AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: VALLEYS — “MOON CHILD”

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Apr 082020
 

 

Last October Tragic Hero Records released the powerhouse third album by the North Carolina metalcore band Valleys. Aptly entitled Fearless, it represented the culmination of a process of perseverance, with themes that focused on life-changing personal struggles, as well as symbolism directed to the country’s tumultuous political climate and social unrest, inspired by a desire to speak up for the marginalized among us who can’t be heard.

Today we’re presenting a mysterious (and eventually gore-ridden) music video for one of the most explosive and head-spinning tracks on the album, a song called “Moon Child“, along with an interview of the band that focuses on that video as well as the music. Continue reading »

DERANGED: “DEEDS OF RUTHLESS VIOLENCE”

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Apr 082020
 

 

(Here’s Vonlughlio’s review and recommendation of the new album by the Swedish death metal band Deranged, who began life in 1991, and whose latest full-length is out now via Agonia Records.)

I am now here to write about a band I have been a fan of since the late ’90s and believe have always been consistent in their vision of BDM over the years. That band is Sweden’s Deranged and they just released Deeds of Ruthless Violence on March 27th via Agonia Records.

This is one band whose music I have enjoyed and still ask myself why it does not have the recognition it should. I mean, sure, they have fans around the world and are well-respected but I wish more for this project. They have been consistent with their art and vision and have released music that has transcended the test of time. Continue reading »

AN NCS EP PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): DOWNCROSS — “CURRENT TOWARDS END”

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Apr 082020
 

 

The Belarusian black metal band Downcross made a startling debut with their first album, Mysteries of Left Path. To paraphrase what we wrote in introducing our premiere of the album early last year, every one of the eight tracks on the album was emotionally powerful, and powerful in the production of their sound. They included magnetically attractive melodic hooks and shifts among contrasting moods within each song — from cold-hearted to glorious, from bereft to barbaric, and much more.

There was also heavyweight heft in the low end, and tremendous, penetrating, gleaming vibrancy in the guitar tones (without becoming completely “clean” in their tone). The drumming rocked and romped as often as it thundered, and there were as many hook-laden strummed chords as the dense wash of blazing tremolo vibrations.

The duo of vocalist/drummer Ldzmr and guitarist Dzmtr quickly proved that their debut was no fluke, because their second album (which we also premiered last fall), What Light Covers Not, was also tremendously good, and further vivid evidence that Downcross are gifted songwriters. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: ECLIPSE OF THE SUN — “WORLD WITHOUT WORDS”

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Apr 072020
 

 

Five years on from their debut album Daimonion, the Hungarian band Eclipse of the Sun now return with a second full-length, Brave Never World. It presents music that has evolved into an epic formulation of doom/death metal, combining dramatically varying vocals, dark melodies, granite-heavy riffs, and astute use of symphonics, which in union present stirring yet gloom-cloaked experiences on a monumental scale, interwoven with passages of poignant sorrow.

The labels that will release the album on April 25th, Satanath Records and More Hate Productions, recommend it for fans of Isole, Paradise Lost, Swallow The Sun, My Dying Bride, and Amorphis, which of course is very good company to be in. Apart from the appeal of those references, we also have tangible evidence of what Eclipse of the Sun have accomplished on this new album, because today we’re premiering a multi-faceted and relentlessly gripping song called “World Without Words“. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: SINISTRAL KING — “SERPENT UNCOILING”

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Apr 072020
 

 

Sinistral King is a new formation that only began to take shape in 2018, but its members are not newcomers to the dark musical arts of death and black metal which form the backbone of this new band’s music, because Sinistral King‘s line-up features members of Unlight (Germany), Triumph of Death (Swizterland), and Vredehammer (Norway). But while each of the members brought their own experiences and influences to this new endeavor, they have not been confined by them, but have also integrated other stylistic ingredients into their songwriting and execution, which is richly displayed on their debut album, Serpent Uncoiling.

This new record consists of five significant tracks, each of which creates dramatic contrasts yet also draws all the differing movements together in unifying ways that manifest pitch-black occult darkness. Their success in doing so is vividly displayed by the album’s title track, which we’re premiering today in advance of the album’s release by Vendetta Records on April 24th. Continue reading »

AN NCS INTERVIEW: DAVID MCGRAW (CATTLE DECAPITATION)

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Apr 072020
 

 

(In this new installment of a series devoted to metal drummers, Karina Noctum talked with David McGraw of Cattle Decapitation, and we join Karina in thanking David him for his time and attention.)

Cattle Decapitation is definitely one band that leads the way when it comes to extreme metal. Their blend of Death, Heavy, Grind, and Black Metal with a complex arrangement of progressive riffs and top-notch technique is something I have always admired. So I had to include David McGraw in my series as he is definitely one of the best drummers in the genre.

Due to the pandemic he is currently home and available for drumming coaching while he should be on tour. He took some time to answer my questions, something I’m pretty grateful for. What’s left for us in Europe is to hope their superb tour together with Disentomb, Internal Bleeding, and Gloom will be re-scheduled, but things look certainly gloomy grim here when it comes to shows in the foreseeable future. Continue reading »

THE BLACK DAHLIA MURDER: “VERMINOUS”

 Album Reviews  9 Responses »
Apr 072020
 

 

(This is Andy Synn‘s review of the new album by The Black Dahlia Murder, due for release on April 17th by Metal Blade Records.)

If I were forced to select one word to describe The Black Dahlia Murder’s particular brand of high-stakes, high-adrenaline Death Metal that word would undoubtedly be… anthemic.

After all, one of the band’s defining features has always been their ability to conjure up a seemingly endless series of contagious, crowd-friendly choruses and red-hot hooks to balance out their molten metallic mayhem, with much of this burden often falling to lunatic-larynxed frontman Trevor Strnad, whose distinctive delivery – part predatory preacher, part Death Metal drill sergeant, part crazed carnival barker – is an inimitable part of the group’s sound.

The band’s last album, 2017’s superb Nightbringers, in many ways felt like the apotheosis of this, with songs such as “Kings of the Nightworld” and the titanic title track featuring some of the catchiest, most bombastic material the group have ever written.

The thing is… once you’ve peaked like that, there’s almost nowhere to go but down. So the big question now is whether or not Verminous is going to be a victim of the band’s success, or whether the gang have found a way to escape the curse of diminishing returns… Continue reading »

SYMBOLIK: “EMERGENCE”

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Apr 062020
 

 

(On April 10th The Artisan Era will release the debut album of California’s Symbolik, and today we present DGR’s detailed review.)

Stockton, CA’s Symbolik are a band I’ve been following for a long time. Seeing their logo pop up on a few local show flyers way back in the early 2010s led to me finding the group’s EP Pathogenesis and being so impressed by it that I wound up seeing the band live three times after that. They were one of those groups I had thought was going to really cut a swath through the hyper-speed tech-death scene at the time, long before it had started congealing around a handful of specific record labels that would later unwittingly codify an overall sound. However, things progressed slowly in their camp and barring a single entitled “Diverging Mortal Flesh” that came out in 2015, Symbolik remained fairly silent save for the occasional here-and-there show.

It wasn’t until earlier this year, over eight and a half years after the release of their Pathogenesis EP that we finally heard from the group — now signed to The Artisan Era and ready to release a full-length debut entitled Emergence. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: THE PROJECTIONIST — “A STARTLING HOUSECALL”

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Apr 062020
 

 

Many fans of black metal, or other other metal genres, have heard descriptive references to music within such genres as “theatrical”, an adjective that may connote a sense of the dramatic, of the elaborate, or perhaps of the grandiose and bombastic. But   Canada’s The Projectionist has elevated their formulation of black metal to a level that literally is theatrical.

The band’s forthcoming fifth album, The Stench of Amalthia, is a full-concept operetta which tells a horrifying story, making use of an array of voices to play the characters in the nightmarish tale the band have crafted, and all of it destined for the kind of full theatrical stage performance for which The Projectionist have already become known.

In advance of the album’s release by Moribund Records on April 17th, today we’re presenting a track that occupies a pivotal place in the record’s fiendishly conceived narrative. You could listen to and appreciate “A Startling Housecall” without knowing anything about the scene it portrays or the album’s narrative as a whole, but this is an instance of music that really requires context. And so let’s begin with a description of the album’s story, and of what happens in this scene in particular. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: ANCIENT BURIAL — “INTO THE LAND OF DEATH”

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Apr 062020
 

 

Little is known about Ancient Burial. The line-up is anonymous, though rumor has it that it may include members of other better-known formations, and their unearthly renderings of raw black metal would draw comparisons to the music of the Portuguese Black Circle (whose bands we’ve paid significant attention to over the years). Perhaps more will be revealed in time, but for now what we have — or rather, will have on May 1st via the Signal Rex label — is Ancient Burial‘s debut album Beyond the Watchtowers.

Below you’ll find streams of the first two tracks revealed from the album, one that has been previously disclosed and one that we’re premiering today. Neither of them will have mass appeal. Both of them are sadistically abrasive and well-calculated to create sensations of terror and devastation, of infernal possession, and of other-dimensional eeriness and mortal threat. They are also perversely enthralling, capable of plunging at least some listeners into the same wicked state of possession and violent trance that seems to have overcome the performers. Other listeners will cower in corners or run for the hills Continue reading »

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