SHORT BUT SWEET: ANTEDILUVIAN – “SEPTENTRIONAL THEOPHANY”

 Album Reviews, SHORT BUT SWEET  6 Responses »
Jun 292013
 

I like to think I do a decent job of keeping my eyes open for new releases by bands I like, including bands and labels who don’t send out lots of press releases or advance promo copies to NCS. But I completely fell down on the job in the case of Canada’s Antediluvian, despite the fact that I was powerfully impressed by both their 2011 debut album Through the Cervix of Hawaah (reviewed here) and their 2012 split with Adversarial (reviewed here). Just how badly did I fall down? Well, for starters, until yesterday I completely missed the fact that Nuclear War Now! released Antediluvian’s second full-length album — Logos — in April.

And to top that off I also failed to notice that two previously unreleased tracks recorded at the same time were released in May as a 7″ vinyl EP (entitled Septentrional Theophany) accompanying the premiere issue of a zine called Haruspex. The zine, written by Jason Campbell with artwork by  Tim Grieco (Haasiophis of Antediluvian) was originally intended for release in support of NWN! Fest III, but apparently will be an ongoing thing. It’s being sold, along with the Antediluvian release, by Nuclear War Now! at this location.

Obviously, having just discovered these two oversights yesterday, I don’t have either release in my grubby claws yet. But I did listen to the two songs from Septentrional Theophany on Bandcamp. If it’s possible for music to be both primitive and avant garde, that’s what these two songs are. Continue reading »

AND NOW FOR SOME (OCCULT) CLEAN SINGING BY TWO ASS-KICKING OLD FRIENDS: VENOMOUS MAXIMUS AND ARKHAMIN KIRJASTO

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  2 Responses »
Jun 282013
 

We’re about to slide right on into the weekend, and I’d like to help grease the skids with a couple of new things from two bands I’ve praised in the past. They are “Exceptions to the Rule” around here, because both include clean singing, but it’s the kind of singing that doesn’t offend me in the least. And “clean” is kind of a relative term anyway.

VENOMOUS MAXIMUS

I fuckin’ love Venomous Maximus. I fuckin’ loved their 2012 album Beg Upon the Light. I really fuckin’ loved the song “Moonchild” from that album, so much so that I included it on my list of 2012’s Most Infectious Extreme Metal Songs. This spring the band signed with Napalm Records, who are giving Beg a proper label release in North America on July 2 (as well as in Europe). And to help promote the album to a new audience, Napalm has released an official music video for . . . “Moonchild”! Hell yes.

Rather than work myself up into a new linguistic lather over the song, I’ll just quote again what I’ve previously written about it: “I mean to tell you, the central riff in this song (which slams right out of the gate) is an absolute headbanging killer. Seriously, you’d need a neck brace to keep your skull from bouncing like a basketball. And the surprise (for me) is how much I like the (mostly) clean vocals. They conjure up visions of old-school Ozzy but with some sandpapery grit emerging here and there.” Continue reading »

WATCH THE NEW NINE INCH NAILS VIDEO: “CAME BACK HAUNTED”

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  4 Responses »
Jun 282013
 

“Came Back Haunted” is the name of the new video from Nine Inch Nails, which debuted not long ago. It’s noteworthy for two reasons. First, it was directed by filmmaker David Lynch. Second, the song is from Hesitation Marks, which is the first album from NIN album since 2008’s The Slip. Hesitation Marks is scheduled for release on September 3.

Trent Reznor has described “Came Back Haunted” (which is now available on iTunes) as “familiar, it’s very self-referential and purposely. I think that’s the most like that there is on that record.” And when you hear the song, you can see the sense in that quote.

I won’t spoil the video for you, other than to say that it’s not exactly straight-forward, but it’s David Lynch, so what did you expect? The video comes with this warning: “This video has been identified by Epilepsy Action to potentially trigger seizures for people with photosensitive epilepsy. Viewer discretion is advised” Watch it next… Continue reading »

ANOTHER LIST OF FIVE LIFE-CHANGING ALBUMS

 Mosh Pit  4 Responses »
Jun 282013
 

Earlier this week, I posted an article listing five albums that changed my life, the ones that led me down the path into heavy music, and invited readers to share their own lists. I can’t claim credit for the idea — it was inspired by a similar article written by Topon Das of Fuck the Facts. But it has turned out to be the most-read piece at NCS this week and it led to a lengthy and fascinating group of comments — 100 of them so far — in essence a collection of short memoirs about personal musical journeys. It has spawned more posts along the same lines at NCS (with more to come), and now the idea has spread to another blog.

This morning, fellow blogger Full Metal Attorney posted his own list of five albums that changed his life. In the preamble, he explains why the idea for this kind of list has proven to be so interesting:

“This isn’t, ‘What are your five favorite albums?’ That’s pertinent information, yes. But it only tells of current taste. It doesn’t tell you anything deeper. But this question asks for your history, your personality, your memories. It invites you to tell a story.”

Full Metal Attorney’s list, and the explanations for the five albums that appear there, is yet another personal story. I won’t spoil the discovery of what’s on there, but I’ll say it includes two albums that I didn’t see coming. Continue reading »

ODINMONKEY: AMON AMARTH INSPIRES FIREFOX

 Mosh Pit, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  17 Responses »
Jun 282013
 

This news item isn’t the kind of thing you see every day. In March, the company that makes the Firefox web browser (Mozilla) rolled out in test mode a significant new module for the browser called OdinMonkey — and gave credit to Amon Amarth as the musical inspiration for the name. And as of this week that module is now included in the latest Firefox release.

Now I know a few things about computer hardware and software, but the knowledge doesn’t go especially deep, so there will be a limit on how well I can explain what OdinMonkey does. But here goes (and I hope readers who know this stuff better than I do will correct me if I fuck it up):

Every web browser includes a JavaScript engine, which is software that interprets and executes JavaScript (a type of programming code) delivered by web servers, and that allows users to see and interact with web pages on their computers and other personal devices. OdinMonkey is a module for the JavaScript engine embedded in Firefox that will dramatically speed up the execution of JavaScript, boosting performance by 1000% or more, improving the ability to play games online and to use web-based applications. According to an article I found on the ExtremeTech web site:

“With OdinMonkey optimizing this process, code executed this way is only two times slower than native execution (as if the code was executed locally, outside the browser, without the JS-to-assembly transcompiling). While this might not sound particularly fast, normal JavaScript (such as when you load the ExtremeTech website) is maybe 20 or 30 times slower than native code. For comparison, Chrome executes asm.js code at around 10 times slower than native speed, and Firefox (without OdinMonkey) is around 12 times slower than native.

…Not only does it boost performance by a huge margin, but it could also act as a cornerstone for web apps that actually perform like their installed, native cousins. In short, OdinMonkey could finally allow for a web-based Adobe Photoshop or Crysis.”

And now here’s the metal part of this story. According to Luke Wagner, a software engineer at Mozilla who announced OdinMonkey on his blog, this was “the musical inspiration for OdinMonkey”: Continue reading »

FIVE OF MY FAVOURITE . . . INSPIRATIONAL FRONTMEN

 Mosh Pit, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  28 Responses »
Jun 272013
 

(Here’s another in Andy Synn’s irregular series of things that come in five’s.)

This edition of the “Five of my favourite…” column should be pretty self-explanatory. For those of you unaware, I’m currently in two bands here in the UK, a high-velocity technical/melodic death metal band called Bloodguard, and a slower, doomier melancholic death metal band called Twilight’s Embrace. So, stemming somewhat from the recent clamor over “Five albums that changed your life”, I thought it might be interesting to list five of the frontmen who inspired me to pick up the microphone myself.

Now, to be clear, these aren’t necessarily the frontmen/singers I count as my current influences as a vocalist (there’s little to no correlation between some of their vocal styles and the way I sing today), but they are the ones who I looked up to and who made me want to be like them.

TIM WILLIAMS – VISION OF DISORDER

One of my early loves, I actually only got to see V.O.D. live for the first time earlier this year. Thank god it lived up to my long-gestating expectations. Tim Williams (above) is an absolute ball of barely contained fury onstage, a mix of frustrated repression and calculated rage, with a voice that simply bleeds passion. You can tell he means every word that passes from his tortured throat. Continue reading »

FIVE ALBUMS THAT CHANGED MY LIFE: A LIST BY DGR

 Mosh Pit  10 Responses »
Jun 272013
 

(Following up on an NCS post earlier this week in which I invited readers to name five albums that changed their lives, focusing on the albums that led them into heavy music, DGR compiled the following list of his own.)

After Islander saw the success of his “Five Albums That Changed Your Life” post, he brought up the idea of having each of the site’s writers do a list. That way, folks could really get to know the other guys here. I had originally written this as a comment, but since it will likely be amended into the O.G. post (or posted separately, depending on how brave we’re feeling after seeing the albums I wrote about), I figured why not get the album art in there and really blow this thing out. [Editor’s Note: I am feeling brave, though the feeling will probably pass quickly.]

Most folks who have participated in the comments to the “Five Albums” post have stuck with the heavy metal discs that changed their lives – and to be honest with you, it’s a great approach. I wanted to try something a little different since I don’t know if there have been any discs that have really changed my life in the ways that others have been changed, but I do have some albums that were landmarks in my music-listening career – including the ones that set about leading me into other genres of music or turning me on a darker path toward more brutal stuff. Picking five albums of heavy metal may have been easier for me, but this has been a pretty fun challenge. You’ll likely figure out the theme of the music that changed my life pretty quickly.

Stevie Wonder – Talking Book

I lived in the Bay Area when I was really young, and being the typical really young person (at least of that era), there was really no music in the world outside of what I saw on TV and what my parents listened to. Since I was a child of divorced parents, it basically played out that whatever my mother listened to is what I listened to. Continue reading »

LANTERN: “BELOW”

 Album Reviews  3 Responses »
Jun 272013
 

(In this post TheMadIsraeli reviews the new album by Finland’s Lantern. The album is out now on the Dark Descent label.)

Lantern are a discovery who I have to say surprise and bewilder me with their sound.  Equal parts early Napalm Death, early Emperor, and Celtic Frost, the resulting sound is badass in all of its off-kilter bestiality.  The inclusion of a mix intentionally made to resemble late 80’s demo work makes it even stranger, yet it fits their sound perfectly.  All in all, I’m surprised I haven’t heard more talk of these guys considering their three previous releases (two demos and an EP).  I haven’t heard any of those previous releases; this album is my first exposure.

Those influences I listed?  This really is an attempt to merge all those sounds together.  The result is something that is chaotic, yet melancholic and alien.  The strange riffs hybridize the styles (there are no specifically identifiable death metal riffs, black metal riffs, or anything else of the sort going on here) and the vocals are insanely primitive, the production only applying a minimum degree of dirtying, amounting to something like a caveman grunt or roar.  Vocalist Necrophilos comes off as something of a more raw, more open-sounding Barney Greenway back in Napalm Death’s early 90’s days.

The instrumental work, all provided by second member Cruciatus, boasts its own personal flare.  His riffs, as I said, hybridize death, black, thrash, and doom metal, all to astonishing effect, while his drum work has an impeccably old school feel to it.  Blast beats fall in and out of sync; as a matter of fact, the drums are always on the verge of derailing when the music speeds up, which brings a nice chaotic touch. When the slower pieces come, his drumming takes on a commanding simplicity that marches forth with agonized perseverance. Continue reading »

NEW FROM VASAELETH: “PARADISE RECONSECRATED” (PLUS ALBUM ART)

 Eye-Catchers, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  9 Responses »
Jun 262013
 

Yours truly has been keeping both bloodshot eyes peeled for info about the next album by Vasaeleth. Keeping my eyes open without blinking for hours on end makes them hurt quite a lot, and this may explain why I sometimes make whimpering noises. However, we must all endure pain for our pleasure, because this is the way of the world. Of course, much of the time we must endure pain to no good end at all. This also is the way of the world.

Aw fuck, where was I?  Oh yeah, waiting for Vasaeleth. Well, my painful vigilance was rewarded this afternoon with a boatload of information. First, Profound Lore confirmed the title of the new album (All Uproarious Darkness) and announced its release date (August 20). Second, PL unveiled the album’s cover art, which you can see above. It was painted by the viciously talented Antichrist Kramer. It’s quite eye-catching, don’t you think?

And finally, we have been given a new song to hear, one bearing the title “Paradise Reconsecrated”. I’m of two minds about the song. In one of my minds I’m being torn apart by wild, voracious beasts who are growling and shrieking and tearing and swallowing whole in a feast of ravenous abandon. In my other mind, I’m enveloped by a blackened death metal tornado, the air being sucked from my lungs while the guitars grind and moan and squeal, the bass thunders, and the drums rumble like an earthquake; and then I’m eaten alive by wild animals. It feels so good. Continue reading »

EXTOL: “EXTOL”

 Album Reviews  14 Responses »
Jun 262013
 

(Andy Synn reviews the spectacular new come-back album by Norway’s Extol)

So, all my cards on the table… I approached this album with an equal mix of awe and trepidation. After all, this band means a huge amount to me, and as much as I’ve been hoping for a reunion for a long, long time, there’s always been that nagging fear in the back of my mind that things simply might not be the same after so long.

So you can imagine my relief to discover that this album fulfils, and perhaps exceeds, all of my hope and expectations – combining the scintillating spirit and raw passion of their early orks with an even greater sense of self-awareness and mature song-writing – in a manner which simultaneously reinforces the band’s legendary reputation and primes them to be introduced to a whole new audience

Of course, my fellow acolytes will probably already be locked in… so what can I say that will entice the unfamiliar listener to give these long-lost legends a shot?

Well, a good place to start would obviously be with this edition of THE SYNN REPORT, wherein I take a deep-dive into the band’s diverse discography, as their long-awaited fifth album effectively draws from all the different eras of their career – from the Prog Death days to their Tech Thrash period to their more overtly melodic moments pre-hiatus – and combines them into what, as signified by the decision to call the record simply Extol, is perhaps the definitive statement of their identity. Continue reading »

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