MECHINA: “EMPYREAN”

 Album Reviews  6 Responses »
Jan 122013
 

(In this post, NCS guest contributor Booker reviews the new album by Chicago’s Mechina.)

Well, after a bit of a wait, Mechina’s Empyrean finally dropped on the 1st Jan – after being originally slated for release a year earlier on 1st Jan 2012 – which they announced was also their 9th anniversary as a band (9 year wedding anniversary = pottery, 9 year band anniversary = new album! Yes!!).

I admit the first I ever heard from Mechina was a note on a blog (probably The Number of the Blog, since I can’t find it again and that site’s now down) alerting all followers to the release of their single Andromeda, which the band released free on their mechinamusic.com website.  So intrigued was I, I found myself immediately sourcing a copy of their previous album Conqueror, and boy was my inner Demanufacture/Obsolete-era Fear Factory fan in for a surprise.  Machine gun riffage and double bass drumming, but with intricate orchestration and sound effect backing, all tied together in an album-length sci-fi concept album.

Andromeda continued the storyline, and Empyrean, their third full-length by my count, forms its finale…. Continue reading »

THE VoS TOP 12 OF 2012!

 Listmania, LISTMANIA 2012  9 Responses »
Jan 122013
 

(We’re winding down our 2012 Listmania series, but we still have a few we’re excited to bring you.  This one comes from our fellow blogger Eric Yanyo, a/k/a Valley of Steel.)

So here we are, nearly two weeks into 2013 (how the hell did that happen??), and by now I’m sure all of you have completely forgotten about 2012 and all of the year-end “listmania” stuff, right? Well, could I possibly interest you in one more? Maybe?

It’s been a really busy time for me, as I’ve been getting involved with a number of new projects — plus I compiled my own huge collection of year-end lists: check out a whole slew of them here, featuring a whole bunch of Pittsburgh-area musicians and music scene luminaries, talking about their favorite albums or shows or whatever from last year.

Anyway, my own list of my favorite 2012 releases has been pretty much put together inside my head for a while, but it’s been a struggle with a variety of other priorities just to find the time to get this in writing. But finally, here we go.

Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: BYZANTINE’S “SOUL ERASER”

 Premieres  8 Responses »
Jan 112013
 

It was a very sad day when West Virginia’s Byzantine dissolved roughly five years ago following the release of Oblivion Beckons. But as everyone knows by now, Byzantine are back with a new, self-titled album that’s set for release on February 26. We’ve had the good fortune of hearing it in advance, and it’s going to blow people away.

We’ve already featured (here) a lyric video for the first track from the album that Byzantine released — “Signal Path” — and today we’re privileged to debut the band’s official music video for another song: “Soul Eraser”.

One of the hallmarks of the new album (in addition to massive grove) is its musical diversity, and “Soul Eraser” is a good example of that. In addition to bringing a truckload of stomping, jabbing, pummeling riffs and rhythms, it’s built around a melody that will get stuck in your head awful damned fast. The song also includes spiraling lead guitar work and a whole lot of vocal diversity. And when the song really cuts loose at about the 3:00 mark, hold on to your hats. Continue reading »

OUR LIST OF 2012’S MOST INFECTIOUS EXTREME METAL SONGS: PART 13

 MOST INFECTIOUS SONGS-2012  3 Responses »
Jan 112013
 

Welcome to the lucky 13th part of our list of the year’s most infectious extreme metal songs. Each day (almost) until the list is finished, I’m posting at least two songs that made the cut. For more details about what this list is all about and how it was compiled, read the introductory post via this link. To see the selections that preceded the two I’m announcing today, click here.

We’re getting deeper into death metal territory today. There will be plentiful bludgeoning. Internal organs may be damaged. Massive head trauma may result. But cretinous smiles will be left at the end. Or maybe I should just speak for myself.

PUTREVORE

If you were looking for pure, unadulterated, unforgiving, horrific death metal in 2012, you couldn’t go wrong with this multinational band’s album, Macabre Kingdom. This second full-length collaboration between Dave Rotten of Avulsed and Rogga Johansson of Sweden was, for me, the 2012 counterpart to the previous year’s debut by Disma, Towards the Megalith: an unstoppable battle tank of metal that  was both catastrophic in its atmospherics and also strangely addictive.

I wrote a notice about the album last April after seeing Juanjo Castellano’s stunning cover art, but I failed to review the album. I was too scared. Continue reading »

BANDS I WANT TO TALK ABOUT (by Utmu): URFAUST, THOU, and SLOTH HERDER

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  11 Responses »
Jan 112013
 

Awesome artwork by Michiel Eikenaar

(In this post, guest writer Utmu sheds some light on underground bands who deserve a higher profile.)

I’ve been listening to some bands lately and I really like them. I also wanted to write another article, so I just decided to combine the two. I don’t know how obscure these bands are, although the music they make is great and they should be recognized for that.

The first two are bands who may be well-known in certain circles, but to anyone who merely scratches the surface of those circles (like I often do with different scenes) I think they’re more obscure. Again, I don’t really know how well-known these bands are, so don’t hold me to the “this band doesn’t get enough attention” mentality. I enjoy them and I don’t hear about them often. The third section in this article is about a creative band from my region who I think should get way more recognition than they seem to get.

URFAUST

Here’s a band that’s been on my radar for a while. Ever since Invisible Oranges released that mix-tape containing Aosoth and Infestus, I’ve remembered Urfaust because they have a really unique sound, and more recently I’ve put time into really listening to their music — it was a great decision to do so. Continue reading »

FIVE OF MY FAVOURITE . . . MISHEARD LYRICS

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  16 Responses »
Jan 112013
 

(A post in which Andy Synn presents five of his favorite mondegreens . . .)

This edition comes with a warning. If you want to continue hearing these songs in the ‘Correct’ way, don’t click the jump to the main article, because what I’m covering here today are the sort of misheard lyrics that essentially ruin a song for you forever. Ok, maybe not ruin, but they definitely stick with you. Once you’ve heard them, you can’t un-hear them.

And I’m not talking about the youtube-style ‘Boat Rudder’ or ‘Fishmaster’ parodies where someone’s posited ludicrous alternative lyrics. I’m talking about just a tiny line here or there that I accidentally misheard the first time round, and have never really been able to shake. Thankfully each of these also gives rise to some unintentional hilarity, as they definitely add a new interpretation to each of the tracks!

Some of them are literally only a one-word change, but that’s enough to completely alter the meaning of the surrounding lines, mostly in a rather ludicrous way!

Again – don’t go any further unless you want some songs ruined for you forever! Continue reading »

WOLFHEART RISES: TUOMAS SAUKKONEN SHUTS DOWN BEFORE THE DAWN AND ALL HIS OTHER PROJECTS AND MAKES A NEW START

 Uncategorized  12 Responses »
Jan 112013
 

(all photos by Janica Lönn / STORM Photography 2012)

 
As bombshell news goes, this is a pretty big detonation: Tuomas Saukkonen announced yesterday that he is shutting down all of his current musical projects — Before The Dawn, Black Sun Aeon, Routasielu, Dawn Of Solace, and Final Harvest — and starting a completely new one under the name Wolfheart. At the same time, he released a teaser of new Wolfheart music.

Saukkonen disclosed his decision and his future plans in an extensive interview published late yesterday by the Finnish Kaaoszine site. Fortunately for non-Finnish speakers, the article includes an English translation. In a nutshell, Saukkonen explained that he had been growing disenchanted with his most popular vehicle, Before the Dawn, for several years, and that even after the release of BTD’s well-received 2012 album Rise of the Phoenix, BTD no longer gave him the artistic freedom to make the kind of music he wanted to make.

Perhaps ironically, the success of Rise of the Phoenix gave him the freedom to finally leave it behind without regrets. Once that decision was made, he explained, “it was logical for me to clean the table at once and start building something from scratch again.” And that led to the demise of his other bands and the birth of Wolfheart.

Saukkonen says that he began writing new music for Wolfheart in the fall of 2012 and at this point he has already finished recording and mixing half of the songs for the band’s as-yet untitled debut album, with plans to complete it in March and then explore label opportunities. His goal is to release the album before the winter of 2013. Continue reading »

OUR LIST OF 2012’S MOST INFECTIOUS EXTREME METAL SONGS: PART 12

 MOST INFECTIOUS SONGS-2012  6 Responses »
Jan 102013
 

This is Part 12 of our list of the year’s most infectious extreme metal songs. Each day (almost) until the list is finished, I’m posting at least two songs that made the cut. For more details about what this list is all about and how it was compiled, read the introductory post via this link. To see the selections that preceded the two I’m announcing today, click here.

We’re wading into death metal waters today and I plan to be here for the next few days. With these next two songs from two of my favorite 2012 albums, we’re not tip-toeing in either. We’re taking a deep dive into turbulent rapids.

AEON

I reviewed this Swedish band’s fourth album Aeons Black here, naming it one of the year’s top five death metal releases — without figuring out what the other four might be. It’s premium face-melting death metal, a 51-minute collection of mainly superheated songs spewing hellfire, with big, hook-filled, piston-driven rhythms that hammer and pummel and blast like heavy-caliber weaponry.

Yet there’s more to the album than a whirlwind of decimation, and the song I picked for this list is a good example of what I mean. Continue reading »

THE SYNN REPORT, PART 31: LILITU

 Album Reviews, THE SYNN REPORT  11 Responses »
Jan 102013
 

(In this 31st edition of THE SYNN REPORT, Andy Synn reviews the discography of a band from Georgia named Lilitu.)

Recommended for fans of: Green Carnation, Dark Tranquillity, Insomnium

Something of a mysterious and fluctuating entity, over the years the gothically-inclined melodic black/death metallers of Lilitu have gone from relative obscurity, to underground acclaim, to the cusp of mainstream (at least in metal circles) attention, and then right back again.

The brainchild of one Henry Derek Bonner, the band has gone through numerous line-up changes since its inception (including, in one of its most recent incarnations, current Arsis bassist Noah Martin), as well as steadily transfiguring its sonic identity from a more earthen, doomy sound, tinged with blackened melancholy, through a more progressive, gothically-influenced approach, to its final form of focussed, melodic death metal dynamism.

An entire album entitled White Nights In A Day Room, Black Sun In The Daytime was shelved around 2006, and the last known communication from the band confirmed that the group had become a two-piece — with all musical and vocal duties being shared by Bonner and his new partner in crime Justin Blake Stubbs — and that they would be taking their sound back towards its roots, with a darker, more primordial sound, with a more potent black metal influence, something which had steadily been pared back over the years. Continue reading »

LET THE FLAME WARS BEGIN: THE OSCAR NOMINATIONS ARE OUT

 Off Topic  13 Responses »
Jan 102013
 

Briefly departing from our usual focus on metal, I thought I’d mention that the nominations for the 85th annual Academy Awards were announced this morning by actress Emma Stone and Oscars show host Seth MacFarlane. As usual, many of the the nominations were predictable and expected and some weren’t. And once again, there were omissions that will get many movie fans riled up and pissed off.

Not surprisingly, Steven Spielberg’s Lincoln leads this year’s Oscar race with 12 nominations, including best picture, best director, best adapted screenplay, and acting nominations for Daniel Day-Lewis, Sally Field, and Tommy Lee Jones.

Surprisingly, Life of Pi picked up a whopping 11 nominations, including best picture, best director for Ang Lee, best adapted screenplay, and a shitload of technical nominations.

The best actress nominations included both the youngest and the oldest nominees in the history of the category: 9-year-old Quvenzhane Wallis for Beasts of the Southern Wild” (she was 5 years old when the movie was filmed) and 85-year-old Emmanuelle Riva for the Austrian drama Amour. The other nominees are Jessica Chastain for Zero Dark Thirty, Jennifer Lawrence for Silver Linings Playbook, and Naomi Watts for The Impossible.

As mentioned, Daniel Day-Lewis picked up a predictable best actor nomination for Lincoln, but so did Hugh Jackman for Les Miserables, Bradley Cooper for Silver Linings Playbook, Joaquin Phoenix for The Master, and Denzel Washington for Flight. Now for a few oversights . . . Continue reading »

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