ANOTHER NCS EXCLUSIVE PREMIERE: THE LYRIC VIDEO FOR “TRANSITION” BY SIGHT OF EMPTINESS

 Premieres  1 Response »
Jan 182012
 

Lyric videos for metal songs seem to be increasing in popularity, but many of them are disappointing. They often consist of nothing more than images of an album cover or the band, with the words scrolling or fading in and out. And many times you’re better off not knowing the words. Lyrics aren’t critical to the kind of metal we listen to at NCS, because you usually can’t understand what the vocalist is singing, and they often turn out to be a forgettable distraction from the music — or worse — when you see them in print while listening.

Well, the brand new lyric video for the song “Transition” by Costa Rica’s Sight of Emptiness turns out to be a different breed of cat. This is a video well worth seeing, and we’re proud to give it an exclusive premiere.

You should already be familiar with the song — we premiered it here at NO CLEAN SINGING one week ago, and it’s damned cool. The lyric video now enhances the listening experience, creatively interpreting the lyrics through an intriguing (and ominous) animation that ends with the unfolding of the cover art for the “Transition” single, which you can see above.

The eye-catching animation was created by Andrés Montero Conde at B2crea (http://www.b2crea.com/), and it’s a kick to watch. The lyrics themselves tell the story of a rebirth, a transition and transformation of a being . . . but there’s a dark undercurrent to this story. Watch it after the jump (we recommend you take this to full-screen mode if you’re viewing it on a computer). Also after the jump, some exciting recent news about Sight of Emptiness. Continue reading »

AN NCS-SPONSORED KING GIANT CONTEST

 Metal News  20 Responses »
Jan 182012
 

The January 21 official release date for Dismal Hollow, the new album by Virginia’s King Giant is fast-approaching, and we’re teaming up with the band to bring one lucky NCS reader a special prize package: either a CD or the color-vinyl LP of Dismal Hollow (whichever the winner chooses), signed by the band — plus any one of the band shirts to be found at their Big Cartel site as long as the winner’s size is available (and if not, winner’s choice of one of the hats).

We’re thrilled to help promote interest in Dismal Hollow, because this album is so damn good that it knocked us flat — stretched out on the ground, eyes rolled back in our heads, and drool coming out our mouths. To quote BadWolf’s review (posted here), “prepare yourselves for the first excellent album of 2012, a slow cruise through doom country.”

And to quote myself from yesterday’s post on the excellent video for “Appomattox”: “It’s simply one of the new year’s first great albums — a dark, raw, smoke-filled crusher of Southern doom that rocks hard and is also one of the heaviest beasts you’ll hear in 2012. Massive, hook-filled riffs link up with thundering rhythms, head-spinning guitar solo’s, and Dave Hammerly’s incredible vocals to produce one memorable song after another.”

So what do you have to do to put yourself in the running for this prize? Find out after the jump . . . Continue reading »

KING GIANT: “DISMAL HOLLOW”

 Album Reviews  8 Responses »
Jan 182012
 

(In this post, BadWolf reviews the remarkable new album by Virginia’s King Giant.)

Human beings cannot make music in a vacuum. The land under our feet and histories written by our ancestors, even our neighbors’ ancestors, colors our lives in the present. That may seem elementary, but it’s essential to being a conscientious person … not to mention understanding King Giant’s 2012 album, Dismal Hollow. The Pimmit Hills, VA, quintet infuses their brand of stoner metal with the past, and the experience of being a small-town American in a part of the union that lost the American Civil War. In other worst, this is not merely heavy metal, it is haunted metal.

(more after the jump . . .)

Continue reading »

TAAKE NOMINATED FOR SPELLEMANN AWARDS (2012)

 Metal News  19 Responses »
Jan 182012
 

(NCS contributor Rev. Will provides a retrospective on some recent news from Norway.)

Ah, Norway. The land of salmon and black metal. It’s every metal-loving fisherman’s dream destination.

However, it is also home to some of the world’s most extreme black metal bands. Taake, a Norwegian black metal band that recently gained notoriety for anti-Islamic sentiments expressed in their song lyrics, had been nominated for Norway’s top metal prize, the prestigious Spellemann award in the “Metal” category.

This is the equivalent of the American Grammys, except the American Grammys don’t nominate black metal bands in any category. It’s a surprise (or perhaps more of a shock) to many that the essentially one-man black metal project was one of five nominees competing for the award last week (the other four being Insense, Shining, Vreid, and Årabrot; with Årabrot coming in victorious), because one of Taake‘s songs on Noregs Vaapen declares: “To hell with Muhammad and the Muhammadans!” Continue reading »

EYE-CATCHERS: MESHUGGAH (again) and LUMINOKAYA

 Eye-Catchers  15 Responses »
Jan 172012
 

Huh.  It appears I jumped the gun earlier today when I posted what I thought was the album art for Meshuggah’s new album, Koloss. If I had just waited, I would have seen THIS.

According to a press release I received, it’s going to be in 3-D, and its name is “Gateman”.  It was developed by Luminokaya Lab — over a period of nine months. Luminokaya Lab appears to be the alter ego of a Russian graphic artist named Keerych Luminokaya. I found a lot more of his work, some of which you can see after the jump. “Eye-catching” is probably too mild a word for it. “Eye-popping” perhaps. Or “Eye-exploding”.

What I posted today as the Koloss album art turns out to be only a part of a bigger piece of work. I think I like the larger concept even more. But do yourself a favor, and see more of Luminokaya’s work after the jump, and much more can be found via that Luminokaya Lab link up above. This may be the first metal album cover he’s done, but I have a feeling it won’t be the last. Continue reading »

SPAWN OF POSSESSION DEBUTS THE FIRST SONG FROM “INCURSO”

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  18 Responses »
Jan 172012
 

Fans of technical death metal had a lot to be happy about in 2011, with new releases by the likes of Decapitated, Origin, and Krisiun. This year shows promise, too, with a new Psycroptic on the horizon (I’m not mentioning Necrophagist for fear of jinxing that possibility). But most die-hard tech death freaks I know are perhaps most excited about the March 13 Relapse release of the third album by multinational heavyweights Spawn of Possession.

It’s been a long wait since Noctambulant dropped in 2006, but the wait is nearly over. So far, we’ve seen the eye-catching Par Olofsson artwork for the album cover. We’ve seen the track list. And now, we’ve got the first song from the album.

It’s called “Where Angels Go Demons Follow”. It’s an auspicious introduction to the new album. It’s right after the jump. Continue reading »

SOLSTAFIR: THE “FJARA” VIDEO

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  4 Responses »
Jan 172012
 


Solstafir’s “Fjara”:  One of the most beautiful, most memorable, most emotionally piercing songs I heard during 2011. Not “extreme” enough in its sound for me to include on our MOST INFECTIOUS SONG list, but I gave it an “honorable mention”. I should have put it on the fucking list anyway.

Today, Metal Hammer premiered the official video for “Fjara”. It suits the song: scenes of the dramatic Icelandic landscape; water falling, surging, receding; a beautiful woman dragging a coffin, the symbol of a loss she cannot escape (shades of Gojira’s “Vacuity” video); the hulk of a dead U.S. bomber; ghosts and spirits . . .

It’s beautifully made, like the song. Watch it after the jump. Continue reading »

STRUCTURES: “DIVIDED BY”

 Album Reviews  No Responses »
Jan 172012
 

(In this post, TheMadIsraeli provides a succinct review of the debut album on the Sumerian label from Toronto’s Structures.)

This won’t be a long review because it really doesn’t need to be.  I think this band’s music alone should be selling them.

Structures is the band that’s redeeming deathcore and, dare I say, potentially keeping it alive.  YES, there have been all too many discussions about the awful production on this album — the excessive clipping, the lack of dynamic range, the excessive fuzz when a heavy impact of bass comes in — and yet I FIND MYSELF DIGGING IT for how shitty it sounds.  It actually fits this band’s sound.

And what IS this band’s sound exactly?  I honestly don’t fucking know how to describe it, but of course I’ll try:  They employ every single element and aspect of the deathcore and djeathcore styles ever used, combined with plenty of old-school hardcore moments and a SHITTON of tempo and time signature changes.  Not only is the music technically and compositionally sound, but it’s massive as fuck.  This IS the most brutalizing deathcore I’ve ever heard in my life, and Structures delivers it without having to be over-the-top or relying on excessive posturing.  This shit rules.

Yeah.  That’s my review.  Enjoy the music after the jump.   Continue reading »

EYE-CATCHERS: MESHUGGAH AND ENTHRONED

 Eye-Catchers  8 Responses »
Jan 172012
 

Yesterday, Meshuggah released the name of their new album — Koloss. That’s all the Meshuggah news we had, but we wrote about it anyway, explaining: “It’s really not much news, but frankly this is one of those albums where every tiny morsel will receive and deserve attention.” Today, we have more Meshuggah morsels. First, we have the album art — which is utter coolness. We also now have the track list. I’ve never figured out what good it does to have a track list before the music is released, but here it is:

01. I Am Colossus
02. The Demon’s Name Is Surveillance
03. Do Not Look Down
04. Behind The Sun
05. The Hurt That Finds You First
06. Marrow
07. Break Those Bones Whose Sinews Gave It Motion
08. Swarm
09. Demiurge
10. The Last Vigil

So, chew on that shit until we have the next morselage. And meanwhile, you can feast your eyes on another eye-catching piece of album art for another album we’re highly anticipating around here — the new one from Belgian black metal band Enthroned (after the jump). Continue reading »

MORE MOVING PICTURES! (KING GIANT, CIPHER SYSTEM, and THE DILLINGER ESCAPE PLAN)

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  3 Responses »
Jan 172012
 

We started yesterday with three videos and we’re starting today with three more. Two of today’s offerings are official videos that were released yesterday by King Giant and Cipher System and the third is a Capital Chaos live performance by The Dillinger Escape Plan. All of these bands know how to bring the metal, albeit in very different ways.

KING GIANT

On January 21, Northern Virginia’s King Giant will have the CD release show for their new album Dismal Hollow. We’ve heard it, and BadWolf’s review will be up here soon. But in short, it’s simply one of the new year’s first great albums — a dark, raw, smoke-filled crusher of Southern doom that rocks hard and is also one of the heaviest beasts you’ll hear in 2012. Massive, hook-filled riffs link up with thundering rhythms, head-spinning guitar solo’s, and Dave Hammerly’s incredible vocals to produce one memorable song after another.

We first stumbled across King Giant in September 2010 because of the ass-kicking video for a song called “13 to 1” off their 2009 album Southern Darkness, and wrote about that here. A few months later, they released a performance video for another Southern Darkness song called “Solace” — and we had to write about that one, too. Yesterday, the band released the first video for Dismal Hollow. It was produced and directed by Kevin Barker (who also made those previous KG videos) and funded by the band and their fans through Kickstarter (I’m proud to have chipped in for that project myself). It’s fuckin’ great. Continue reading »

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