A TOP 5 LIST FROM MIKA ANDRE

 Listmania, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  No Responses »
Jan 062012
 

We first made the acquaintance of Mickael André in the early days of this blog when we developed a fascination for the French metal band of which he is the bassist — Eryn Non Dae.. I counted, and we’ve posted about them seven times since 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.”

I asked Mika if he would share with us a list of the metal he enjoyed most during 2011, and he responded with a list, which I’ll come to eventually. But this post also gives me an excuse to feature music from the many projects in which Mika is involved. Eryn Non Dae. is only one of those projects, though it’s Mika’s main one. The latest news from END. is very sweet news indeed — they are now beginning to record their second album. Their 2009 Metal Blade release, Hydra Lernaïa, was a remarkable debut, and I’m really curious to hear what the band will come up with next.

But END. is not Mika André’s only musical project. He’s also the guitarist for an instrumental band called Nojia (that’s their photo at the top of this post), who recently released a fascinating debut album called Solarchitect. (available here).

The album starts with a 6-minute overture and then proceeds through four long songs, ranging from 11 to 18 minutes in duration. It was recorded live, with all the musicians performing together in the studio — and when you hear the range and complexity of the music, you’ll appreciate even more what that means. I’ve embedded a music player later in this post that will stream the entire album — listening is an intense, mesmerizing experience. Continue reading »

THIS HELPS KICK THE SHIT OUT OF THE ATLANTIC OCEAN

 Metal News  6 Responses »
Jan 062012
 

Yesterday, I was whining about the INFERNO Metal Festival in Oslo Norway this April — exciting line-up of bands, too fucking far away for me to see. One of the comments on that post, from Kazz, pretty much summed up my feelings about the matter:  “Sometimes the Atlantic Ocean just pisses me off.” To which I responded, “Damned ocean. If it were only smaller, we could kick the shit out of it.”

But look! Now we have help with the shit-kicking! This morning I saw the announcement about the tour featured in that flyer up there. Now THAT is going to be one skull-fucking abomination of a musical extravaganza. It will be particularly sweet because the tour starts only four days after GOATWHORE releases their new album on February 14, which was recorded by Erik Rutan at his Mana Recording Studio in Florida.

And speaking of Erik Rutan . . . HATE ETERNAL! Hells yeah. No one puts the power drill to your cranium quite like Hate Eternal in a live setting.

Oh, and speaking of boring holes in your skull . . . CEREBRAL BORE, all the way from Scotland! And fucking FALLUJAH on top of that!

I’m not saying this is better than Inferno Fest, I’m not saying that we’ve found the secret to subjugation of the Atlantic Ocean, but it do make me feel a damned sight better than I did when I was whining yesterday — because this death metal juggernaut will be stopping in Seattle, which involves no Atlantic Ocean crossing for me to reach. Maybe it will make a stop somewhere near you, too. The full schedule is after the jump. And because these four bands are now on my mind, I’ve got videos from each of them after the jump, too. Continue reading »

2012: METAL IN THE FORGE (Part 1)

 Forthcoming Albums  28 Responses »
Jan 062012
 

December and 2011 are both over, and with the end of the last month, it’s time to round up what we saw over the last 30 days about forthcoming albums.

We usually try to post these updates on the first of the month, but the first of this month was New year’s Day, and I was moving kinda slowly that day. Plus, I’ve been focusing on year-end lists from a variety of sources, and, well, I’m late with this. I have more excuses, if you’d like to hear them.  No?  Okay, I understand.  I’ll just shut up and get going with this list.

So, here’s the deal:  In these METAL IN THE FORGE posts, I collect news blurbs and press releases I’ve seen over the last month about forthcoming new albums from bands we know and like at NCS (including occasional updates about releases we’ve included in previous installments of this series), or from bands that look interesting, even though we don’t know their music yet. In this series, we cut and paste those announcements and compile them in alphabetical order.

Remember — THIS ISN’T A CUMULATIVE LIST. If we found out about a new forthcoming album before December, we wrote about it in previous installments of this series. So, be sure to check the Category link called “Forthcoming Albums” on the right side of this page to see forecasted releases we reported earlier.

This month’s list begins right after the jump. It includes some real eye-openers. In fact, it’s not too soon to say that 2012 is already looking like yet another royally skull-fucking year for metal. But as usual, this list is half-assed rather than comprehensive. I confess that in December I was even more half-assed than usual in keeping my eyes open for news about new albums. So, feel free to leave Comments and tell all of us what I missed when I put this list together. Let us know about albums on the way that  you’re stoked about, even if you don’t see them here! Continue reading »

THE TOP 11 OF 2011, BROUGHT TO YOU BY VALLEY OF STEEL

 Listmania  7 Responses »
Jan 062012
 

(As our Listmania series winds down, today we welcome another fellow blogger, whose moniker you may also recognize from his NCS comments. Check out his diverse year-end list of new discoveries below, and be sure to check out the Valley of Steel blog, too.)

Hello, NCS readers! Sitting here on the long bus ride from the Valley to my job in Pittsburgh, I am given the opportunity to do a lot of reflecting. For example, today I am reflecting on the fact that it is FUCKING COLD enough outside to FREEZE A POLAR BEAR’S NUTS OFF. But, since it is also the dawn of a new year, many people like to take the time to reflect back on the year that has just concluded, as well as looking ahead to the one that is just beginning. So I have written posts that look in both of those directions. This first one addresses some of the great music I have discovered during 2011, and if Islander chooses to publish it and if you all don’t completely hate it, there will be a second post to follow which discusses what YOU want the future of metal to look like.

Over the past month or so, I have seen literally OODLES of year-end lists all over the internet. In fact, this website alone has featured damn near an oodle and a half. Many of them (not the ones on NCS, specifically, but just some of those I have seen around) seem to just re-shuffle the same few “big name” releases in various orders, with a couple controversial or “surprise” entries to almost make each list worth reading.

Well, I almost didn’t make my own list, because I really didn’t see the point of just rehashing the same old thing YET AGAIN. The more I thought about it, though, I realized the beneficial part of reading these lists, which is that you might find something new that you otherwise would have missed out on. With that in mind, I spent a lot of time thinking about the joy of discovering new music, and how much awesome music I discovered in 2011. So, then I decided to make a list of some of that music, to share with YOU. Continue reading »

THIS JUST MAKES ME WANNA PUKE

 Metal News  8 Responses »
Jan 052012
 

Over the last couple of months, Norway’s INFERNO Metal Festival has been dribbling out the names of the bands who will be performing over the Black Easter weekend in Oslo on April 4-7.  I hadn’t checked the line-up since before the holidays, but I just did. Makes me fucking sick . . . because I’m here and Oslo is there and never the twain shall meet, or at least there will be no meeting this April. Because I would dearly love to see this show, but it ain’t happening.

Let’s just consider the headlining band — Arcturus. Now that’s a band I would like to see. They seem to have achieved a kind of cult status in Europe with an avant-garde take on black metal. They broke up in 2007, but reunited last year under the leadership of ICX Vortex for an anticipated appearance at the ProgPower USA festival — which never came to pass. Assuming they actually follow through at the Inferno fest, it would be their first festival appearance in five years.

But that’s just for starters. Look at the rest of that line-up! And it could get worse: There’s an Inferno “kick off” show on January 28 at the John Dee Club in Oslo (with performances by Vesen, TrollFest, Bulk, and Dead Trooper) at which the final festival line-up will be announced — which means more bands will probably be added.

If you’re going to this festival in April, do me a favor and keep that to yourself.  And don’t tell me about the line-ups for the other European festivals that have started rolling out for the coming spring and summer.

OUR LIST OF 2011’S MOST INFECTIOUS EXTREME METAL SONGS: PART 11

 MOST INFECTIOUS SONGS-2011  4 Responses »
Jan 052012
 

This is Part 11 of our list of the most infectious extreme metal songs released this year. Each day until the list is finished, I’m posting two songs that made the cut. For more details about what this list is all about and how it was compiled, read the Introduction via this link. To see the selections that preceded this one, click the Category link on the right side of the page called MOST INFECTIOUS SONGS-2011.

In yesterday’s Part 10 of this list, we veered off our usual, heavily beaten path with two slow, doomy songs that were as beautiful as they were dark and featured almost entirely clean singing. Today, we’re back on path — straight down the fuckin’ middle of it. This installment of the series could be called the “rip hell” edition, because that’s what both songs do — they’ll rip the bloody hell out of your head, leaving a spurting neck stump — and a smile on what remains of your face.

DEIVOS

The 2011 Unique Leader release by this Polish band only made one of the many year-end album lists we’ve posted over the last month — the one from Johan Huldtgren (Obitus), but there would have been a second appearance if I hadn’t been too lazy to create one of my own, because it made a lasting impression. To borrow from my review of Demiurge of the Void in October:

“The music — all of it — is a jet stream of head-whipping fury. . . . [T]he pattern consists of this: Brutally fast, razor-sharp, blood-spattering riffage, blasting with the heat of an acetylene torch, segmented into massive slamming beats that deliver a physical jolt. Tempos that unpredictably stagger a step forward or a step back or just plain stomp on your neck, just to prevent you from getting too comfortable. Drums that follow a near-inhuman pace, a percussive holocaust designed to provoke a non-stop adrenaline rush. Diseased guitar solos that either moan sickeningly in the background of the aural torrent or slither forward out of the chaos, like a serpentine creature trying to escape the maelstrom. Bestial barking vocals that well up from a deep, dark place.” Continue reading »

PTAHIL: “FOR HIS SATANIC MAJESTY’S GLORY”

 Album Reviews  8 Responses »
Jan 052012
 

Get an eyeball-full of that album cover, would you? Purple, red, and yellow: colors that are just meant to go together, even if they don’t teach that combo at interior design school. Cloaked acolytes standing before a great, cloaked, faceless being, and a monstrous firepit blazing with white heat, and the roasting flesh of the disobedient filling the nostrils of the faithful with a sickly sweet aroma. Or maybe it’s just hot dogs. It’s hard to see into that firepit.

I missed this album when it had its North American release in November. It’s about to be discharged in Europe, on January 16, by Wraith Productions. DECIBEL magazine’s on-line site started streaming the album in full yesterday (here), which is what caught my eye, and then my ears.

Try this on for size: echoing vocals dipped in lye and then scalded in the smoking blood of a battlefield; fuzzed-out sludgy riffs and rough solo’s that hit you down in your gut and make you want to hit back; punk and rock and doom rhythms that are as catchy as a new strain of STD; ingenious production that’s somehow both sharp-edged and full of DIY distortion; and lyrics that conjure satanic rituals full of bile and venom.

That’s the sound of Ptahil on their debut album, For His Satanic Majesty’s Glory. No fucking around, no pretense, the kind of black metal that’s usually hot instead of cold, the kind that makes mean drunks want to inflict pain in the mosh pit, rock ‘n’ roll for the utterly damned, stoner metal for the corpse-paint set. Continue reading »

FUN WITH CONDOMS AND A POWER DRILL. ALSO, BROKEN GLASS AND A BED OF NAILS.

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  8 Responses »
Jan 052012
 

I think the first time I listened to Sweden’s Avatar was after Andy Synn reviewed a show they played in Oslo as support for Dark Tranquillity (here). I only listened to a couple of songs, but based on what I heard, I thought Andy summed up the music pretty well in his show review:  “a strange mix between Judas Priest-esque trad metal, Sentenced-style melancholy, and the upbeat folkery (?) of latter day Amorphis.”

Today’s press releases in the NCS in-box brought the news that Avatar has been signed by eOne Music for the North American distribution of their next album, Black Waltz, which will be released on February 14 in the U.S. There’s also a brand new music video for the album’s title track. And yes indeed, it’s interesting to watch.

It was professionally filmed at night in what’s billed as Sweden’s largest amusement park, and although it’s sort of fun watching Avatar’s face-painted front man spinning gleefully in a brilliantly lit carnival ride, it’s Hellzapoppin who steal the show. They’re a long-running group of performers who model themselves as a circus side-show act, and they contribute a variety of eye-catching stunts to the video.

As for the song itself, the title is a big clue. It is indeed a kind of metal waltz, a blending of melodic death metal and the cadences of the classical dance and a bunch of other shit thrown in the mix, too. My first reaction was that it was a bit too weird, a bit too schizophrenic, a bit too cheesy for my tastes. But then I noticed that the damned melody had gotten stuck in my head and I found myself listening to the song again. I may have to give this album a chance when it arrives. Check out the video after the jump. Continue reading »

COME INSIDE “THE CATHEDRAL WALLS”: SWALLOW THE SUN’S NEW VIDEO

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  2 Responses »
Jan 052012
 

Swallow the Sun blend melodic doom and death about as well as it can be done. We’ve been eagerly awaiting their new album, Emerald Forest and the Blackbird, which is due for release on February 13 by Spinefarm. We already posted a preview of what the album holds in store at this location. And now, we have a first taste of the music.

Today, Terrorizer premiered an official video for the song “Cathedral Walls”, which features the vocals of Anette Olzon (Nightwish) in the chorus.

The first half of this nearly 7-minute song is all melancholy, the sorrow of bereavement, all clean vocals from Mikko Kotamäki and Olzon. Pretty and atmospheric. And then as the ashes fall to the ocean, the shit gets heavy, and it’s the heavy side of StS that I wait for in their songs. It’s usually worth the wait, and I’ve even come to enjoy the build-ups and the denouements.

No big surprises here — it’s Swallow the Sun doing what they do — but it’s a satisfying introduction to the new album. Watch and listen after the jump. Continue reading »

AN NCS INTERVIEW: VEKTOR’S DAVID DISANTO

 Interviews  3 Responses »
Jan 052012
 

(Want to know where Vektor’s unique sound comes from?  Want to know which sci-fi works figure importantly in Vektor’s creative process?  Want to know about a major geographic relocation for this band? Then read BadWolf’s interview of the band’s main man David DiSanto.)

BW: Let’s start easy: For anyone who has not heard it yet, describe “Outer Isolation” in your own words, for us.

V: “Outer Isolation” is a sci-fi, progressive, technical, thrash odyssey through realms of thought and space. It’s a high speed, aggressive journey that goes into the uncharted depths of the beyond. It’s a personal story of thoughts and philosophies that I experienced during the writing process. It’s not really a concept album, but there are a lot of similar ideas that coincide like delving into philosophies of the mind and self-exploration. The music is based around technical thrash metal, but with an emphasis on taking the genre into new territories. The production sounds new and fresh without being over-produced, which we think is important. We’re all really happy with how it turned out. It has a great feel of being extremely fast and aggressive, while maintaining precision and clarity. It’s a little difficult to describe in words because it’s pretty different from most other albums.

BW: Writing Vektor music can’t be easy—can you describe the writing process?

V:  Well, it’s pretty time consuming. Sometimes songs come together in just a couple weeks while others may take several months. There’s not a formula or anything that I follow when the songs are constructed. Up until now, I’ve been the one who writes all the songs. They’re all just creations from some abstract realm of thought that my brain exists in, haha. All of the songs are very riff-oriented, and that’s how they start. I just play guitar for hours or days until I think up a cool riff and the song takes off from there. I think about what the riffs sound like, usually something strange or space related, and try to build a sonic atmosphere to whatever visions are conjured up in my head when I play them. It’s basically a lot of one on one time with my guitar and my thoughts. After I come up with a general song structure, I show it to the other dudes in the band and they all incorporate their ideas and playing styles to form the Vektor sound. I usually write the lyrics after the music, but it all depends on what type of inspiration is striking at the moment. Continue reading »

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