EYE-CATCHERS: VAULTING, RIGOR MORTIS, AND SWIMMING WITH SHARKS

 Album Reviews, Eye-Catchers  3 Responses »
Sep 252011
 

It’s been a while since we published an installment in this EYE-CATCHERS series. To remind you, the object of this series is to listen to new music based solely on the attractiveness of the album covers — testing the completely irrational hypothesis that cool album art correlates with cool music.

I was inspired to do another one of these posts by an e-mail exchange I had recently with NCS reader Treezplease. He sent me a handful of album-art images and a song to accompany each one, and I dived in. I’m going to include two of those test subjects in this post, and maybe more later. But at about the same time, I also got an e-mail from a German band called Vaulting. I visited their Bandcamp page to listen to something, and right away I saw the album cover up above. So I just had to lead off this post with it, because it truly is a fucking eye-catcher, isn’t it?

VAULTING

Vaulting was founded in 2006 in Wiesbaden, Germany, by two brothers, guitarist Matthias Gathof and drummer Sebastian Gathof. To date, the band have released a 5-song demo in 2007, an 8-song EP in 2008 called Epilog, and a five-track EP in 2009 called Modus Humanis, the cover of which you’re looking at right now. The band are also on the verge of releasing their first full-length album, Nucleus. (more after the jump . . .) Continue reading »

SUNDAY IS FOR EVISCERATION

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  20 Responses »
Sep 252011
 

Long ago, some religions declared the seventh day of the week a day of rest, and in many countries that day became Sunday. Here at NCS, Sunday is a day of evisceration. It’s not really a special day, because every day of the week is a day for evisceration. Because, really, a day without a pile of steaming guts is like a day without sunshine. Am I right? Of course I am.

To begin the eviscerating process, here is Goretrade, from Columbia.

The song: “Dead Man Walking”

The album: Mistaken Conception (July 2010)

http://www.myspace.com/goretrade
http://www.facebook.com/goretrade

(Thanks for the tip Israel.)

FOR THE SAKE OF COMPLETENESS: THE NEW MASTODON AND OPETH VIDEOS

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  7 Responses »
Sep 242011
 


Most of the time I act on impulse and the rest of the time I over-think things. Yesterday or the day before, both Mastodon and Opeth released new music videos for songs from their new albums. I had already posted new videos yesterday from The Devin Townsend Project and Dark Tranquillity, but because Mastodon and Opeth don’t use the initials “DT”, I decided to skip them.

Actually, I decided to skip them because, by the time I found out they had been released, I figured that anyone who cared about those bands had already seen them via some other metal blog or elsewhere. I think that qualifies as over-thinking things. Both videos are good, some people who visit NCS don’t read other metal blogs, and just because I was going to be late to the party doesn’t mean I should ignore the party, so . . . both videos are now viewable the jump.

Mastodon’s is for a song called “Curl of the Burl”. The song is okay, with a nice stoner riff running through it, but it probably isn’t going to join my list of Mastodon favorites. The video is freaky to watch, though. I especially liked the boobs shining as bright as headlights. And if anyone can figure out what that backwoods cretin is snorting in his cabin, please clue me in.

Opeth’s video is for “The Devil’s Orchard” and, like the Mastodon video, it appears to be a drug-induced dream. Some of the psychedelic images are cliched, but the video as a whole is still very well done and fun to watch, and it complements the song quite well. I just wish I liked the song more. Continue reading »

SHORT BUT SWEET: ARTIFICIAL BRAIN

 Album Reviews, SHORT BUT SWEET  7 Responses »
Sep 242011
 

I had an interesting and very fruitful exchange of e-mails yesterday with one of our readers who goes by the name Treezplease. He started off with a handful of recommendations for our really irregular and infrequent EYE-CATCHERS series (in which we pick bands to hear based solely on the quality of the album art). But he threw in a couple of other names, and one of them was this Long Island, NY band — Artificial Brain.

I immediately liked the name, because I have long suspected that my own brain is artificial rather than something you would expect to find in nature. Treezplease threw a song my way — “Spacid” — and I listened to it, and it seemed to send a signal to my own artificial brain that cause a biomechanoid larva to awaken and begin eating its way out through one of my ear canals. Or at least that’s what it felt like. I’m not 100% sure because I passed out. When I came to, I did have a trail of phosphorescent slime running from my ear down my neck and something had burrowed a hole right down through my floor, and I’m afraid it may be headed in your direction.

Later, I discovered that “Spacid” is part of a 3-song demo that Artificial Brain made available for free download on Bandcamp in June of this year. And I saw this note on the Bandcamp page: “Space/Death/Black Metal featuring members of Revocation and Biolich.” Uh, whut da fuck? I don’t know Biolich, but Revocation? Fuck yeah. (more after the jump . . .) Continue reading »

NEW CARNIFEX SONG PUNCHES HOLES THROUGH WALLS; YOUR NEIGHBORS CAN NOW SEE WHAT YOU DO AT NIGHT

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  5 Responses »
Sep 232011
 

We’ve been dribbling out new songs and videos today, and I thought we were through, but we’re not — because I just got a press release about a new lyric video from Carnifex. It’s for a song called “Dead But Dreaming”, which will appear on the band’s next album, Until I Feel Nothing, scheduled for release by Victory Records on October 24. I have a couple of quick reactions, and then I’ll let you go watch and listen to the video.

First, the song is a fucken crusher. Massive, groaning chords set the stage, and then the band rip into high gear with pounding riffs, grisly vocals, artillery-style drumming, and well-placed bass drops. Fans of the band’s deathcore roots will welcome the return of brutal breakdowns, and I enjoyed the juxtaposition of almost dream-like ambience here and there in the song.

Second, the lyrics aren’t half-bad, and certainly an improvement over the misogynistic ranting that filled so many of the band’s earliest songs.

I’m guessing we’re going to get more straight death-metal in the new album, continuing through on the transitions that began on Hell Chose Me, but as deathcore goes, this song proves that Carnifex have still got it.  The vid is right after the jump, along with some Carnifex tour info and a link for album pre-orders. Continue reading »

SEAS OF STONE

 Album Reviews, Eye-Catchers  3 Responses »
Sep 232011
 

(Here’s a brief review from NCS writer TheMadIsraeli . . .)

Just look at this fucking album cover:

It’s got bears fighting on it.  FUCKING BEARS. I suppose you can call this an edition of the NCS EYE CATCHERS series, since I totally downloaded this on merit of the album cover alone. But what exactly could such a mammoth album cover encompass?

Seas Of Stone (from Dresden, Germany) plays dense, humid, mist-engulfed doom/sludge metal that channels the atmosphere of hiking the northern woodlands, and hopefully NOT getting fucked a new one by fucking bears.  The production on this 3-song EP is pretty astounding, channeling the very mood and ambience of the album cover itself.  The instruments are all dense and behemoth in tone, playing sludge that induces a dreading sense of being mobbed.

By fucking bears. (a bit more after the jump . . .) Continue reading »

ANIMALS AS LEADERS: “ISOLATED INCIDENTS”

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  9 Responses »
Sep 232011
 

Today seems to be a day for song and video debuts from bands we like here at NCS. As long as they continue rolling out, we’ll continue putting them up.

The most recent advent comes from those brilliant instrumentalists in Animals As Leaders, whose sophomore album Weightless is coming our way in November via Prosthetic Records. The song that debuted in full today is called “Isolated Incidents”, and it’s a blast to hear.

The song begins with an inventive but almost placid passage, which is hardly preparation for the sledgehammer blows that follow it as the song kicks into high gear. Tosin Abasi is in fine, fine form, mixing a host of different guitar instrumental styles as the song weaves its way through the maze of its progressions, and his compatriots Navene Koperweis and Javier Reyes stay right with him. Coolness. Listen after the jump. Continue reading »

THE DEVIN TOWNSEND PROJECT: THE OFFICIAL VIDEO FOR “JUULAR”

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  11 Responses »
Sep 232011
 

Just minutes ago I received an urgent message from NCS writer TheMadIsraeli, worded as follows:  “Trippy as fuck music video just released for this song.  I don’t even know what I’m watching.” Accompanying the message was a link to the just-released official music video for “Juular”, one of the amazing songs on The Devin Townsend Project’s amazing 2011 album, Deconstruction (reviewed here at NCS).

I thought the new video we featured in our last post — the one for Dark Tranquillity’s “Zero Distance” — was visually interesting to watch. But I’m afraid it has been blown out of the water by this “Juular” video. In fact, this video blows everything out of the water. Words fail me. Watch it after the jump. Continue reading »

DARK TRANQUILLITY: “ZERO DISTANCE” (A NEW SONG AND A NEW VIDEO)

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  14 Responses »
Sep 232011
 

Today, Dark Tranquillity and Century Media posted to YouTube a new official video for a new song called “Zero Distance”. The song will appear on a special tour edition of the We Are the Void album, which was originally released in 2010. The special tour edition will be released in Europe on October 24. Here’s a statement from DT’s Niklas Sundin:

“Zero Distance” was recorded at the same time as the “We Are The Void” album, but due to its different nature we decided to keep it for later use. The time is now right to unveil the song, as well as the other rare/bonus material recorded at the same time, in a massive “We Are The Void” tour edition package. In addition to the added songs and liner notes by Mikael, there’s also a live DVD capturing some special moments during the 150-and-counting gigs in support of the album.”

The music video for “Zero Distance” is the first produced by Aduro Labs (www.adurolabs.se), which is a new film/production enterprise co-founded by DT’s own Niklas Sundin. The video is fun to watch, and the song is . . . well, it’s Dark Tranquillity, but you should just listen to it for yourself. The video is right after the jump, along with a track listing for both the CD and the DVD within the tour edition of We Are the Void. Continue reading »

DEAR TORI AMOS

 IQ Subtraction, Metal News, Phro's Posts  39 Responses »
Sep 232011
 

(Here we have a tender letter from guest contributor Phro to Tori Amos, who seems to have riled up metalheads far and wide with THIS.)

Dear Tori Amos,

Don’t take this the wrong way, but who are you?

I’m guessing you think you’re pretty important… Which maybe you are. But either way I have no idea who you are. Oh! Wait! Are you the little puppy who sang about ironic things in the 90s? …Or was it apples? I’m pretty sure there was a woman singer who sang about stuff. I know you’re not the nice lady who was God. And the Google image search gave me a red head instead of a cute blonde, so you’re not Jewel…well, I’m at a loss.

Anyway, this is a letter for you.  I hope it will justify your sense of importance.  By the way, this might seem like it was written for a five year old, but that’s only so it’s easy to understand for you.

Anyway, apparently you have challenged metal. Which…what…when…where…who?  Who, exactly, do you think that is? Limp Bizkit? I mean I may not know who you are, but I also don’t issue challenges to  random…umm…things, because that’d just be weird. (You know music can’t hear or read, right? I mean, technically, it doesn’t even exist since it’s just sounds waves, but let’s keep this at the five year old level.) Continue reading »

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