NEUTRON HAMMER: “IRON STORM EVOCATION”

 Album Reviews  No Responses »
Sep 022012
 

The album cover provides a good clue: Iron Storm Evocation is raw, primitive, and thoroughly necrotic. It’s also one hell of a hell-ripping ride.

The album is the full-length debut by Finland’s Neutron Hammer, the culmination of nine years of effort that included a demo and two EPs. It doesn’t boast zooming technicality, ground-breaking creativity, or melodic hooks that you’ll be humming days later, but for this kind of music who wants or needs that? What Iron Storm Evocation brings is 40 minutes of blasphemous black thrashing death mixed with venomous black ‘n’ roll that’s a shitload of evil fun. It exerts a kind of animal magnetism that has brought me back to it repeatedly over the last month.

With few exceptions, the music barrels ahead at high speed with high distortion, and although the production quality isn’t really lo-fi, it’s close enough to coat everything in grime. The dominant musical style is blasting blackened thrash with rapid-fire chords and hammering percussion, sometimes blazing away with enough speed to fuse everything into the proverbial wall of noise. But no song on the album is really all one thing.

Even on the tracks where rolling hellfire is king, you get changes in rhythm and riffing that bring the beats of old-school punk, crust and d-beat, Motörhead on an open throttle, and pretty close to straight-up rock, without ever losing the authentic air of thoroughly blackened filthiness. There’s a dose of Venom and Hellhammer, an injection of of Impaled Nazarene and Nunslaughter, and even a bit of Discharge,  to go along with the hailstorm of infernal thrashing. Continue reading »

ANAAL NATHRAKH: TITLE, RELEASE DATE, AND ALBUM ART FOR “VANITAS” SURFACE

 Metal News  12 Responses »
Sep 012012
 

Well, well, look at what popped up on Anaal Nathrakh’s Facebook page (here) a couple of hours ago. Though there hasn’t yet been any official press about it, I believe this confirms that the name of their next album is Vanitas and that it will be released on October 15 by Candlelight Records. And lookie what else I found — a page where the album appears to be available for pre-order (here) that includes a small image of the album cover:

You may think that “vanitas” means “vanity”, and so it does, but it also means “emptiness” and has connotations about “the meaninglessness of earthly life and the transient nature of all earthly goods and pursuits”. “Vanitas” was also the name given to a genre of still-life painting that flourished in the Netherlands in the early 17th century, usually containing “collections of objects symbolic of the inevitability of death and the transience and vanity of earthly achievements and pleasures”.

This album has been finished since March of this year. Here’s what AN’s Dave Hunt said about it in an interview about three days after it was completed: Continue reading »

PSYCHOFAGIST: “9 PSALMS OF AN ANTIMUSIC TO COME”

 Metal News, SHORT BUT SWEET  4 Responses »
Sep 012012
 

In February 2010, when NCS was only three months old, I stumbled across a mind-bending Italian band named Psychofagist and enthusiastically reviewed their second album, II secondo tragico, which had been released in November 2009 by an online record label named Subordinate Recordings. To quote myself (always an enjoyable activity):

“This noise howls and shrieks, stops and turns in sharp angles, screams in the piercing wail of a saxophone being tortured within an inch of its life, and then breaks down into a gloomy, meandering trek through a surreal landscape. . . . The drums and the bass careen unpredictably from wall to wall with power – you feel like ducking lest your head come off. The guitars scream furiously or shudder in desperation or mutter like the muted ravings of the insane. No consistent rhythms here. No headbanging riffage to be found. Just a pummeling but erratic sonic assault that keeps you constantly off-balance. . . . Oh, and did I mention the banjo on ‘Defragmentation Rotunda’? And there’s a flute in the mix somewhere too.”

The music was dramatically variable, dynamically unhinged, and like nothing else I had heard before. But despite how amazing I thought the album was, I lost track of Psychofagist until TheMadIsraeli sent me an e-mail today recommending a Psychofagist song called “Apophtegma Non-Sense”. It turns out that song is one of five that Psychofagist contributed to a January 2012 split with that excellent Polish grind unit, Antigama. The split was also released by Subordinate and its title is 9 Psalms of An Antimusic To Come.

Happily, the Psychofagist tracks are available on Bandcamp. Happily, the music is just as amazingly fucked up as ever. Continue reading »

MALAYSIAN DEATH: LAVATORY AND HUMILIATION

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  10 Responses »
Sep 012012
 

We’ve never written about a Malaysian metal band in the nearly three years that NCS has been fouling up the interhole. If you had asked me two days ago to name a Malaysian metal band, I couldn’t have done it. I know there’s a scene there, and my guess is that, like a lot of Southeast Asian metal, it’s dominated by brutal/technical death metal and grindcore bands, but as for concrete facts, I had none.

However, within these last two days, by sheer coincidence, I’ve come across two Malaysian bands, both of whom have recently been signed by noteworthy record labels: Lavatory and Humiliation. They’re both devoted to old school death metal (though not the same kind), they’re both working on their label debuts, and they both sound tasty.

LAVATORY

It seems this band (above) is very new, having released their first music in the form of an EP called Transgression just earlier this summer (which I found on cassette at Hells Headbangers). But that EP was enough to snag the attention of Pulverised Records, who signed them for the release of a debut album.

Pulverised can be relied upon to deliver quality, and by “quality” I mean death metal that the average human skull isn’t strong enough to withstand. So the Pulverised signing alone was grounds for high hopes. I also found a song from Transgression that provides further grounds. Its name is “Blinded By Darkness”, and it’s a goddamn good song. The power of the filth is strong with these young ones. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD: EARLY GRAVES, ZONARIA, DETHKLOK, NUCLEAR DEATH TERROR, RED ELEVEN

 Free Shit, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  4 Responses »
Aug 312012
 

Someone left a comment on one of today’s earlier posts saying “NCS has always been the most long-winded out of all the metal sites.” Really hurt my feelings. Made me feel real low and pouty. Some people just wanna know if the shit is awesome or not. Makes me wanna just clam up and let all this shit that I saw and heard today speak for itself.

EARLY GRAVES

New Early Graves album. Red Horse. Out 10/30 on No Sleep Records. Pre-Order available at http://www.nosleepstore.com/. New song, too. Also called “Red Horse”. Fucken explosive crusty punky grindy mayhem. Pure awesomeness. (thanks Utmu)


Continue reading »

ERYN NON DAE.: “MELIORA” IS COMING

 Metal News  2 Responses »
Aug 312012
 

In the early days of this blog, we developed a fascination for the French metal band Eryn Non Dae.. We’ve posted about them a lot since early 2010, most recently here. The band’s own description of their music is one I would endorse: “Complex and brutal structures, black and apocalyptic moods, an obscure music where dissonant compositions carry an in-your-face, aggressive vocal style… A trip into the depths of the soul.”

Our interest began with the band’s 2009 album Hydra Lernaïa (reviewed here), and I’ve been following their news ever since, while waiting for their next release. Finally, that day is about to dawn.

The new album is named Meliora, and it will come with that wonderful cover art you see above, which was created by the band’s (obviously multi-talented) bassist Mika André. It was recorded by Mobo (Conkrete Studios), who also recorded Hydra Lernaïa as well as albums by a multitude of other French bands, including Gorod’s latest release, A Perfect Absolution. It’s scheduled for release in October, but excerpts of the songs are available for listening at this location.

Because I’m planning a full review closer to the release date, I won’t say much at this point about my reactions, except I’m blown away by what I’m hearing. It’s crushing, searing, complex, intense music.  Continue reading »

KHONSU: “ANOMALIA”

 Album Reviews  12 Responses »
Aug 312012
 


(In this post Andy Synn reviews the just-released debut album on Season of Mist by Norway’s Khonsu.)

There’s something incredibly exotic, even erotic, about the darker side of music.

Whether you believe that music (and art) creates some sort of spiritual or emotional connection, or whether you see it merely as a stimulus for strange, internal chemical reactions, the fact remains that ever since Sabbath struck their first doom-laden chord there has been an inherent darkness to our music that touches something within us far different from what the rest of the world experiences.

The hybrid black metal sound of Khonsu absolutely revels in this darkness, wrapping its post-industrial, post-apocalyptic (but never post-metal) sound in a shroud of shade and shadow, while taking the audacious (and risky) step of using the keyboards as a leading instrument, utilising this expanded sonic palette to great effect to realise both extroverted concepts and introverted neuroses in equal measure.

Always a dangerous choice, in the wrong hands this often results in nothing but pompous farce or overblown, soulless theatrics. But Anomalia bucks this trend – instead of simply filling out the sound in a passive fashion, the ever-present synth lines and haunting keyboard refrains actively control and direct the direction of the music and have been given the necessary time and care that they need to realise their potential. Rather than being treated as an afterthought, a mere parlor trick or cynical attempt to expand the sound, the synth work here is an integral part of each song’s foundation, granting each one a thematic breadth and depth outside and beyond the confines of black metal’s traditionally guitar-based aesthetic.

Progressive in intent and ambition, the structures of all the songs, which you may have gathered are all of a somewhat significant length, are complex without being convoluted, intelligent without being impenetrable, and though each track is a singular contained chapter, they all contribute, individually and as a collective, to the overall direction of the album.

This is pure Blade Runner black metal, born and raised in Perdition City under the hazy glare of neon lights, where the blood of the dragon meets the sprawling sound of tomorrow. Continue reading »

BLACK SABBATH VOL. 4 TURNS 40

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  11 Responses »
Aug 312012
 

It’s time to celebrate another metal anniversary. Tomorrow, September 1, 40 years will have passed since the official release of Black Sabbath’s fourth album. Hard to believe: Forty. Fucking. Years.

As I’ve done in the past, I’m stealing from my fellow metal blogger Full Metal Attorney, who is a lot more on the ball watching the calendar for events like this than yours truly. He discusses the significance of this album on his own site today, proclaiming it the pinnacle of Black Sabbath’s career, surpassing each of the band’s first three albums — Black Sabbath (1970), Paranoid (1970), and Master of Reality (1971).

FMA attributes the album’s excellence mainly to Tommy Iommi’s riffs, especially on “Supernaut”, “Wheels of Confusion”, “Cornucopia”, “Snowblind”, and the song he calls “the heaviest Sabbath song of all”, “Under the Sun”. But he also praises the performances of the rest of Sabbath — Geezer Butler, Bill Ward, and of course Ozzy.

As FMA himself acknowledges in the article, lots of people would disagree with him putting Vol. 4 above Paranoid and Master of Reality. He chalks that up to the presence of the weird experimental track “FX,” the relatively long acoustic instrumental “Laguna Sunrise,” and the piano/synth ballad “Changes” — but he asserts that these quirky, imperfect songs are precisely what has made the album so memorable after 40 years, in addition to all of the album’s phenomenal successes. Continue reading »

KEYBOARD WARRIORS: “GRIM” KIM KELLY

 Interviews  31 Responses »
Aug 312012
 

(photo credit: Nick Palmiretto)

(In this post, Dane Prokofiev [formerly known as Rev. Will around these parts] returns to NCS with another installment in his Keyboard Warriors series, in which he interviews well-known metal writers. Today’s subject is the thoroughly awesome “Grim” Kim Kelly.)

The name “Grim” Kim is, surely, not unknown to denizens of the metal blogosphere and physical print media.

Starting at the tender age of 15, the New York-based female metal writer worked her way up from underground fanzines to bigger outlets, and she has been at the craft for nearly a decade since. Her career as a metal writer seems to be one of the most successful cases around, as evident from her perennially expanding portfolio (she recently became a staff member of Pitchfork Media), and so it is only natural to inquire: what were the unique life experiences that shaped her to be who she is today?

Of course, that is not all that perks the interest of the body modification enthusiast’s admirers and peers. In this interview, No Clean Singing delves into certain iffy metal issues with the seasoned metal scribe as well.

 

Hello Kim, it’s time to start talking about yourself again! Were you christened (or satanized) “Grim” Kim by a good metal pal, or did you come up with it yourself?

It’s a nickname given to me by my friend Curran Reynolds. He runs Precious Metal, a weekly metal night at Lit Lounge in Manhattan, and when I was in college in Philly, I’d often come up to catch the show and hang out. I eventually started DJ-ing there upon occasion, and he decided that “Grim Kim” was to be my DJ name. When I started writing for MetalSucks I used it as my pen name ‘cause everyone else there had a quirky nom de plume, and from there, I guess it just stuck. People like rhymes. Continue reading »

VHÖL

 Metal News  13 Responses »
Aug 302012
 

You know, if I owned a kvlt metal record label (and therefore, by definition, did not care about food or running water), I would do something like this.

The phone would ring one day, and someone would say, “Would you be interested in signing a band composed of these folks?”

Mike Scheidt (YOB)-Vocals

John Cobbett (Hammers of Misfortune, ex-Ludicra)-Guitars

Sigrid Sheie (Hammers of Misfortune)-Bass

Aesop (Fucking) Dekker (Agalloch, Worm Ouroboros, ex-Ludicra)-Drums

I’d think on it for about two seconds, while wiping the drool off my mouth, and while the inner me would be squealing like a little girl, I’d try to play it cool and ask if there was any music to hear. And upon being told Not Yet, I’d just go ahead and give up and ask where to send the contract, and then excuse myself to go change my shorts.

I’m not exactly sure it went down like that in the offices of Profound Lore. All I know for sure is that this band is a real thing, it’s called VHÖL, they’re recording an album, and Profound Lore plans to release it. Continue reading »

 Older Entries  Newer Entries