NO CLEAN SINGING

UNDERDOGS IN THE UNDERGROUND: ROUNDABOUT ROUND-UP (PART 2)

Mar 092013

(This is Part 2 of a two-part post, in which NCS contributor Austin Weber puts the spotlight on six underground bands. In this part the subjects are Terracide, Fields of Elysium, and In Human Form. Part 1 can be found here.)

The new age of music has been creeping into a higher plane of existence for some time, due to more inexpensive and accessible sound-recording equipment intertwined with the development of many new exciting avenues for independent distribution. Combined with the ability to raise funds without label support, this has leveled the playing field for the creation of new music. But this is a dual-edged sword because it can mean a lack of promotion for many groups who truly are doing great things. This is an article for those kinds of bands.

Terracide– Primordium

If Iron Maiden taught us anything it’s that melodies and metal rule, and I am a huge fan of anything from power metal to melodic death metal. Terracide are a new group from Washington, DC, playing a high-voltage combo of energetic power metal, thrash, and death metal. This is a step up from both your average melodic death metal, due to the huge power metal influence and flashes of thrash inherent in their music. Continue reading »

GOROD HEADLINE BLOODLETTING NORTH AMERICA 9, POLYPHIA MAKE WAVES, AND BETHLEHEM PLAN THEIR NEXT ALBUM

RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC 2 Responses »

Mar 082013

I just took a short break from the work grind, flitted around the interhole and the NCS e-mail inbox like a blowfly in search of a raw wound, and came across three items I wanted to pass along. Two are news items, one is new music.

TOURISM: BLOODLETTING NORTH AMERICA 9

I saw that a new North American tour has just been announced. It begins May 3 and runs through June 1. It made my already bulging eyes bulge further from their sockets, sort of like what happens to frogs when you inflate them with a bicycle pump.

The headliner is Gorod. I could stop there, but the rest of the line-up is cool, too: Inanimate Existence, Kamikabe, and Vale of Pnath.

But that’s not all. On selected dates, the tour will also be joined by Fallujah, Pyrexia, Applaud, The Impaler, River of Nihil, The Kennedy Veil, Cognitive, and Archspire. Continue reading »

COMING UP FOR AIR: DAMNATION PLAN, KHORS, ONE INCH GIANT

Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC 3 Responses »

Mar 082013

Hi. This is Day 12 of me being away from home and working like an indentured servant on my fucking day-and-night job. I know there’s been tremendous curiosity about what I am doing. I’m not at liberty to disclose where I am, but I thought I’d share a few details about the nature of the project.

As some of you have guessed, it does indeed involve super-science. My colleagues and I are testing methods for grafting additional penises onto parts of the male anatomy where penises are not usually found. There’s a gamers convention in town, so we’ve had no trouble finding willing test subjects.

We’ve had more trouble finding willing penis donors, so we’ve just been taking them without consent. Because there’s a gamers convention in town, we’ve had no trouble finding people who aren’t actually using their penises, so no harm done. That’s all I can tell you at the moment.

As you know, the demands of the project have almost entirely prevented me from listening to metal or writing about it for almost two weeks. However, the work schedule for today and tomorrow isn’t quite as awful as it has been, so I have a brief window of opportunity to come up for air and see what I’ve been missing. Here’s a small selection of items I found this morning. Continue reading »

FIVE OF MY FAVOURITE . . . LONG SONGS

RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC 31 Responses »

Mar 082013

(Here we have the latest installment of Andy Synn’s lists of favorite things that come in fives.)

One thing that metal does very well (compared at least to pop, hip-hop, and even most rock music) is the long-form song. Heck, I imagine if I were to calculate the “average” run time of a song from amongst my vast collection, it would definitely come out somewhere between 5-6 minutes. A “short” metal song is often one that goes up to about 4 minutes after all (in contrast to the fact that this would be considered longer than average in the other genres I’ve mentioned).

One reason for this is that metal often needs room to breathe, to develop its melodic (or dissonant) themes properly. Metal revels in space, stretching itself, filling up the space with noise and sound, light and vision. It’s also a genre often synonymous with story-telling, and one which – largely free from the external constraints enforced upon the 3-minute pop song – contends to offer a deeper and more rewarding (and as such, longer lasting) emotional experience for the listener.

Then of course there’s Napalm Death… so, ok, metal isn’t ALL about length and depth (short, sharp impact is certainly a common trade-mark too) but it DOES tend to do long songs very well.

So I’ve chosen five of my absolute favourites, presented in order from shortest to longest. And there’s not a single Opeth song among them. Continue reading »

UNDERDOGS IN THE UNDERGROUND: ROUNDABOUT ROUNDUP (PART 1)

RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC 5 Responses »

Mar 072013

(In Part 1 of a two-part post, NCS contributor Austin Weber puts the spotlight on three underground bands — Cognizance, The Conjuration, and Replacire. Part 2 will come tomorrow.)

Cognizance – Inquisition

By now we all know Alex Rudinger left The Haarp Machine and joined The Faceless. What we weren’t made aware of is that he recently did session drumming for a tight group of young UK death metallers on their debut EP Inquisition. Cognizance create death metal heavily entrenched in a pervading brutality but are smart enough to prop up their songs with memorable guitar playing.

As a group they clearly draw from the absurdly steamrolling nature and rhthms of Beneath The Massacre but make it their own by smoothly matching it with an elegant melodic embrace similar to Fallujah. They just so happen to approach that ballpark but then conveniently step away and find their own place with grace. Continue reading »

ROUND-UP: DEVOURMENT, PYRITHION, AND MECHINA

Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC 10 Responses »

Mar 072013

(DGR pitches in with this round-up of recent news and music while I’m still drowning in day-job bullshit.)

Since Islander has once again found himself incredibly busy I figured that I would do my best to get the word out there about a few things that caught my eye earlier on in the week. I had meant to get this up yesterday but unfortunately found myself dealing with jury duty summons – which isn’t that bad in the grand scheme of things – so this one is going up today.

Enough excuses though; this week found a couple of death metal videos hitting the web and one electronics fused industrial death bit of music popping up as well. Since they’ve unfortunately flown under our radar, your lovely knight in shining armor gets to ride in upon his pale horse and capture what he can.

DEVOURMENT: “Parasitic Eruption” Video

We’ve been hotly anticipating stuff by Devourment for some time now and the group finally got to release their album Conceived In Sewage via Relapse earlier this year. Now the band have a music video for the song “Parasitic Eruption” which – music-wise – is an excellent example of exactly what this band is about. Continue reading »

FALLUJAH, HACRIDE, TORMENTED

Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC 5 Responses »

Mar 062013

Starting Day 10 of my day-job death march. It’s looking like after today I’ll get a bit of a break — still can’t go back to Seattle, but I’ll have more time off that I can spend catching up on metal. But yesterday was another day-and-night clusterfuck and I had no time to pay attention to music. So this will be another very quick round-up of just a few things I saw that interested me early this morning.

FALLUJAH

This Bay Area band have a new EP on the way, called Nomadic. Yesterday TheMadIsraeli notified me that they premiered a new song from the EP named “The Dead Sea”. I listened to it.

Here’s the message I got from TheMadIsraeli: “I think the term for this is all consuming”. I can understand that reaction. The dramatic introductory music is a great build-up to an explosive start to the song proper. And as the song proceeds it proves to be a galvanizing experience, masterfully interweaving head-smashing death metal aggressiveness and head-swirling prog extravagance. Continue reading »

RECENT NEWS: IMMOLATION, ARSIS, PIG DESTROYER, NEW STANDARD ELITE

Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC 6 Responses »

Mar 052013

About to begin Day 9 away from home. Still working day and night on that project for my fucking day (and night) job. Averaging four hours of sleep a night. Brain is fried. Unable to write complete sentences any more.

Wasn’t able to check my NCS email at all until late last night. Had no chance to surf the web for new music. Haven’t listened to metal in 24 hours. Starting to get the withdrawal shakes.

Did see these things when I checked my e-mail.

IMMOLATION

Fucking Immolation’s new album is named Kingdom of Conspiracy. Super-badass cover art was unveiled — created by the immortal Pär Olofsson. Super badass. Continue reading »

IT LOOKS LIKE SOMEBODY’S NIGHTMARE

Album Reviews 3 Responses »

Mar 042013

(In this post we have a guest review by NCS supporter and commenter Marious.)

Today I’d like to bring your attention to SamarA, an incredible band that I’ve had the privilege to gig and/or barbeque with several times. The band is a force to behold live as fog rolls in, images of nuclear explosion and natural disasters play on the back drop, audio samples loop, and the guitars slowly build up a palpable tension. By the time the first song actually begins and the piercing vocals cut in, chances are good that they have your full attention. I never get tired of seeing these guys.

BADWOLF’S TOP 10 MOST METAL NOT-METAL ALBUMS OF 2012

Listmania, LISTMANIA 2012, That's Music -- But It's Not Metal 27 Responses »

Mar 042013

(I bet you thought we’d finished our 2012 Listmania series. Think again. BadWolf brings us one more list.)

Three months into 2013, here’s another top 10 about 2012. These are my favorite articles to write every year, and also the most difficult. 2012 in particular was a musical gauntlet. The more promos we get here at NCS and at the other sites I write for, the more metal I listen to, the more I need non-metal records to give myself a break. It’s an infinite feedback loop.

I thought this would be an easy article. So many of my favorite artists in my favorite genres released albums in 2012 that I anticipated the article would write itself. Needless to say, things did not turn out that way. Old favorites like Marillion and Titus Andronicus released middle-of-the-road records. At the same time, I developed a tremendous appetite for hip-hop. One version of this list was entirely populated by rappers, which would have necessitated another top 10 list.

Also, so many metal labels released more-or-less rock records that I debated including them. In the end I opted not to: you know who Graveyard are, and they don’t need me for a cheerleader (seriously, though—listen to Graveyard).

In the end, these ten albums made the cut more-or-less based on play counts alone. They all share certain qualities with my favorite metal albums: intense sound, aggressive or melancholy delivery, vocals. You could call those things the core of my taste. Perhaps they’re also at the core of yours. Continue reading »

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