NO CLEAN SINGING

AN NCS INTERVIEW: TITANIA

Jun 252024

(Today we present Comrade Aleks‘ interview of Tania Duarte, vocalist of the Peruvian heavy doom band Titania, whose debut album The Maverick was released on CD this past spring.)

Most die-hard doom metal fans will name two bands if we ask about Peruvian doom metal: Reino Ermitaño and Kranium. The first one was a traditional doom band with a lady on vocals, and the second one is a band with a huge history and only two albums in their discography.

Kranium (founded in 1986) released their second album Uma Tullu in 2020, so it’s okay, we know that they’re more or less active. But Reino Ermitaño… they haven’t released anything since 2014, and it seems that the band is no more.

Honestly, I almost missed it, but two years ago both bands gave birth to Titania, a traditional doom band that includes members from Kranium and Reino Ermitaño: Mito Espíritu (bass), Eloy Arturo (guitars), Tania Duarte (vocals), and Manuel Lozano (drums). Their first album The Maverick was released in late 2022, but the CD-edition was released only in 2023.

Tania Duarte gladly accepted our request and answered about the band’s current occupation. Continue reading »

KÓLGA: “BLACK TIDES”

Album Reviews No Responses »

Jun 242024

(Vizzah Harri wrote what follows below. It’s best that we not spoil it by attempting any further introductory words.)

Nearly 3 months have passed since Black Tides has been released. So many things in life are timebound; news, they say, needs to be relevant, timely and fresh. Nothing refreshes more than a jump into the ocean, or smelling the salty morning breeze, I mean, 3am is morning, right?

If you don’t mind, we’re going to take a trip back in time, because that’s exactly what Kólga’s sound implores us to do. And like the evening news after an emergency, it’s best to wait until the stylus revolts unto the dead wax. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: PNEUMA HAGION — “HARBINGER OF DISSOLUTION”

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Jun 242024

The Texas duo Pneuma Hagion made an inspired choice of artwork for the cover of their forthcoming third album, From Beyond: It is William Blake’s 1795 drawing The House of Death, which was inspired by lines from Book XI of John Milton’s Paradise Lost, in which the archangel Michael reveals to Adam in terrible detail the doomed fate of humans — a description of a “Lazar-house” filled with afflicted people suffering in their agonies, “and over them triumphant Death his Dart Shook….”

Pneuma Hagion‘s new album, which is set for release on August 30th by Everlasting Spew Records, conjures terrible images of its own:

“From Beyond explores Lovecraftian ideas of horrifying extra-dimensional entities forcing their way into the causal universe by infecting the minds of humans.

“Each song is from the perspective of some malevolent entity of unfathomable nature trying to influence the world of mortals and trying to infiltrate our universe in order to cause its ultimate destruction.” Continue reading »

ƁLÓÐ – MARA

Album Reviews No Responses »

Jun 242024

(Andy Synn finds himself haunted by the new album from France’s Blóð)

Let me start by saying that if I hadn’t already decided who I was going to feature for this month’s edition of The Synn Report (which will likely be published at the start of next week) then I very much would have liked to have done a deep-dive into the discography of doomy, devilishly blackened Sludge/Post-Metal duo Blóð.

But since I’m not going to have time/space to fully delve into the depths of their back catalogue here (though you should definitely do so when you get chance) we’ll just have to be satisfied with heaping praise on their recently-released third album, Mara.

AN NCS INTERVIEW: NEUROPOLIS

Interviews 1 Response »

Jun 212024

(Here we have Comrade Aleks‘ extensive interview with vocalist Vladimir Alekseev from the Russian doom/death metal band Neuropolis, who released their debut album in February of this year.)

The St. Petersburg death-doom band Neuropolis was founded in 2016 and had two very solid EPs in their discography – Temptation / Искушение (2019) and Golem (2020) plus a reputation honestly earned through live performances and, in general, thanks to an active position on social networks. But what we have now is this: The Neuropolis lineup has been radically updated after 2021, with vocalist Vladimir Alekseev as the only member who has remained in the group after those previous sessions.

However, these changes seem to have given Neuropolis an impetus in a new direction, and, having released the full-length album All Nothing / Всё ничего, these St. Petersburg doom-heads have not given up weekly rehearsals and are already recording new material. So doom metal is not only about inertia. And an interview with Vladimir will serve as proof of this assumption. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): REPLACIRE — “THE CENTER THAT CANNOT HOLD”

Album Reviews, Premieres 2 Responses »

Jun 202024

Behind every album there is a tale — of course there is. Sometimes the tales are mundane, but in the case of Replacire‘s new album The Center That Cannot Hold, the story brings to mind the travails of Sisyphus, that benighted figure from Greek myth whom the gods punished for cheating death by forcing him to roll an immense boulder up a hill, only for it to roll back down every time it neared the top.

In legend, the fate of Sisyphus is one of eternal toil. but fortunately Replacire did eventually manage to reach the summit and stay there, not only completing this new album but also achieving a new summit in their music.

We’ll give you an excerpt of information about why the completion of the album turned out to be such a struggle, but our main mission today is to present a full stream of the album on the eve before its June 21 release by Season of Mist. Continue reading »

ASCENSION FESTIVAL ICELAND: AN INTERVIEW WITH STEPHEN LOCKHART

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Jun 202024

(Our editor-in-chief Islander is responsible for conducting the following interview, and the introduction that precedes it.)

The fourth edition of the Ascension metal festival will take place in Iceland on July 3rd – 6th, 2024, with a four-day lineup consisting of 30 bands. As the festival accurately says, it “prides itself on offering an eclectic, esoteric and wholly unique experience,” placing “a strong emphasis on Icelandic and international Black metal, along with alternative and experimental acts.”

The festival is produced by Studio Emissary, an Icelandic recording, mixing, and mastering studio that has played a pivotal role in the birth and expansion of Icelandic black metal (but has also worked with the likes of the Iceland Symphony Orchestra and Björk’s Biophilia), and by Studio Emissary‘s sister company, the Oration record label.

Ascension is the spiritual successor to the Oration festival, which ran for three years in Iceland. I attended the last of the Oration festivals in Reykjavík, and I’ve made it to two of the three Ascension festivals that have happened so far, including the 2019 edition that was hosted in the charming Reykjavík suburb of Mosfellbær, which will be the site of Ascension again this year — and I’m very excited to say that I’ll be at this year’s Ascension too.

The man behind Ascension, Studio Emissary, and Oration is Stephen Lockhart (he’s also the person behind Rebirth of Nefast, and a past participant in other Icelandic music groups). In an effort to help support Ascension, which in my festival-going experience really is unique, and to satisfy my own curiosity about a few things, I reached out to Stephen for an interview, and he graciously agreed to answer some questions. Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: CEREMONY OF SILENCE — “PRIMAEVAL SACRIFICE”

Premieres 1 Response »

Jun 192024

On July 19th Willowtip Records will release Hálios, the second album from the Slovakian death/black metal band Ceremony of Silence. The label’s introduction of it is very intriguing:

Hálios represents the unborn luminous radiance, the all-pervading immutable light of the Universe, and our fundamental inherent nature. It is the thousand-rayed Sun, always in motion, but unchangeable, the axis mundi manifesting the sacred within our temporal world and serving as a bridge to the mythical time. The album sets forth on an eerie journey to this sacred dimension, reenacting the old stories inspired by the essence of the ancient Indo-European mythology, entwined in the obscure visions and dreams.

This introduction suggests that the music will be even deeper in its development of profound, soul-stirring atmosphere than this band’s first full-length, 2019’s Oútis (reviewed here), and that is indeed true. But it’s also true that Ceremony of Silence are still capable (indeed more so) of mounting head-spinning shock-and-awe assaults on the senses. Both the first single from the album and a second one we’re premiering today with a lyric video are proof of all that. Continue reading »

AN NCS EP PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): ADELON — “RESURGENCE”

Album Reviews, Premieres, SHORT BUT SWEET 1 Response »

Jun 192024

Metaphorically speaking, most metal bands have a core stylistic foundation around which they might then add other embellishments — or not. To switch up the metaphor, they might have a fundamental DNA, then spliced with other genetic strands to create a hybrid of sound — or not.

In the case of the Swiss band Adelon, whose four-song debut EP Resurgence we’re premiering today in advance of its June 21 release, they point to the strong influence on their music of Gojira and Decapitated, suggesting that their own foundations are themselves a multi-faceted structure of death-metal groove and technicality, even before they add additional embellishments and hybridized strands (which indeed they do, in abundance).

By the time all the hybridizing is in place, it becomes considerably more difficult to separate foundation from everything else that goes into the final edifice, which is in fact much less of an edifice than a constantly morphing dreamscape, in which prog-metal and even elements of jazz play significant roles, along with all the obliterating grooves and the tech-death fireworks. Continue reading »

CONSTRUCT OF LETHE – A KINDNESS DEALT IN VENOM

Album Reviews 1 Response »

Jun 192024

(Andy Synn has some kind, and some unkind, words for the new album from Construct of Lethe, out Friday on Transcending Obscurity)

There’s an argument to be made – in fact, I’m going to make it now – that Construct of Lethe‘s second album, 2018’s Exiler, is one of the best Death Metal albums of the last ten (and probably twenty) years.

But, after releasing such a milestone album (one which you might even be tempted to call a “masterpiece”, at least in the original sense of that word) what exactly was the band to do?

And the answer, it turns out, is to throw caution to the wind and construct an ambitiously flawed, yet absolutely fascinating (not to mention utterly ferocious) autobiographical concept album about the devastating doldrums of depression and suicidal ideation, split into 12 “chapters” (not all of which could be called “songs”), that is intended to be experienced as a singular, uninterrupted sequence.

So, without further interruption or delay… let’s dive in.

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