BLASPHEMER: “THE SIXTH HOUR”

 Album Reviews  8 Responses »
Feb 132020
 

 

(This is Vonlughlio’s review of the latest album by Italy’s Blasphemer.)

This time around I have the opportunity to do a small write-up about the Italian band Blasphemer’s third album, The Sixth Hour, which was released on January 24th via Candlelight Records.

This project was given birth in 1998 by Simone Brigo (Guitars) and Paolo Maniezzo (vocalist up to 2017) with the intention to express their artistic vision, and their thoughts and views of organized religion, hate, and death, in a Brutal Death Metal setting.

It was not until 2002 that they released their debut demo, Life Kills, and subsequently they did some splits in 2003 and 2006, but it was when they released their debut album On the Inexistence of God that I found out about them. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): ENSNARED — “INIMICUS GENERIS HUMANI”

 Album Reviews, Premieres  9 Responses »
Feb 122020
 

 

To try to sum up the music of Ensnared‘s new album Inimicus Generis Humani as “progressive death metal” or “avant-garde death metal” would probably send the wrong signals. It might make people underestimate how vicious, how emotionally disturbing, and how mentally mutilating the music often is. But it’s definitely something very different from the kinds of death metal you come across on the usual beaten paths. Perhaps “interdimensional death metal” would be closer to the mark for music of such predatory spirit and such evil alien allure.

Inimicus Generis Humani is this Swedish band’s frightful and fascinating second album, following 2017’s excellent Dysangelium. The same two labels that released that first record, Invictus Productions and Dark Descent Records, will be releasing this new one on February 14th. Not long to wait, to be sure, but you won’t have to wait a moment longer to listen to the album, because we’re bringing the full stream to you today. Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: ALL MY SINS — “DALEKO AD JUGA”

 Premieres  1 Response »
Feb 122020
 

 

The Serbian duo All My Sins devote themselves to the creation of atmospheric black metal as a journey on the path of southern Slavic mysticism. Following their 2018 debut album Pra sila – Vukov totem and a 2017 EP (Zov iz Magle) that we premiered and reviewed here  — both of which are well worth your time if you haven’t yet discovered them — the band will soon be releasing a new EP named Plamen i Led (Flame and Ice) through the partnership of Casus Belli Musica and Beverina.

The EP consists of three songs, two of which are the band’s interpretation of songs originally released by Luna (Yugoslavia) and Old Wainds (Russia), while the third is a re-shaped version of a song from All My Sins‘ second demo in 2004. Along with some further details about the EP, what we’re presenting today is the premiere stream of the Old Wainds cover, and an accompanying video. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD: HEAVEN SHALL BURN, BLACK ROYAL, REGARDE LES HOMMES TOMBER, SKAM, KALLOMÄKI

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  7 Responses »
Feb 122020
 

 

One week has passed since I posted the last of these round-ups, and dozens of new songs have emerged since then that I’d happily throw your way, in addition to the many dozens I haven’t foisted upon you from preceding weeks. However, it turns out that I had overlooked new tracks from some of my favorite bands, discovering those only two days ago. I can’t resist including them here, along with a few newer discoveries.

HEAVEN SHALL BURN

We seem to have fallen off the radar screen of Century Media, because we haven’t received a single press release about the new album by Heaven Shall Burn, whose many previous releases we’ve covered with religious fervor. Even worse, none of my NCS compatriots breathed a word to me about the fact that three songs from the new album have debuted for public consumption. I had to find out about them yesterday via a YouTube side-bar. What is the world coming to? Well, I know it’s going to shit, I just didn’t know it was this shitty. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: SALTAS — “ASTRAL FUNERAL MARCH”

 Premieres  2 Responses »
Feb 112020
 

 

We had some favorable things to say about Death•Spirit•Continuum, the 2019 compilation of demos by Saltas that first brought this formidable Swedish duo to our attention. We also remarked about how powerfully it created a deepening, and almost suffocating, atmosphere of disease, decay, and desolation, while managing to achieve hypnotic effects despite how emotionally unsettling and unnerving the music often was.

We have been eagerly anticipating something further from Saltas, and now we have it — a debut album named Mors Salis – Opus I that will be released on March 15th by Nuclear War Now! Productions. Created by the same two members who first appeared through the pair of demos on that compilation — guitarist N.R. of Runemagick and The Funeral Orchestra, among others, and drummer C.J., known for his work in Irkallian Oracle — the album is an arcane death ritual, immersing the listener in an experience that draws upon death and doom metal but goes far beyond familiar conventions into other-dimensional realms.

The first preview track from the album, “Dimensional Seismic Waves“, was a profoundly eerie and head-spinning piece of bizarre sonic alchemy — intricate in its composition, twisted in its path, and blood-freezing in its effects. And now we have a second track to present: “Astral Funeral March“. Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: CRYPT DAGGER — “THE GOD FUKK YOU”

 Premieres  No Responses »
Feb 112020
 

 

It didn’t take long for Germany’s Crypt Dagger to rip their way into the consciousness of certain segments of the underground (the crevices inhabited by denizens who like their music blasphemous, belligerent, and brazen). They detonated a two-song demo last year and then soon followed that with the four-track EP Tales of Torment, which one publicist has aptly characterized as “filth-banging, black-as-pitch SPEED METAL with a heavy debt to punk, as well as such surprising influences as Devo, The Mummies, and early B-52s“.

Wasting no time in building on the nasty impressions made by that EP, Crypt Dagger have brewed up a new eight-song inferno entitled From Below, which will be released by Dying Victims Productions on March 27th. It includes those four tracks from Tales of Torment plus three brand new onslaughts, and a cover of Dead Moon‘s “5440 or Fight”, adding up to 24 minutes of mayhem.

Today we’re premiering a lyric video for one of the new songs, the one that indelicately opens the new release: “The God Fukk You“. Continue reading »

UNSUNG HEROES OF 2019: MALEVICH / OUR EARTH IS A TOMB / UMBRA CONSCIENTIA

 Album Reviews  2 Responses »
Feb 112020
 


Malevich

 

(In this post Andy Synn combines reviews of three recommended albums that we largely overlooked last year.)

This week is, thankfully, notably less busy in terms of new releases than the last one was.

In fact the only ones which really jump out at me are the new Ihsahn EP, Telemark (which, as a long-time fan of the man’s work, I found to be a big disappointment), the highly-anticipated full-length from Godthrymm (about which I’ll be writing more later in the week), and the debut record from Washington-based Black Metallers Izthmi (which I’ll also be writing about very soon).

So, taking advantage of this temporary lull, I’ve decided now is the perfect time for another look back at last year so as to give some belated attention to three artists/albums which I/we otherwise didn’t get around to covering at the time. Continue reading »

RENATO GALLINA (diSEMBOWELMENT): “NIGHTSIDE OF EDEN”

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  1 Response »
Feb 112020
 

 

(Comrade Aleks has brought us not quite a premiere, but close to it, a sharing of a re-recorded track by the founder of diSEMBOWELMENT, which he introduces as follows.)

Being formed in 1989, Melbourne, Australia’s diSEMBOWELMENT turned out to be one of death-doom metal’s obscure pioneers with their own original sound. The band was active for just four years, but they managed to get a deal from Relapse, and their one and only full-length album Transcendence Into The Peripheral remains one of those innovative albums which is usually mentioned as a “must hear” release.

In 2019, Renato Gallina, the founder behind diSEMBOWELMENT, felt a powerful urge to re-visit the track, “Nightside of Eden“, which was featured on this one and only album. Gallina (as he has stated) was always “incredibly dissatisfied with this version” and has told us that it “was the weakest and most regretful moment on the album”. Almost three decades later, the track, as he stated, “has been re-contextualised and is finally true to how it was originally meant to sound”. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: HAISSEM — “BLACK TIDE DOMINION”

 Exceptions to the Rule, Premieres  3 Responses »
Feb 102020
 

 

Haissem is a melodic black metal band started by Ukrainian musician and vocalist Andrey Tollock in Donetsk in 2014. With him working as the sole performer, Haissem released albums in 2016 (Maze of Perverted Fantasies), 2018 (Panacea for a Cursed Race), and 2019 (Demonotone), as well as a pair of EPs in 2017 and 2019. Over the course of those releases, Haissem’s creativity has expanded from a stylistic affinity for melodic black metal rooted in the ’90s into music of greater variety and more diverse stylistic influence.

Haissem’s newest output is an album named Kuhaghan Tyyn (which means “The Evil Spirit”) that will be released by the band’s new label Satanath Records on March 22nd. As compared to previous records, this one includes a greater use of synthesizers (though they are still subtle) as well as guest performers on specific tracks, including female vocalist Alyona Malytsa, harpist D. Vander, and cellist Alexandra Zima — the latter of whom makes an appearance on the song we’re premiering today , “Black Tide Dominion“. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: BORGNE — “JE DEVIENS MON PROPRE ABYSSE”

 Premieres  1 Response »
Feb 102020
 

 

Originally the solo project of Bornyhake (whose name has been associated with a significant number of other groups), but eventually expanding into a full band, the Swiss entity Borgne released their first album in 1998, and their path since then has resulted in eight more full-lengths. The most recent of those, entitled Y, will be released by Borgne‘s new label Les Acteurs de l’Ombre Productions on March 6th.

Borgne‘s musical hallmark has been the integration of industrial music into black metal, with an increasingly atmospheric quality that combines with the compulsive mechanical rhythms and intense, ravaging aggression. We have a prime example of these aspects of Borgne‘s music to share with you today, as we premiere the new album’s second track, “Je Deviens Mon Propre Abysse” (I Become My Own Abyss). Continue reading »

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