SEEN AND HEARD: MORS PRINCIPIUM EST, NECROWRETCH, EXIVIOUS, AND BODY COUNT

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  9 Responses »
Dec 102012
 

Metal does not honor your putrid rules.

Okay, I’m not talking about YOUR rules, especially if they include visiting this site like your life depends on it. I’m talking about the rules of all those other people, like the rule that says Mondays must suck. Because metal hath brought these gems to your Monday.

MORS PRINCIPIUM EST

I think this is my fourth post about the new album from Finland’s Mors Principium Est (pictured above) since I found out about it in July. Entitled …And Death Said Live, it has already been released in Japan, it’s due for release in Europe and Australia on December 14, and North Americans will be able to get it on January 15.

As you can tell, this is an album I’ve been eagerly anticipating. Over the weekend I discovered that it’s now streaming in full at the Finnish Inferno web site. At that same location, you will find a track-by-track commentary by the band’s vocalist Ville Viljanen, and that of course will give you English-only speakers the always-hilarious opportunity to let Google Translate work its magic on the Finnish language. Continue reading »

BESTIAL WARLUST: “SATAN’S FIST”

 Album Reviews, SHORT BUT SWEET  6 Responses »
Dec 102012
 

If there were ever a band name that should receive a “Truth In Advertising” award, it would be Bestial Warlust.

The band formed in Melbourne, Australia in 1993 and blasted out of the gates with two full-length albums in 1994 (Vengeance War ‘Till Death) and 1995 (Blood & Valour). They followed those with two short demos and a split, and then the band dissolved.

The second demo was a three-song release entitled Satan’s Fist. Before it was recorded, guitarist K.K. Warslut had moved on to Destroyer666 and vocalist Damon Bloodstorm (now with Cemetery Urn) had left to join Abominator, leaving two of the band’s members to record Satan’s Fist: drummer Marcus Hellcunt (now with Vomitor) and guitarist/vocalist Skullfucker.

Hells Headbangers has unearthed Satan’s Fist and has recently released it on both 12″ vinyl and CD (here). Although Bestial Warlust proved to be quite influential in the development of warlike blackened death metal as a sub-genre, listening to Satan’s Fist is not like journeying back to 1996 for a history lesson. It’s a scathing sonic assault that has lost none of its riveting appeal with the passage of time, and it more than holds its own with the best blackened death releases of 2012. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD: SKELETAL SPECTRE, DARKTHRONE, KAOTOXIN, AND OBLIVION (the movie)

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  2 Responses »
Dec 092012
 

In no particular order, here are things I saw and heard this morning that I thought were worth tossing your way.

SKELETAL SPECTRE

I really fuckin’ enjoyed this multi-national band’s last album, 2011’s Occult Spawned Premonitions (reviewed here). The band includes an extraordinary extreme vocalist named Vanessa Nocera as well as Roger “Rogga” Johansson of Ribspreader and Bonegnawer fame. I’ve been watching Skeletal Spectre pretty closely as they move forward toward the release of their next album, Voodoo Dawn. This morning I saw the unveiling of the finished cover artwork by Adam Geyer, which is up above. Very nice.

I’m still blasting “Bone Dust”, the one song from Voodoo Dawn that has surfaced to date. In case you missed it the first time it was featured at NCS, here it is again; the album is due out in early 2013 from Pulverised Records.


Continue reading »

BANDCAMP FAN ACCOUNTS

 Metal News  27 Responses »
Dec 092012
 

We’ve been singing the praises of Bandcamp since its very early days. It no longer really needs the publicity: Metal has discovered Bandcamp in a big way, with dozens of record labels and thousands of bands now having established Bandcamp pages, where they stream, give away, and sell their music (and other merch). I’ve seen some writers calling it “a piracy killer”, and although that’s probably more optimism than reality, it certainly gives fans an effective way to hear and acquire digital music without having to enrich some douchebag torrent site with their visits.

Bandcamp’s creators have always said that over time they would add new features, and so they have. The most recent enhancement was rolled out in beta test beginning the week before Thanksgiving. It’s called the Bandcamp Fan Account, and for now it’s an invitation-only trial. I got my invitation on November 21 and intended to write something about this new development then, but I got distracted by something important, like the sound of a passing car, and forgot. Thanks to NCS reader Booker for reminding me.

The Bandcamp Fan Account allows you to establish your own customizable page on the Bandcamp site and to populate it with a list (with album art and recommended tracks) of all the music you’ve downloaded from Bandcamp, as well as a “wish list” of what you’d like to get. You can share your page with other people on Bandcamp, which allows them to explore the collection of what you’ve acquired. If you don’t want other people to see that Katy Perry album you got, Bandcamp also gives you the ability to hide selected albums from public view.

You can “follow” the fan pages of other fans and receive e-mail alerts when they download new music, which is how I know about Phro getting that Katy Perry album. The Fan Account also gives you the option of following bands and labels on Bandcamp, and if you do that you’ll get e-mail alerts when they add new music to their own pages. Continue reading »

“THAT’S METAL!” – BUT IT’S NOT MUSIC (NO. 68)

 That's Metal -- But It's Not Music  7 Responses »
Dec 092012
 

 

In this series we feature photos, videos, and news items that we think are metal, even though they’re not musical. Today we have seven items for you:

ITEM ONE

As usual we’ll start with a photo, the one at the top of the post. It was taken by the Cassini spacecraft in orbit around Saturn on November 27, 2012. It shows a vortex of swirling clouds near the north pole of Saturn. To get a sense of how big this cloud formation is, Cassini was about 230,000 miles away when it took the photo.

This cloud formation lies at the center of an enormous, rotating hexagonal cloud formation that is unlike anything seen by humans anywhere else in the solar system. A pic of that, also taken by Cassini, is at the right.

Cassini took 14 pics of this swirling cloud formation, and those photos have been combined to create a smooth animation that can be seen here. Follow this link to get more info. This thing is so huge, strange, and scary looking that I think it qualifies as metal. (thanks to Mike Yost for turning me on to this) Continue reading »

A LISTMANIA INTERLUDE: WHAT MAKES AN ALBUM ONE OF THE BEST OF THE YEAR?

 Listmania, LISTMANIA 2012  42 Responses »
Dec 082012
 

In this piece I’m following up on a discussion that began in the Comment section of one of yesterday’s posts.

We’re in the middle of that time of year when metal sites (and cross-genre sites) publish lists of the year’s best albums. I suspect the initial reaction of most people when they see these lists is to agree or disagree based on whether they liked or disliked albums on the list, or whether the list omitted some of their favorites.  Of course year-end lists can also be really useful as a guide to new music that people might want to check out for the first time.

But let’s take a step back and ask a highly relevant question. In fact, it’s so highly relevant that maybe writers who create lists should be answering it explicitly when they announce their picks:  What makes an album one of the year’s best? The Comments in yesterday’s posts suggested some different ways of answering that question.

Using 2012 old-school death metal releases as an example, one commenter wrote: “They may sound pleasant to our ears, yes, but most of it just ain’t gonna cut it for ‘Best of’ lists, because ‘Best of’ lists ought to honor bands that have at least pleasantly surprised most seasoned extreme metal listeners by pushing the boundaries of their chosen genres or coming up with unique crossovers done thoughtfully and musically coherently.”

To me (and some other commenters), that seems unduly restrictive. The truth is that not many bands in a given year successfully pull off such feats, and even when they do, that doesn’t necessarily mean their albums are going to be among the best of the year. Continue reading »

LISTMANIA CONTINUES: DID YOU KNOW AMAZON HAD A LIST?

 Listmania, LISTMANIA 2012  4 Responses »
Dec 072012
 

I’m including this post in our LISTMANIA series more out of curiosity than anything else, because I don’t know many metalheads who get their music based on recommendations by Amazon.com. In fact, until this morning I didn’t know that Amazon even compiled Best of the Year staff picks. But they do. And because Amazon sells a shitload of music, I thought this was worth a mention.

There are actually three different lists that I’m including here. First, Amazon compiled a list of the 100 Best Albums of 2012. I waded through that list to find the metal albums that made it (at least as I define metal). And here they are, with their numerical rankings:

36.  Converge: All We Love We Leave Behind

39.  Godspeed You! Black Emperor: Allelujah! Don’t Bend! Ascend!

40.  High On Fire: De Vermis Mysteriis

46.  Baroness: Yellow and Green

67.  Gojira: L’Enfant Sauvage

I guess five metal albums out of 100 isn’t bad (though I’m sure I would get an argument from many of you about the inclusion of Godspeed You! Black Emperor as metal). Interestingly, the No. 1 album on Amazon’s list is My Head Is An Animal, the debut album by an Icelandic band named Of Monsters and Men. Continue reading »

BANDCAMP UPDATE: EARACHE AND DEBEMOR MORTI

 Free Shit, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  11 Responses »
Dec 072012
 

Not long ago we reported the awesome news that pioneering metal label Earache Records had established a Bandcamp site, launching it with an interesting mix of both new and older releases from their formidable catalogue. Just days after that, they increased the awesomeness by adding Bolt Thrower’s legendary 1991 album War Master to the site.

That was one of 8 albums we suggested that Earache add to Bandcamp, and guess what? Yesterday they added another album from our list:

Entombed: Left Hand Path (1990)

We pushed for the addition of that album because . . . well hell, if you don’t know why, I don’t know how to begin to explain. It is one of your humble editor’s favorite metal albums of all time, world without end, amen.

And holy shit, that’s not all. When I wasn’t paying attention Earache also added two more albums from the NCS list: Altars of Madness (1989) and Blessed Are the Sick (1991) by Morbid Angel!!!

And that’s STILL not all . . . Continue reading »

LISTMANIA CONTINUES: “THE BEST METAL OF 2012” FROM POPMATTERS

 Listmania, LISTMANIA 2012  30 Responses »
Dec 072012
 

While awaiting the rollout of our own series of posts devoted to the year’s best metal, I continue to keep an eye out for year-end lists published by what I’ve been calling “big platform” web sites. By “big platform” sites, I mean those that have web traffic which greatly exceeds even the biggest metal-only sites. By definition, these are sites that cover musical genres beyond metal, and usually entertainment interests beyond music.

PopMatters is a popular culture web site with broad coverage of music, film, television, books, comics, software and video games — you name it. Its articles get picked up regularly by the mainstream media, and it claims a readership of more than 1 million unique visitors per month. In other words, it fits the profile of “big platform” web sites whose lists of 2012′s best metal we’ve been re-publishing here at NCS.

Today, PopMatters published its list of “The Best Metal of 2012″, ranking the chosen albums from #20 to #1. The list was compiled by Craig Hayes, Adrien Begrand, Dean Brown, Brice Ezell, and Dane Prokofiev (who is an occasional contributor to NCS). To see the list with accompanying descriptions and explanations of the choices along with sample tracks from most of the listed albums, use this link.

It’s a very interesting list, which we’re re-publishing after the jump. You will see some names that have appeared on other lists we’ve published so far. In fact, those names are appearing so frequently I suspect they would be on some “consensus list” if anyone were to compile such a thing (with Panopticon’s Kentucky turning into a real dark-horse favorite). But you’ll also see some new entries that may be surprising (at least they surprised me — pleasantly): Author & Punisher (coming in at No. 4!),  Atriarch, Krallice, Dragged Into Sunlight, and Ahab. But the biggest surprise is the pick for the No. 1 spot. Continue reading »

“THE ONLY GOOD TORY” TAPE CONTEST!

 Metal News  8 Responses »
Dec 072012
 

Of course, you know that NO CLEAN SINGING, in collaboration with GRIND TO DEATH, released a free 46-song compilation of grind, powerviolence, harsh crust, and fastcore called The Only Good Tory. So awesome is this comp that no price can be put upon it, which is why we put no price upon it.

When we announced the release of this comp, we said that in the near future we would be be offering the comp on limited-edition tape produced by DIY Noise as a prize for a competition among NCS readers. We din’t fuckin’ lie: That day is now upon us. And as a bonus, the tapes will come with exclusive NO CLEAN SINGING and GRIND TO DEATH patches! To announce the contest, we turn to our Master of (deviant) Ceremonies, PHRO:

Hey girls and boys! Are you having a great holiday season? Want to make it even better by getting a FREE TAPE OF TEH GURINDZZZ?

It’s easy, if you’re not a drooling moron*!

As we all know, grind/violence is basically Shakespeare with a heroin addiction, so let’s get all poetical up in here! Send us your most inspired grind/violence rewrite of the brilliant lyrics to Napalm Death’s “You Suffer” and we’ll choose the best one (or however many, I’m still drunk, Islander can sort out the dogfuck details) to get a free tape. Continue reading »

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