AN NCS PREMIERE: SCHAVOT — “WAART OE!”

 Premieres  No Responses »
Sep 052023
 

On October 13th the Zwaertgevegt label will release an album-length split that assembles the music of four connected Dutch black metal bands: Schavot, Asgrauw, Hellevaeder, and Duindwaler. The title of the split is Verloren Vertellingen (“Lost Tales”), so-named because each of the eight tracks is a musical interpretation of folk tales from the rich history of the Netherlands.

Despite the thematic focus of each band’s recordings for this split, and the connections among members, the bands definitely do not all sound alike, which is one of the factors that makes the split so compelling. What we have for you today is one of the two songs on the split by Schavot. Continue reading »

THINGS YOU MAY HAVE MISSED (BUT SHOULDN’T)

 Album Reviews  No Responses »
Sep 052023
 

(Andy Synn recommends four more albums from last month that he doesn’t want you to miss)

As has been well established by now, if it comes down to a choice between covering bigger names or lesser-known bands… we’ll almost always plump for the latter.

Sure, it decreases our potential reach a little, but it also increases the impact of what we do – one more positive review in a sea of hyperbole isn’t exactly going to “move the needle”, but a bit of praise (usually mixed with a bit of constructive criticism) from us can do wonders for a band with more limited exposure.

In that vein, then, today we’ve got some punky, d-beat loving Thrash (Colony Drop), some terrific “true” Black Metal (Cvinger), a genre-bending riff-odyssey (Hekser) and a shamelessly OTT slab of symphonic extremity (Sanguine Glacialis), all of which you may have overlooked during what was an extremely busy August.

Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: AGLO — “LAST RITES”

 Premieres  2 Responses »
Sep 052023
 

Imagine a Venn diagram. In one circle are fans of Star Trek: Voyager. In the other are fans of crushing, crawling, and careening sludge and death metal. In the intersection is where you’ll find the Australian band AGLO and its debut album Build Fear.

How big is the intersection? Who can say? Granted, it’s unlikely that AGLO will be invited to play a Voyager con, but it’s wonderful to imagine the stunned looks that would produce. Most people there would run for the exits in horror. Some would stay ’til the bitter end, either relishing the experience or too scared to move, and the size of the intersection would expand.

Yes it’s true that AGLO‘s new album, which will be released by Brilliant Emperor Records on November 10th, is entirely based on storylines from Star Trek: Voyager episodes. It’s also true that if you’re a fan of such bands as Crowbar, Incantation, Eyehategod, and Morbid Angel, you’ll find yourself rooted in place ’til the album’s bitter end, whether you care about Voyager or not. Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: SHORES OF NULL — “DARKNESS WON’T TAKE ME”

 Premieres  2 Responses »
Sep 042023
 

In March of this year, with the assistance of Spikerot Records, the Roman band Shores of Null released their newest album The Loss of Beauty, and it has quickly drawn widespread admiration (including at our site) for its compelling renderings of melancholy and tormented moods, and earned its recommendations for fans of Amorphis, Enslaved, and Paradise Lost.

We are fortunate, however, that Shores of Null seem just as devoted to the creation of captivating videos as they are captivating music, and they are fortunate to have done this through a very successful collaboration with director Martina L. McLean and the filmmakers at Sanda Movies.

Shores of Null have already released four accomplished videos for songs from The Loss of Beauty, and we’ve assembled all of them at the end of this article. But the principal focus today is a fifth video, this one for the song “Darkness Won’t Take Me“. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: THIRD STORM — “THE CLANDESTINE GOSPEL”

 Premieres  1 Response »
Sep 042023
 

Five years after the release of their debut album The Grand Manifestation, the Swedish black metal band Third Storm are returning with a new full-length named The Locust Mantra, which is set for release on October 6th by Chaos Records. But a glance at Metal Archives reveals that the band’s roots are far older than the timing of that debut album or even Dark Descent‘s 2015 release of their first EP might suggest.

In fact, Third Storm was first formed in 1986, when the four original members were only in the age range of 14-16. They recorded a couple of primitive, thrashy demos, played about a dozen shows, and then threw in the towel in 1988.

Yet obviously something re-kindled the Third Storm spirit a quarter-century later, when original vocalist Heval Bozarslan re-started the band, joined by guitarist David Eriksson and eventually by guitarist Hasse Hansson, and now they show no signs of stopping again. Indeed, this new album is the second installment in a planned trilogy that began with The Grand Manifestation. Continue reading »

SHADES OF BLACK: SÜHNOPFER, TAUBRA, SLIDHR, BIAŁYWILK, FLUISTERAARS, RAAT

 Album Reviews, SHADES OF BLACK, SHORT BUT SWEET  3 Responses »
Sep 032023
 

Here in the U.S. we’re in the middle of a holiday that sprawls over the weekend and through Monday. Because of the nature of the celebration (Labor Day), not working is an even more central part of the holiday than it is for others. The event is also generally regarded here as marking “the end of the summer” (for reasons that have nothing to do with weather forecasting).

Probably more so on this holiday weekend than any other, I feel the urge to fuck off. Although I did sleep long and late overnight, you can see that the old NCS tradition of observing no weekends or holidays still won out today, as it will tomorrow (two Monday posts are already scheduled, and there might be a third).

The first three selections below were already on my list of things to check out in preparation for this column, but links to all three also arrived in one fell swoop yesterday from my internet friend Miloš, which eased the always-difficult process of choosing.

After those, I’ve gone off in other directions. The combined volume of the music here should give you lots of ways to fill your holiday time. If there’s one word I think applies equally to all of it, that word is “breathtaking”. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD ON A SATURDAY: GRAVESEND, TETRAGRAMMACIDE, DEN SAAKALDTE, KAUNIS KUOLEMATON, :UGN:

 Exceptions to the Rule, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  4 Responses »
Sep 022023
 


Gravesend

A week that ends with a Bandcamp Friday is a terrible week for the NCS in-box. During just the 24 hours of September 1st we received 310 e-mails. The count for the week was significantly more than 1,000.

Such weeks are also terrible for roundups like this one, because so many bands and labels release new music in an effort to capitalize on the attention that Bandcamp Fridays tend to attract — terrible because it results in so much music to choose from.

I sure as hell didn’t read all those 1,000+ e-mails. I did skim the subject lines, skipping over the ones that seemed geared toward selling merch and others that arrived because (annoyingly) we’re somehow on mailing lists for music that has nothing to do with metal, and others which hinted that the metal was of the kind that would hurt my head if I listened to it (e.g., power metal). And eventually I just ran out of time, so I’m sure I overlooked some things that might have been gem-like if I’d discovered them.

But the skimming process still left me with a giant pile of new music I thought might be interesting, and on top of that were other sources of recommendations outside of our e-mails that I pay attention to. Nothing more than instinct and impulse led to finding the following needles in that haystack. Continue reading »

GONZO’S END-OF-SUMMER MEGA-ROUNDUP

 Album Reviews  8 Responses »
Sep 012023
 


Radiant Knife

(NCS contributor Gonzo rejoins us with a selection of seven albums he’s been greatly enjoying over the summer that’s now drawing to a close.)

Summer has a habit of hitting me harder and faster than an Archspire blast beat, so with that in mind, I’ve developed a tradition of compiling my usual monthly columns into one bigger-than-usual compendium at the end of August.

There was plenty to sift through over the past three months – along with some other shit that was released before then that somehow flew under my radar. Let’s dig in.

Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: LACRAU — “QUEDA”

 Premieres  No Responses »
Sep 012023
 

On September 22nd the Monumental Rex label will release an album named Axioma, which is the debut recording of the Portuguese band Lacrau, whose lineup includes members of Carma and Everto Signum.

The album is a conceptual work crafted from elements of Depressive, Black, and Doom Metal that grapples with the burdens of aging, and it was inspired by the legendary Scandinavian ritual of senicide. As the band explain: “It is told that the practice consisted in elderly people throwing themselves, or being thrown, from precipices after becoming unable to take care of themselves or perform everyday tasks”.

Written in Portuguese, the lyrical narrative of Axioma describes the ritual from different angles: “the realization of the burden, the journey to the cliff, the induced feelings and the acceptance of the fate.”

In July we premiered the song “DECLINIO“, and on this Bandcamp Friday we follow that with another track premiere from the album. This one is called “QUEDA“. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: VACUO — “TO THE PUTREFYING CHANTS”

 Premieres  No Responses »
Sep 012023
 

Florence is one of the many jewels of Italy, a Tuscan city renowned for its art, architecture, and rich cultural history. But like all of the world’s great cities it has also been the setting for terrible events.

In areas near the city, for example, a serial killer known as The Monster of Florence murdered 14 victims (mutilating many of them) over the course of a decade or more in the 1970s’ and ’80s, and we’re told that it is in the area of those infamous events where Vacuo was born.

This solo project draws inspiration not from the beauty of Florence but from abyssal and abismal visions, and creates frightening audio renderings of them from ingredients of lo-fi black metal, abraded dungeon synth, noise, and freakish electronics.

Vacuo‘s debut, the work of sole member A., takes the form of an experimental EP named To Languish and Despair, which will be released by the Italian label Xenoglossy Productions on September 29th, and today we’re introducing you to its chilling fascinations through our premiere of the EP’s opening track, “To the Putrefying Chants“. Continue reading »

 Older Entries  Newer Entries