perspective). They’ve been on major metal tours with the likes of Behemoth and Danzig, they’ve supplied songs for computer games and movies, yet all in all they’re more likely to be the sort of band you’ve probably heard before, but never realised it.

Part of that is the name – unwieldy, and more than a little hokey to some – and part of that is the band’s steadfast commitment to the underground aesthetic. They’ll do these things, they’ll play ball with the mainstream, but they’ll do so on their own terms.

They’re a band who put the emphasis on the METAL part of Black Metal, heavy, aggressive, and uncompromising, drawing elements liberally from across the Thrash, Death, and Traditional spectrum, without upsetting that careful balance between occult glamour and oily grime that Black Metal thrives on. More than anything they’re an unrepentantly dark and blasphemous band, a band whose sound touches on something nameless and forgotten, an atmosphere, an aura, of something not quite human, not quite alive, permeating every note and every aspect of their music. Continue reading »

ALBUMS TO ANTICIPATE IN 2013

 Forthcoming Albums  67 Responses »
Jan 212013
 

We’re essentially finished with our 2012 Listmania series. That series has included more than 30 lists of last year’s best metal, and collectively they form a nice shopping menu for people still interested in catching up on what they missed. We’ll have a big Listmania wrap-up post tomorrow, with some statistical analysis by a guest who has combined and ranked everything on the lists we’ve posted.

But we’re now well into the new year’s first month and it’s time to start looking ahead. We’ve already reviewed several albums due for release in the near future and featured advance music from many others, but so much more is coming.

What I’ve got below is a list of bands who have new albums or EPs due in 2013 that I’m particularly interested in hearing. (And by the way, this list doesn’t include some forthcoming 2013 releases that I’ve already heard, e.g., Rotting Christ, Koldbrann, Omnium Gatherum, Byzantine, Hate, Kongh, and Oblivion — they are all most certainly worth watching for.)

But I’m sure I’ve overlooked a lot more. So I invite you to take a look at this list and then supplement it in the comments. Please tell us which albums are on your own “highly anticipated” list for 2013. Continue reading »

OLD MAN WINDBREAKER HEARD YOU LIKE LISTS – SO HERE’S A LIST OF LISTS OF LISTS

 Listmania, LISTMANIA 2012  13 Responses »
Jan 212013
 


‘Sup dog!

(NCS reader and frequent commenter Old Man Windbreaker, who hails from India, helps us wrap up our Listmania series with a big-ass list of his favorite 2012 listening.)

Greetings. Over the length of this text, you shall be subject to Old Man Windbreaker’s self-indulgent eccentricities, primarily because you allow it. Here is a list of lists of One’s memorable listening experiences from 2012 (and the past couple of weeks). Furthermore, the items in the lists are provided with Bandcamp streams or Soundcloud playlists or YouTube playlists [Lists]. Note that One said “listening experiences”, and not “albums” or “music releases”. Quite a few of the entries are composed of mutiple releases. Anyway…

Feast your eyes and ears upon the list-yness!

But, in case you don’t want to read One’s commentary for some reason, here is a summarised list of Old Man Windbreaker’s favorite listening experiences of 2012, in no particular order after the top 3:

1. Portal of I by Ne Obliviscaris
2. Cognitive by Soen
3. Rengeteg by Thy Catafalque
4. Beastwars and Tower of Skulls by Beastwars
5. Griseus by Aquilus
6. Gods of Eden by Gods of Eden
7. Utilitarian by Napalm Death Continue reading »

HOLY GRAIL: “RIDE THE VOID”

 Album Reviews, Exceptions to the Rule  2 Responses »
Jan 212013
 

(DGR reviews the new album by California’s Holy Grail, which will be released in North America on January 22.)

A solid chunk of time has passed since Holy Grail’s last release Crisis In Utopia. That was a pretty good piece of old-school-flavored metal that tried to bring in some heavier elements but never enough to really stray from sounding like a modern-day throwback. It was thrash by people who loved it and were able to craft a very good product that could stand right alongside their favorites.

Ride The Void – which had its European release on January 18th this year – is the group’s second full-length in a discography that also includes a smattering of EPs and single releases along the way. There have been some minor line-up changes, but overall the core of the band has remained the same.

This time the group have taken advantage of the close to three-year gap between releases to write a ton of music. Ride The Void comes in at thirteen tracks (fourteen if you get the bonus) of solid, retro-flavored without falling too far into idol worship, thrash music.

Thirteen songs is a lot, so it’s fair to ask whether it’s worth your time to check these guys out? Is it thirteen songs of wind rushing through your ears or is this a good opportunity to look into Holy Grail? Continue reading »

AN NCS INTERVIEW: DOUG MOORE OF PYRRHON

 Interviews  1 Response »
Jan 212013
 

(In this post, BadWolf interviews Doug Moore of Pyrrhon and brings us new Phyrrhon music, too. The fantastic photos accompanying this interview were taken by Caroline Harrison of Brooklyn Vegan. To see all of them, go HERE.)

Pyrrhon might be extreme metal’s best-kept secret; their sound is hard to pin down, but resides somewhere between Am-Rep style noise rock and progressive death metal of the most confrontational variety. The Brooklyn four-piece’s first album, An Excellent Servant But A Terrible Master, racked up a positive review in Decibel, and some powerful blog acclaim in 2011. This weekend Pyrrhon uploaded the third demo track from what will become their as-yet-unnamed second album for Selfmadegod Records.

I sat down to chat about Pyrrhon with vocalist and lyricist Doug Moore. It was hardly our first extended conversation. In the interest of full disclosure, I would proudly call Doug a friend since we attended Maryland Deathfest together last May. We both write on staff at InvisibleOranges and contribute to Stereogum.com—any prospective professional musicians would do well to read his industry analysis for a dose of healthy Schopenhauer-level sobriety. None of that changes my professional opinion of him, though.

Objectively speaking, Doug is a powerful vocalist and one of the best lyricists in contemporary metal, period. Our interview evidences his ferocious intellect, and personal dedication to extreme music. Continue reading »

CALL OF THE VOID AND A RELAPSE SAMPLER

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  4 Responses »
Jan 202013
 

I previously mentioned that because I’ve been squeezed in a work-related vice all week, I’ve fallen way behind in reading NCS e-mails. I’m still way behind, but I did stop to explore one from a few days ago because of the strikingly ghastly artwork you see above, which is by Anthony Lucero.

It’s the cover for Dragged Down A Dead End Path, the debut album from a Colorado band named Call of the Void that’s scheduled for release by Relapse Records on March 19 in North America and earlier in Europe. Having been struck by the artwork I wanted to hear music, and a song from the album happens to be included in a free Relapse sampler on Bandcamp.

The sampler seems to have been released in October, but I missed it. Maybe you did, too, so more about that after the jump. But first, here’s why I’m spending NCS space on Call of the Void.

The one song that’s streaming from the new album so far is “Failure”. As soon as it starts, the music feels as if the band have dropped a crushing weight right on top of your head — slow, massive, sludgy chords mix with the shriek of feedback and a battery of battering from the kit. That turns out to be just a prelude to a faster frontal assault. Continue reading »

THEMADISRAELI’S TOP 21 OF 2012 (THE SURPRISES)

 Listmania, LISTMANIA 2012  1 Response »
Jan 202013
 

(Here’s the fourth and final part of TheMadIsraeli’s multi-part rollout of his list of 2012′s best metal. Sample songs are at the end of the post. And you can find the first 16 albums on his list here, here, and here. Despite the numbering, the albums are presented in no particular order.)

Finally, the end of my LP’s of the year.  These are, for me, the albums that blindsided me with how good they were.  Mostly new bands that came out of nowhere are here.

17. Infant Annihilator –  The Palpable Leprosy of Pollution

An album that dare I say is deathcore’s resurrection.  Infant Annihilator brought a titanic atom bomb impact with a style of technical deathcore that just destroyed everything in its wake.  I can’t wait to see what these guys do next. Continue reading »

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