THINGS I SAW AND HEARD TODAY

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  15 Responses »
Jun 012012
 

I’ve been doing actual paying work all morning. I took a break not long ago and cast my baleful eye around the interhole and my NCS e-mail box to see what there was to see and hear. And these are things I thought worth passing on.

First, that cover you see above is for a tribute album to Emperor called In Honour of Icon E, which will be released on June 25 by Metal Swamp. It’s a very nice piece of art, created by Wolkogniv of Folkingrimm Art.

It also looks like it will be a very nice album, with Emperor covers by the likes of Demonical, Helheim, Horna, Taake, and Setherial. I’ll give you the full tracklist rundown after the jump, but the news for today is that the album has gone up on Amqzon for pre-order, which means you can hear snippets of each song here. Continue reading »

GOROD IN THEIR ELEMENT, WITH SPIRIT

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  3 Responses »
Jun 012012
 

Here at NCS, we are massive fans of Gorod’s 2012 album, A Perfect Absolution. Few tech-death bands in the world have such a flair for combining wonderfully intricate and heavy compositions with memorable melodies.

So it brought a smile to my face to see that Gorod today released a video of them performing “Elements and Spirit” at Rock School Barbey in Bordeaux, France a few weeks ago. Watching and listening to the video made my smile even bigger.

Watch, and smile, at Gorod in their element . . . right after the jump. Continue reading »

VICIOUS HEADBANGING FTW: ZATOKREV AND DEMONICAL

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  6 Responses »
Jun 012012
 

I don’t usually post live videos on this site unless the video and sound quality are in the good-to-great range — which means either pro-quality official vids or above-average fan-filmed clips. That just reflects my own prejudice: I don’t get much out of watching a live clip if the sound is muddy and the images are blurry or too dark. But sometimes the imperfections unexpectedly enhance the viewing/listening experience. I’ve got two examples of what I mean.

ZATOKREV

I found out about this Swiss band in April because they’d just been signed by Candlelight Records, and I posted about them then. Zatrokrev is a Slavic name; Metal Archives says it mean “Blood For This”. The band’s lyrics are in Czech and Slovak, as well as English, because vocalist/guitarist Frederyk Rotter is Czech-born. I still really like the name of their third album, which Candlelight will be releasing: The Bat, The Wheel, And A Long Road To Nowhere. It may have lost something in the translation from Czech.

When I wrote about Zatokrev the first time, they had one new song on YouTube called “Feel the Fire Pt. 1”, which I liked a shit ton. Since then, I’ve found another one called “Goddamn Lights”, which coincidentally is exactly what I say on post-bender mornings when my eyes open. It’s a fuckin’ good song, too, and I’ll have it for you after the jump. But, as noted above, the main reason for this post is a live video.

On May 4, Zatokrev performed at a venue called Le Grillen in Colmar, France, and a fan caught a couple of the songs on video.You expect a metal band to headbang while performing, but Zatokrev really headbang. If I headbanged like Fredryk Rotter, my head would fly off my neck like a discharged cannonball and punch bloody holes through unsuspecting moshers in the pit, leaving the rest to slip ‘n’ slide on the intestines when they hit the floor. Continue reading »

FUN WITH DJERV AND AMORAL

 Exceptions to the Rule, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  10 Responses »
Jun 012012
 

Those of you who don’t have a problem with clean singing in metal will be just fine with this post.  And for those of you who are like me and have a low tolerance for it, well, just bear with me.  In the end, I think you’ll have some fun with this, too.  What I have here are two videos that debuted yesterday, both of which are clever and both of which feature some pretty catchy jams . . . but no growlies.

DJERV

Djerv is a Norwegian band fronted by Agnete Kjølsrud, whose name I recognize only because she sang along with Dimmu Borgir on three of the songs on Abrahadabra, including “Gateways”. You may recall that she appeared prominently in Dimmu’s video for that song. Djerv released their self-titled debut album on Indie Recordings last year, and of course I haven’t heard it, because . . . well . . . you can guess why.

Yesterday marked the appearance of an official video for one of the songs from that album — “Headstone”. I decided to give it a shot, and I’m glad I did. It features the kind of film-making technique that converts footage of real people (in this case, the members of Djerv) into animated characters. I saw a comment on Djerv’s FB page that described it as Frank Miller meets Night of the Living Dead, and that captures it pretty well. It’s fun to watch, and funny, too. Continue reading »

ICELAND METAL MONTH CONTINUES: BENEATH, CARPE NOCTEM, WORMLUST, AND KHAMUL

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  1 Response »
May 312012
 

Here on the last day of May, I decided to christen the month Iceland Metal Month at NCS (see today’s first post).  Since we’ve wrtten about 8 Icelandic metal bands so far, it seemed like the logical thing to do. And having gone that far, I decided we ought to go further and bring the total to an even dozen. So, here we go . . . four more bands worth getting to know from a country that’s starting to seem close to Finland in the ratio of killer metal bands per capita of population.

BENEATH

I found out about this Reykjavík band while doing a little research on Ophidian I, who I included in that earlier post about Icelandic metal today: It seems that guitarist Unnar Sigurðsson is a member of both bands. It further appears that drummer Ragnar Sverrisson is also a member of another awesome Icelandic band, Atrum (who we’ve written about more than once in the past).

Beneath’s line-up solidified in late 2008, and in 2009 they won the Wacken Metal Battle contest in Iceland, thereby becoming the first Icelandic band to perform at the Wacken Open Air festival in August 2009. They released a debut EP titled Hollow Empty Void on Mordbrann Musikk in 2010 (it’s available on iTunes), and they’ve finished recording a debut full-length, Enslaved By Fear. That album will be released on July 17 by the dependable Unique Leader label. The eye-catching album cover was done by Raymond Swanland.

Now, about their music . . . Continue reading »

NILE: DOWNLOAD “THE FIENDS” FOR FREE

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  1 Response »
May 312012
 

Last week we reported on the premiere of the first song from Nile’s new album, At the Gates of Sethu, which will be released via Nuclear Blast Records on June 29 (Europe) and July 3 (North America). The song is called “The Fiends Who Come To Steal the Magick of the Deceased”. At that point, it was exclusively streaming at Noisecreep.

But now, you don’t have to stream it any more, because Nuclear Blast is making the song available as a free download, in return for your e-mail address.  GO HERE to get the track for your very own. And in case you haven’t yet heard the song — which may not be exactly what you’re expecting from Nile, check it out on the player below:
 

THINGS I SAW THIS MORNING

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  24 Responses »
May 312012
 

I saw this album cover. It’s for the next album by Dysrhythmia, Test of Submission, which Profound Lore says they will be releasing on August 28. No test is needed . . . I am ready to submit.

I also saw that Be’lakor has just put HD versions of all the songs from their terrific new album Of Breath and Bone up on YouTube. Find those tracks here. Read Andy Synn’s review of the album here. (And thanks to NCS reader Daniel for the tip on this news.)

I also saw that Doris Yeh from Chthonic is on the cover of a fashion magazine called FHM.  I no longer have to wonder what she looks like naked. Continue reading »

MORE FIRE AND ICE FROM ICELAND: GONE POSTAL, ANGIST, AND OPHIDIAN I

 Album Reviews, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  9 Responses »
May 312012
 

I should probably just go ahead and designate May as Iceland Metal Month at NO CLEAN SINGING. So far this month we’ve featured music from Severed Crotch (here), Svartidauði and Vansköpun (here), Azoic (here), and Dynfari (here). Since today is the last day of the month, I thought I’d close it out with three more Icelandic metal bands.

GONE POSTAL

This band from Kópavogur was formed in 2007. They released a debut full-length titled In the Depths of Despair in 2008 through Iceland’s own Molestin Records as well as three subsequent releases, of which Promo II (2011) is the latest.  In March of this year, they won the Wacken Metal Battle contest in Iceland, which will give them the right to perform at Wacken Open Air this summer.

I gather from a few things I’ve read that the band’s style of music through the early releases was a kind of experimental death metal. What I’ve heard are the three songs on Promo II, and those songs instead reflect a pronounced black metal influence. The music is shot through with ripping/roaring tremolo guitars, vicious rhythms, and an air of bleak dissonance. The vocal style flexes between harsh growls and eviscerating shrieks. The production is as raw as a fresh wound. Yet as cacophonous as the music often is, strange melodies ring out through the tidal wash of bile, lending the music a kind of sick fascination. Continue reading »

ZOMBIE ASS: TOILET OF THE DEAD

 IQ Subtraction  15 Responses »
May 302012
 

Phro has obviously been spending way too much fucking time on his own blog or I would have found out about this movie from him instead of having to read about it on Skeletonwitch’s FB page.

Just when you think zombie filmography has become so saturated that there’s nothing new to say about zombies, we get Zombie Ass: Toilet of the Dead. Leave it to the Japanese to take a tired old cinematic trope and breathe new life into the shit. I mean, don’t get me wrong: I like a crap zombie movie as much as the next dude, but they get kinda boring after a while — even when real life starts imitating art. But there’s a difference between a crap zombie movie and a craptastic movie with shit zombies and hot, gun-toting Japanese chicks wearing schoolgirl uniforms, which seems to be required dress for all hot Japanese chicks.

Zombie Ass, which premiered at a film festival in Austin, Texas (?!?) last fall and had its Japanese premiere in February 2012, was made by renowned Japanese director and legendary ass-fetishist Noboru Iguchi. It seems to involve poop-covered zombies crawling from outhouses, mutant intestinal parasites, and a lot of potent farting. Sounds awesome, no?

The odds of me seeing this movie are zero, but the “international” trailer for the film — complete with garbled English voiceover and titles — is fucking hysterical.  Okay, to be more precise, it’s hysterical if you have a really juvenile, scatalogical sense of humor like I do, and I’m pretty sure you DO have that kind of sense of humor, or why else would you be wasting your time at this site? Continue reading »

RELAPSE GOES ALL IN ON BANDCAMP

 Metal News  26 Responses »
May 302012
 

I like to think we were one of the first metal blogs to pay attention to Bandcamp, with this feature on the service back in March of 2010. Since then, the popularity of Bandcamp as a platform for streaming and distributing metal has exploded — to the point where, in addition to bands, almost every metal label worthy of attention has put big chunks of their catalogs on the site. (Metal Bandcamp has been keeping track of all the metal labels who’ve established a presence on Bandcamp, and you can see their pretty comprehensive list here.)

But yesterday, we saw what must still count as something of a milestone, notwithstanding the now-established popularity of Bandcamp: The venerable Relapse label has now put their entire 20+ year catalog on Bandcamp. The official Relapse page now features over 122 artists including (and these are the names that Relapse called out in their press release) Baroness, Dying Fetus, Pig Destroyer, Red Fang, Necrophagist, Revocation, and of course many more. This will allow fans not only to stream everything in the Relapse catalog, but also to get CD-quality downloads of the music (Bandcamp offers the FLAC format as well as 320k mp3).

But wait, that’s not all! Continue reading »

 Older Entries  Newer Entries