AN NCS PREMIERE: ABJECTION — “AN ILLUSION OF SLEEP”

 Premieres  No Responses »
Feb 122021
 

 

We all have experienced the in-between mental states that occur as we descend into sleep and then emerge again into wakefulness, not being fully awake or asleep (the scientific terms for these similar but not identical phases are hypnagogia and hypnopompia). In those phases, it’s not uncommon to experience hallucinations, and sometimes sleep paralysis or lucid dreams. In the song we’re premiering today, “An Illusion of Sleep“, the lyrics suggest that the Canadian death metal band Abjection are exploring the unreal disturbances that can occur in these blurred transitional conditions — and the music itself manifests turmoil and insanity in frightening but electrifying ways.

“An Illusion of Sleep” is the first track to be revealed from the band’s ravaging debut EP, Malignant Deviation. It will be released by Godz ov War Productions on March 25th.

While Abjection is a new formation, its members have proven themselves already in other bands well-known in the underground. It combines the talents of vocalist Cole Benoit (Anion, Dead Again, Origami Swan), guitarist/bassist Sergey Jmourovski (The Weir, Polemos), lead guitarist Troy Horton (Sinews, Wiser Fool), and drummer Josh Bueckert (Wake, Spaewife). Continue reading »

AN NCS INTERVIEW: OMINATION

 Interviews  3 Responses »
Feb 122021
 

 

(With pleasure, we present Comrade Aleks’ extensive interview with Fedor Kovalevsky of the Tunisian extreme metal bands Vielikan and Omination, whose critically acclaimed new album NGR was just recently released by Hypnotic Dirge Records.)

This Tunisian funeral doom-death project offers high quality material. Created in around 2016 by Fedor Kovalevsky (who has Ukrainian roots), Omination consistently developed ’til it became the size of a trio consisting of Fedor at the helm and his bandmates from progressive death outfit Vielikan – Zied Kochbati and Nassim Toumi. With a full lineup and the support of Hypnotic Dirge Records, Fedor presents Omination’s second full-length NGR (New Golgotha Repvbliq), which has been out since the 5th of February.

The last times are upon us! So be forewarned! And don’t forget to take a listen to NGR. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: AVERSED — “ABANDONED”

 Exceptions to the Rule, Premieres  No Responses »
Feb 112021
 

 

2016 was the year in which Boston-based Aversed released their last record, an EP named Renewal, which followed the band’s 2011 self-titled EP. In the years since then the band’s members focused primarily on their other projects and live performance opportunities, including Seven Spires, a member playing live for Begat The Nephilim and another for Allegaeon/Continuum, and spending time as members of Solium Fatalis and Unflesh previously. But now Aversed are about to return in a big way.

On March 19th they will release their debut album, Impermanent. While the band haven’t jettisoned their progressively inclined take on melodic death metal, they’ve expanded their palette to include elements of blackened and orchestral metal in ways that make their sound even more difficult to succinctly summarize. Still at the forefront are the remarkably varied vocal talents of Haydee Irizarry, again backed by the both hard-hitting and sophisticated instrumental approach of guitarists Sungwoo Jeong and Alden Marchand, bassist Peter Albert de Reyna, and drummer Jeff Saltzman.

Two songs from the album have already surfaced, and today we’re bringing you a third one — “Abandoned“. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: TURRIS EBURNEA — “MALACHITE MOUNTAINS”

 Premieres  2 Responses »
Feb 112021
 

 

Turris Eburnea is an experimental death metal band consisting of vocalist/guitarist/multi-instrumentalist Gabriele Gramaglia (Cosmic Putrefaction, The Clearing Path, Summit) and bassist Nicholas McMaster (Krallice, Geryon, Edenic Past, ex-Castevet). Simply seeing those two names joined together is enough to generate a mix of curiosity and excitement. The music they’ve made together in this project, as it turns out, is both utterly fascinating and so twisted and discombobulating that it may feel like it’s flipping your mind upside-down and turning it inside-out.

We’re told that the band’s self-titled EP, which consists of four tracks, “was conceived and raised during the Covid-19 silent and desolating confinement periods”. It will be released by Everlasting Spew Records (CD and digital) on March 15th, with vinyl arriving later, and it comes with these words, which perhaps capture its inspiration:

“…Memory fades and time seems to stretch into a slow infinity, an emotional or existential dissociation, a mind/body separation, a disappearance of individuality into an undifferentiated mass… Like a post apocalyptic world suspended in an ethereal silence.” Continue reading »

THE INSANITY OF ONE-MAN BANDS IN CHINA

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  1 Response »
Feb 112021
 

 

(The following article was written by guest contributor Ryan Dyer, who has been on a mission to spread the word about metal music from China, and in this article he focuses on one-man Chinese bands in the genres of grindcore, noise, and industrial.)

China is home to over a billion people. Hundreds of thousands of these individuals have artistic endeavors, but some don’t play well with others. The one-man band is a unique performance art in the musical spectrum. Usually, electronic music is where one would find them, and usually as a DJ. The one-man vehicle does reach out into other forms of music, however, such as rap, hip hop, industrial, noise, and even grindcore. As the result of one person’s imagination and drive, the output often defies genre limitations, becoming something which could be labeled “outsider music”.

The three musicians presented here are certainly outsiders. Hailing from Beijing, Tianjin, and Shanghai, they prove that no single city is at the forefront of single-handed creative madness in China. It’s omnipresent and on the rise. Continue reading »

AN NCS INTERVIEW: OAKMORD

 Interviews  No Responses »
Feb 102021
 

 

(In this new interview Comrade Aleks spoke with Sami Rautio and Jürgen Fröhling, former collaborators in My Shameful and current collaborators again in Oakmord, whose debut record will be released on February 15th.)

Sami Rautio (Finland) and Jürgen Fröhling (Germany) collaborated successfully for years running the bleak and painful doom/death project My Shameful. My Shameful was no more since 2015, so Jürgen was able to focus on his doom/sludge band Absent/Minded, and Sami… it seems Sami was occupied with his solo project Kadotettu. However, both of them reunited in order to channel a mix of creativity and negativity through a new collaboration – Oakmord.

As Sami confesses, it is on a different range of emotions, and as musicians they have naturally changed over the years, “grown if that term fits here…” I agree with that, and you can make sure yourself while reading this interview — quite a good interview. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): CAEDES CRUENTA — “OF RITUAL NECROPHAGIA AND MYSTERIOUS GHOUL CULTS”

 Album Reviews, Premieres  No Responses »
Feb 102021
 

 

For their third album, and their first one in six years, the Greek black metal band Caedes Cruenta have gone BIG, one might even say Olympian. In the most objective (and mundane) of terms, it is roughly 62 minutes long. But the scale of the album is vast in other, more consequential, ways.

Unmistakably, Caedes Cruenta uphold the finest traditions of classic Greek black metal — the foundational works of Rotting Christ, Varathron, and Necromantia — by melding ferocious aggression and heavyweight punch with ringing heavy metal leads and judiciously deployed synths, as well as a vocal tandem of throat-slitting shrieks and horror-spawning growls. But they do this in ways that create a wide range of atmospheres and emotional sensations — as you shall discover through our premiere stream of the entire album in advance of its February 12 release by Helter Skelter Productions. Continue reading »

HUMANITY’S LAST BREATH: “VÄLDE”

 Album Reviews  2 Responses »
Feb 102021
 

 

(This is Andy Synn‘s review of the new album by the heavy Swedish band Humanity’s Last Breath, which is set for release by Unique Leader on February 12th.)

In the life cycle of every genre there comes a moment of… let’s call it apotheosis… when the build-up of artistic and creative pressures can no longer be contained, resulting in a sudden evolutionary leap, a genetic divergence, when something new is born.

This does not mean, of course, that the original genre dies out, or ceases to evolve either (the very fact that the most traditional, “old school”, forms of Death, Black, and Thrash continue to exist, create, and proliferate, is proof enough of that), nor is it limited to just one time. But, no matter how long it takes or how hard people try to deny it, delay it, or defeat it, it is always… always… inevitable.

And it seems like, for Deathcore, that moment may almost be upon us. As while Välde may not be the album destined to finally redefine the genre (in all its various forms) for a new generation, the steps it takes to refine it, to distil it into its most essential, elemental form, have no doubt planted the seeds for the next stage of its evolution. Continue reading »

MOTHER OF GRAVES: “IN SOMBER DREAMS”

 Album Reviews, SHORT BUT SWEET  No Responses »
Feb 102021
 

 

(We present Todd Manning‘s review of the debut EP by the Indiana band Mother of Graves, which was released on January 8th by Wise Blood Records.)

Mother of Graves are not the first band to rise up from tragedy, but the pain and sadness on display on their debut EP, In Somber Dreams, is palpable. The formation of this band came in the wake of the death of a friend and former bandmate, and as founding guitarist Chris Morrison explains, Katatonia’s EP Sounds of Decay became a focal point for channeling his sorrow.

Mother of Graves take their moniker from a Latvian entity that functions as a protector of graves, but much of their inspiration comes from Britain, Katatonia notwithstanding. We are of course referring to the Peaceville 3, i.e., Paradise Lost, Anathema, and My Dying Bride. The early work of these three bands laid the groundwork for the marriage of the violence of Death Metal and the depressive strains of Gothic Rock, and Mother of Graves have learned their lessons well. Continue reading »

OUR LIST OF 2020’S MOST INFECTIOUS EXTREME METAL SONGS (PART 17): MAKE THEM DIE SLOWLY, REBEL WIZARD, SIELUNVIHOLLINEN

 MOST INFECTIOUS SONGS-2020  2 Responses »
Feb 092021
 

 

There’s not much rhyme or reason as to why I grouped these three songs together. Other than the fact that each of them includes some really nasty ear-shredding vocals, they’re very different from each other musically. I guess it’s a matter of me realizing that I’m running out of time to finish this list (though it’s more a matter of making myself stop than really finishing), and I just want to pack in as many of the songs that really grabbed me last year as I can. Hope you like them too.

MAKE THEM DIE SLOWLY

This slasher-film side-project of Anaal Nathrakh’s Mick Kenney, Fukpig’s The Void,  and perhaps other members of those bands, certainly struck a chord with listeners last year. Make Them Die Slowly released not one but two albums in 2020 (Ferox and The Bodycount Continues…), plus a hell of a good Christmas single (“Silent Night, Murder Night“), and as far as I can tell, people loved the shit out of all of it. I sure as hell did. Continue reading »

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