AN NCS PREMIERE: PESTIS INFEROS — “WITHIN THE DARKNESS, I DWELL”

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Jun 112019
 

 

Syracuse, New York, is home to a malevolent new black metal entity who’ve taken the name Pestis Inferos. Their debut EP, Beyond the Veil of Light, is a ruthless statement of intent by this hellish trio, and today, in advance of its June 24 release date, we reveal a new track from it that’s  fittingly entitled “Within the Darkness, I Dwell“.

When the band first began to take shape in the spring of last year, there were not-entirely-serious musings about embracing Darkthrone worship, but as the songwriting began, the direction shifted more in the direction of Dark Funeral (which perhaps explains the name of the EP’s opening song, “From Throne To Funeral”). The song we’re presenting today is certainly heavy as hell’s gates, and the kind of powerhouse track that is at once cold and cruel, and fiery and ferocious. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): ATLAS ENTITY — “BENEATH THE COSMIC SILENCE”

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Jun 102019
 

 

Beneath the Cosmic Silence, the new album by the Florida progressive death metal band Atlas Entity, proves to be appealing on many levels. For those with a taste for fleet-fingered guitar technicality and agile, astute, and creative drumwork, it will deliver enormous smiles — in part because the top-shelf performance skill isn’t brandished for its own sake, but employed in the service of well-crafted songs. For listeners who enjoy becoming immersed in memorable, mood-changing melodies, both introspective and riotous, it offers that too. People who relish biting savagery will also get their fix. But perhaps above all else, the music is bursting with life — the kind of album whose irrepressible vitality makes you feel good to be alive, no matter how shitty your personal circumstances might be going into it.

The album also incorporates some evolutions in sound as compared to the band’s previous release, the 2015 EP Enceladus, even though the same two people are at the helm — composer, multi-instrumentalist, and vocalist Alex Gallegos and session drummer Samus Paulicelli (Decrepit Birth, Devin Townsend). And as compared to that first release, this one represents a big step forward. We’re very happy to present a full stream of it today in advance of its release on June 14th. Continue reading »

ENTHRONED: “COLD BLACK SUNS”

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Jun 102019
 

 

(This is Andy Synn‘s review of the new album by the Belgian black metal band Enthroned, which was releasd by Season of Mist on Friday, June 7.)

The human brain works in some funny ways (well, mine does anyway).

Conditioned as it is, by thousands upon thousands of years of evolution, to discern patterns in the surrounding world, sometimes it makes unconscious connections between things which the conscious mind would never have thought to put together.

For instance, ever since receiving the promo for Cold Black Suns I’ve been unable to shake this idea that, on a certain level, Enthroned have a lot in common with Sepultura.

Not musically of course – the two bands could hardly be more different – but it’s undeniable that the careers of both groups are defined/delineated by two distinct phases, each with their respective fans and detractors, and that the split between the two eras can, in simple (and far from comprehensive) terms be put down to a dramatic change in vocalist/frontman.

The difference, however, is that while latter-day Sepultura has proven rather divisive and uneven over the years (though not without its high points), the modern version of Enthroned have only gone from strength to strength, to the point where it seems like a majority of the band’s fans now recognise their current incarnation as the definitive one. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: NOCTURNAL BREED — “SHARKS OF THE WEHRMACHT”

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Jun 102019
 

 

As you make your way through the new album by Nocturnal Breed, you might get flash after flash of past glories — memory bursts of Nuclear Assault and Accept, of vintage Metallica and Megadeth, of Celtic Frost and Black Sabbath, of Motörhead and Venom, of King Diamond and Iron Maiden. It’s as much a matter of spirit as of sound, the feeling of fire in the blood and steel in the hand, a dedication to metal domination that won’t be diverted or denied. The music rips and rages, and revels.

Of course there’s a difference between trying to clone the music of legendary bands such as those mentioned above and revealing the influences because it’s what you love, because it’s part of your DNA and thus works its way naturally into what you do, without calculation. That’s the feeling of this new record, We Only Came For the Violence, the sixth full-length by this Norwegian speed metal cult in a career that goes back to the mid-’90s. This is a hell-thrasher’s record, but one in which the backbone of thrash is fleshed out in other ways that channel the band-members’ inspirations and interests. The result is a record packed with killer riffs, razor-sharp rhythm-section work, and vocals that send chills down the spine.

It’s also the kind of dynamic experience that gives every song its own character, and we’ve got a prime example of that in the contrast between the first song revealed from the album and the one we’re premiering today. Continue reading »

SHADES OF BLACK (PART 2): ANDAVALD, STARLESS DOMAIN, NIGHTGRAVE, SKÁPHE + WORMLUST

 Album Reviews, SHADES OF BLACK  6 Responses »
Jun 102019
 

 

I wasn’t able to complete the second Part of this week’s SHADES OF BLACK in time to further despoil the Sabbath with it, but as promised, I have at least used it to begin sending the new work-week deep into the void.

Part 1 consisted of advance tracks from forthcoming albums, but for this one I’ve chosen four complete album-length releases that in all but one case arrived last week. As you’ll discover, there are other marked differences between the selections here and those in Part 1, which is another reason I chose this division.

ANDAVALD

As many of you already know, Fallen Empire Records has permanently ceased activity, but its proprietor has not. Instead, he has joined forces with Mystískaos Records, whose previous releases have included music by Chaos Moon, Entheogen, and Vonlaus. The first three releases of this new collaboration include two of the albums in Part 2 of this week’s black metal column. The first of those is Undir skyggðarhaldi, the debut record by the Icelandic band Andavald. Continue reading »

SHADES OF BLACK (PART 1): VÁSTÍGR, MYSTICISM BLACK, VARDAN, KVELGEYST, HAGZISSA

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Jun 092019
 

 

My mind is on Iceland today. Soon my body will be too. Ascension Festival looms ahead this week, set to begin on June 13th in Mosfellbær. Anticipating that event, I’ve drawn a few connections with Iceland in today’s SHADES OF BLACK selections. My selections are numerous enough that I’ve divided them into two Parts. Part 1 includes advance tracks from forthcoming albums. What I have in mind for Part 2 are three or four full releases. If I can’t finish writing Part 2 in time to post it today, you’ll see it first thing Monday morning.

However, I’m doubtful you’ll see a SHADES OF BLACK here next Sunday, which will be the day after Ascension concludes. Maybe I’ll be able to scrawl a few words about the just-concluded festival, but probably won’t be able to prepare another one of these columns. For Part 1 of today’s column, the organizing principle is subjective impressions first, objective info second.

VÁSTÍGR

Despite the imposing wintriness of the cover art, this first song has the ebullient mood of a thronged carnival in full swing. The reverberating notes sparkle and dance, soar and swirl. The music grows more frenzied, ever-bursting with extravagant drumwork, and darkness creeps into the atmosphere even before the manic exuberance briefly abates, and moodiness descends. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: ABIGORUM — “ÜBER DICH”

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Jun 092019
 

 

Abigorum began as the solo project of Russian musician Aleksey Korolyov, who is also the owner of Satanath Records. Operating on his own, and drawing upon traditions of doom, black metal, and dark ambient music, he recorded a sequence of releases that included a collaboration with Cryostasium (2016’s Unholy Ghost Liturgy) and a split with Striborg (2018’s Spectral Shadows). Since then he has expanded the line-up of Abigorum with the addition of two German musicians — guitarist/vocalist Tino Thiele (from Wulfgar and Metamorph) and bassist Sandra Batsch — and together they have completed a debut album named Exaltatus Mechanism.

The album, whose lyrics are in German, “tells the story of the fascination of the black and grey side of evil, the ridicule of vices and hatred for people who are accustomed to a normal life and do not understand that everything around them is just an illusion, and that they are slaves”. The album will be jointly released on June 14th by Satanath Records and the U.S. label Death Portal Studio, and what we have for you today is the second advance track from the album released so far — “Über Dich” (over you or above you). Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD ON A SATURDAY (PART 2): HEILUNG, LOCISTELLAR, MORDAVIA, PLAGUEWIELDER

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Jun 082019
 

 

I managed to get Part 2 of this Saturday round-up finished in time to actually post it on Saturday, leaving the field wide open tomorrow for a SHADES OF BLACK column, which also might be a two-parter, and a Sunday premiere. The five songs I chose for Part 1 were consistently high-energy, full-throttle attacks, but the songs I’ve selected for this second installment are much more variable. There is also (gasp!) a healthy helping of clean or almost-clean singing to be found here, but I think you’ll find that it earns the exceptions to our Rule.

HEILUNG

I thought for sure I had written about Heilung before today, but can find no evidence of it. I know that I meant to, because I have been fascinated by their past music. But if this is the first occasion, it’s a worthy one, because their new song “Traust” is simply fantastic. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD ON A SATURDAY (PART 1): THY ART IS MURDER, NEKROFILTH, NEVALRA, NUMEN, AKTAION

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Jun 082019
 


Thy Art Is Murder (photo by Jake Owens)

 

I’m two-thirds of the way through a month-long festival orgy. First was Maryland Deathfest in Baltimore, then helping to put on our very own Northwest Terror Fest in Seattle, and this coming week will be Ascension Festival in Iceland. After that I’ll probably just check into a hospital. I wonder if hospitals take reservations?

Between the festival orgy, my fucking day job, and a nagging cold I contracted at MDF, I’ve fallen way behind in my round-ups for NCS, and it’s unlikely I’ll get another one done while I’m in Iceland. But I did spend some time listening to new things last night. I decided to focus on music I added to my listening list just from appearances over the last few days; the thought of trying to crawl through everything I noticed beginning with MDF week was just too daunting.

From last night’s explorations I picked nine tracks, divided into two segments. If you don’t see Part 2 later today, you’ll see it first thing tomorrow, as a prelude to my first SHADES OF BLACK column in a month (another casualty of the festival orgy). Continue reading »

LUCIDITY: “OCEANUM”

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Jun 072019
 

 

(This is DGR’s review of the latest album by the Finnish band Lucidity, which was released in February by Inverse Records.)

It’s interesting that we have never before penned words about Lucidity and their branch of the sad-sack melodeath musical tree, as the Finnish group’s keyboard-laden doom-influenced style seems to be perfectly within this website’s wheelhouse — well, at least in one particular writer’s wheelhouse. But now the time has come.

Lucidity have existed for quite a while now, though only recently appearing to have become a more album-oriented project. Prior to the release of their debut disc The Oblivion Circle in 2015, Lucidity had been putting out a steady stream of demos, totalling around five before the aforementioned debut. Nearly four years later — in the back part of February — the group released their sophomore album Oceanum. Clocking in at nearly fifty minutes across eight songs, Oceanum has some heft to it as it drapes itself in a veil of melancholy while conjuring familiar imagery of forests, lakes, and all things pensive. Continue reading »

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