AN NCS PREMIERE: BECULTED — “GEBORGENHEIT”

 Premieres  2 Responses »
Feb 102022
 

 

Beculted began to take shape in 2018 in Darmstadt, Germany, and completed its current line-up in 2019. Pandemic-trapped behind their own individual walls, the band made the recordings in the fall/winter of 2020 that have now been assembled in their debut album Archaic Manifestations. which will be released on April 29th by the Cologne-based label The Crawling Chaos.

What we have for you today is a single from the album named “Geborgenheit“, which reveals in stunning fashion the ways in which the anonymous Beculted quartet have drawn together stylistic ingredients of doom and black metal to present experiences of dismal oppression, violent upheaval, and chilling unearthliness, painting portraits (as the label accurately says) of emptiness and rapture. Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: DAEMONESQ — “ALLURE AND GRANDEUR”

 Premieres  3 Responses »
Feb 102022
 

The name of the song you’re about to hear is “Allure and Grandeur“. The woman who wrote the lyrics and gave them life through her scorching voice has explained its inspiration:

“‘Allure and grandeur’ is a prayer to the goddess of destruction and renewal by a person that struggles with stigmata causing her to withdraw into an inner exile. By means of this prayer she reminds herself of what she believes in, summons her inner strength, and reignites the rage providing the vitality to fight back”.

That description connects to the name of the debut EP by the German black metal band Daemonesq that includes it — The Beauty of Letting Go — and the music powerfully connects as well. Continue reading »

KONTUSION: “KONTUSION”

 Album Reviews  No Responses »
Feb 102022
 

(This is Todd Manning‘s review of the self-titled debut EP of Kontusion, which will be released on March 25th.)

For many, the tidal wave of old school death metal bands that have saturated the scene for the past decade or so has been an embarrassment of riches. My formative musical teeth were cut from ‘89 to ‘95 or so, meaning that I can listen to this stuff all day long. Admittedly, this means that if a band nails this sound, even if they are pretty average, they will easily grab my attention. But when a band is really freakin’ good, rising above the hordes, well then I’m all in. Such is the case with Kontusion, These guys absolutely rip. Continue reading »

CULT OF LUNA – THE LONG ROAD NORTH

 Album Reviews  6 Responses »
Feb 092022
 

(Andy Synn takes a journey with Cult of Luna on The Long Road North, out Friday on Metal Blade)

Like I said in my review of the new Immolation album yesterday, writing about a band with a long and much-loved career comes with several inherent complications.

In the case of Cult of Luna, the band are so beloved by their fanbase that it’s hard to get people to admit that they’re not infallible, as I found out when I suggested that both their last two releases, 2019’s A Dawn to Fear and last year’s The Raging River EP, had some significant (although not insurmountable) flaws.

The thing is, I’ve always tried to be as honest and objective as I can be with all my reviews – while acknowledging, of course, that true objectivity is an impossible goal – which means providing as clear and as complete an impression of the music, its highs and its lows, its good points and its bad points, and it seems to me like it would be doing the band a disservice to treat them any differently than anyone else.

So let me state this clearly – The Long Road North is not a perfect album. Nor is is “the best album of the band’s career”, as I’ve seen it described elsewhere (in some cases seemingly before they’d even heard it). But it is still, for all that it occasionally loses its way, a road well worth taking.

Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): CORRUPTER — “DESCENT INTO MADNESS”

 Album Reviews, Premieres  1 Response »
Feb 092022
 

 

Only hindsight gives us the ability to speculate about why a band or their label chooses one particular song as the first single from a new album. In the case of Corrupter‘s full-length debut Descent Into Madness, that chosen song was “Darkest Light“.

The opening riff of that song, which has a dismal and diseased aura, seizes attention quickly, but no more so than the eruption of thunderous battery, miasma-like riffing, and gory, gargled vocals that follow it. The guitar work has a dense and writhing quality that’s frightening, and even when the drumming slows and Corrupter send off grand but deeply disturbing fanfares of sound it’s enough to put a cold sweat on the back of your neck.

The second time the music explodes in violence, propelled by a crazed solo, might be even more exhilarating than the first time, an experience in ferocity and fear, madness, and malignancy that’s not soon forgotten. Continue reading »

PERSEFONE: “METANOIA”

 Album Reviews  No Responses »
Feb 092022
 

 

(This is DGR‘s review of the new album by the Andorran extreme progressive metal band Persefone, which was released on February 4th by Napalm Records.)

We’ve been following the progressive metal group Persefone for a very long time now. If you’re curious just how long, we dedicated time for both a Synn Report and a review of their album Aathma, which has resulted in us covering nearly everything the band have done up to this point.

There’s been almost a five-year gap between Aathma and the group’s newest release Metanoia, which hit last Friday via Napalm Records, yet it seems as if there’s been no time at all between them; Metanoia picks up right where Aathma let off, which was itself an album that continued walking down the same path that 2013’s Spiritual Migration took. That specific path, in a roundabout way, brings us back to Metanoia. Continue reading »

MASS WORSHIP: “PORTAL TOMBS”

 Album Reviews  No Responses »
Feb 082022
 

(We present Gonzo‘s review of the new album by Sweden’s Mass Worship, which was just released by Century Media.)

If there’s an award somewhere out there for “best music to listen to while using an industrial-strength sandblaster,” then I think the new album Portal Tombs from Stockholm’s Mass Worship would be a top contender. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): HAMMR — “ETERNAL POSSESSION”

 Album Reviews, Premieres  No Responses »
Feb 082022
 

 

I still have burn marks, slash scars, and giddy memories from Hammr‘s first album Unholy Destruction. That was four years ago, long enough to heal the wounds but not long enough to quell the feelings of dizziness and thrill-filled mayhem that come back in thinking about that blast of proto-black metal, hardcore punk, and evil speed metal. And so I got a surge of adrenaline from just thinking about the advent of a new Hammr album, and an even bigger surge in listening to it — which you’ll get a chance to do right now.

Eternal Possession is the name of the new one, and it’s a valid title, foreshadowing both the experience of being overtaken and overwhelmed by it as a listener and the conviction that the person who made it was himself under the throes of diabolical possession, with a take-no-prisoners, give-no-fucks, spirit that shows no signs of surrender, now or ever. Continue reading »

IMMOLATION – ACTS OF GOD

 Album Reviews  5 Responses »
Feb 082022
 

(Andy Synn passes judgement on the new album from Immolation, out Feb 18 on Nuclear Blast)

If there’s one thing we’re known for here at NCS it’s our focus on celebrating and supporting the underdogs.

So when the promo for Acts of God, by up-and-coming New York death-dealers Immolation dropped into our inbox I quickly snatched it up, as I’m all about giving struggling young bands a helping hand.

What’s that?

Eleven albums, you say?

Over thirty years as a band?

Well, that changes everything…

Continue reading »

AN NCS INTERVIEW: SULLEN GUEST

 Interviews  1 Response »
Feb 082022
 

 

(Comrade Aleks has brought us the following great interview with two members of the Lithuanian band Sullen Guest, whose latest album was released in February 2021 and who have a new EP on the near horizon.)

There aren’t many doom metal bands in the Baltic region, and Sullen Guest are one of very few representatives of the genre in Lithuania. I guess you’ll find everything you could imagine about death-doom in any of their releases. It’s all about misery, death, despair, and doom as well.

The band had enough time to grow, and nowadays they are far from the point where they started seven years ago with their first EP Will You Greet the Sullen Guest as an Old Friend? With the new album Chapter III (Metallurg Music, 2021) they turn to be even more bitter and desperate as their musical palette has become more saturated and expressive.

Sullen Guest’s founder Tenebra (guitars) and Inanitas (vocals, guitars), who joined the band in 2019, reveal details of the band’s new EP in this fantastic interview. Continue reading »

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