OUR LIST OF 2018’S MOST INFECTIOUS EXTREME METAL SONGS (PART 31): ALLFATHER, APOPHYS, IRREVERSIBLE MECHANISM

 MOST INFECTIOUS SONGS-2018  1 Response »
Feb 212019
 

 

Apart from the main criterion for this list (“infectiousness”), there’s no stylistic organizing principle to the three songs I chose for today’s installment. The genres represented here are all different from each other, though on second thought maybe there is something in common: They’re all electrifying, with explosive energy bursting through the speakers when you listen.

By the way, I guess it’s worth mentioning that I haven’t ranked the songs as I’ve rolled out the list. The fact that I’m posting songs at this point, near the end of the list, rather than closer to the beginning, doesn’t mean I think they’re less infectious or less good than the tracks which preceded them. I’ve been figuring out the list as I go along, and so the ordering is pretty random.

ALLFATHER

Britain’s Allfather delivered a polemical and sonic powerhouse of an album last year, And All Will Be Desolation. As Andy wrote in his NCS review, “the band’s Sludge-injected, Hardcore-inflected, proto-Death Metal sound remains as potent and punishing as ever, and invites praiseworthy comparisons with the works of High On Fire, Crowbar, and early Sepultura at their very best…. If you like your Metal heavy and heartfelt and not too polished… and you’re looking for an album where you can practically feel every ounce of blood and sweat and tears which went into its creation… then this one is for you”. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: MUSKET HAWK — “HEXAGON”

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Feb 202019
 

 

March 29th is the date set by Unholy Anarchy Records for the release of Upside of Sick, the third album by the Baltimore-based sludge/grind annihilators Musket Hawk. At least in name, this seems to be a perfect match of label and band, since the music is itself unholy anarchy.

Musket Hawk‘s rampaging music pulls no punches, capable of fragmenting skulls like skillfully deployed crowbars, and just as capably running your head through a gauntlet of raging firestorm chaos. We have a prime example of the kind of devastating and electrifying assaults they mount on the new album through our premiere of a track called “Hexagon“. Continue reading »

KING APATHY: “WOUNDS”

 Album Reviews  4 Responses »
Feb 202019
 

 

(Here’s Andy Synn‘s review of the new album by King Apathy (formerly Thränenkind), which will be released on February 22nd by Lifeforce Records.)

Considering how busy I am these days, and just how much various other priorities are cutting into my writing time at the moment, I came very close to not reviewing this album at all, especially since our friends over at AngryMetalGuy published their own review earlier this week, which largely encapsulated my own thoughts and feelings already.

But then I realised two things.

Firstly, there’s no guarantee that our readers all read AMG, and I wouldn’t want them to miss out on the opportunity to give this album, and this band, a fair shot.

And, secondly, writing about Wounds gives me the chance to go off on one of my world-famous digressions, in this case about the importance (and potential impact) of picking the right, or wrong, genre tag(s)… Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): DOWNCROSS — “MYSTERIES OF LEFT PATH”

 Album Reviews, Premieres  4 Responses »
Feb 202019
 

 

Sometimes the opportunities presented to us for premiering new music leads to the discovery of enormously good surprises — to become captivated by music we might never have otherwise found. And this is one of those startling instances.

Downcross are a duo from Belarus — vocalist/drummer Ldzmr and guitarist Dzmtr — and what we’re presenting today (only one day away from its release by Saturn Sector Rex) is their debut album Mysteries Of Left Path. The only description of the music we had before exploring it was “anticosmic”, plus whatever might be inferred from their ominous masked and torch-bearing visages on the album’s cover. This led to a few guesses about the music — which turned out to be largely incorrect. Continue reading »

OUR LIST OF 2018’S MOST INFECTIOUS EXTREME METAL SONGS (PART 30): SOUL DISSOLUTION, FREDAG DEN 13:E, VARGRAV

 MOST INFECTIOUS SONGS-2018  No Responses »
Feb 202019
 

 

This is another one of those days when I’m leaning into black metal for the latest additions to this list, with a pair of songs that present different shades of black, very different formulations of music that incorporates black metal traditions, but all of them big head-movers in the moment and quite memorable in the aftermath. And in between them I’ve placed some Motörcharged scandicrust that’s equally head-moving and highly addictive.

I should mention that we’re drawing very close to the end of this series. Last year’s series ended with Part 20, and here we’re already up to Part 30. So as to give myself time this coming weekend to agonize over the final picks, I’m not going to stop this week — but at some point next week (probably early in the week), we’ll bring this 2018 list to an end. To check out everything that has preceded today’s installment, you’ll find them behind this link.

SOUL DISSOLUTION

I can’t think of a better word than “magnificent” for “Far Above the Boiling Sea of Life“. That’s the word that leaped to mind when I first heard it in advance of premiering the track in February of last year, and it’s the word that I’m left with every time I hear it — which has been often. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD: WASTE OF SPACE ORCHESTRA, LASTER, HEBOSAGIL, HYBRID NIGHTMARES, MORO MORO LAND, LOKUST, SECOND TO SUN

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  1 Response »
Feb 202019
 

 

I probably should have dug deeper into my ever-expanding list of recent music to check out, but instead spent my latest listening time focused only on what I added to that list over the last 48 hours. With so much new stuff coming out every day, sometimes music that’s even a week old becomes a casualty, rudely shoved aside by newer interlopers. That’s what happened here.

Unfortunately, because I happen to be hurrying at the moment, I won’t have quite as much to say as I usually do about what you’ll be hearing — but you really should listen to all these tracks anyway, even without detailed impressions from me!

WASTE OF SPACE ORCHESTRA

If you haven’t heard of Waste of Space Orchestra, perhaps you’ve heard of Oranssi Pazuzu and Dark Buddha Rising. If you haven’t heard of them either, checking out their music should be on you to-do list just above “see a doctor about that gangrenous toe”. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): DEATHSWARM — “SHADOWLANDS OF DARKNESS”

 Album Reviews, Premieres  2 Responses »
Feb 192019
 

 

Musicians who are passionate about the ravaging sounds of gruesome old school death metal face a constant challenge when they try to create such sounds themselves: How do you wade into such familiar territory, well-guarded by devoted fans of those traditions, and emerge with something that’s still really worth hearing? If we think we’ve heard it all before, what’s required to give us a fresh jolt of electricity, rather than just another formulaic emulation?

The Swedish band Deathswarm have compelling answers to those questions. To surmount the challenges requires (first and foremost) top-shelf song-writing, plus veteran performance skill matched with authentic spirit, and a grasp of tone and production technique that makes the music sound truly monstrous. And those are the answers that Deathswarm deliver through their fantastic debut album, Shadowlands of Darkness, which will be released on February 25th by Chaos Records — and which you can hear in its entirety below. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: VESPERINE — “NOUS, SI PHOTOSENSIBLES”

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Feb 192019
 

 

Torment, turmoil, and tumult flow through the music of Vesperine, a sense of defiance and desperation, and glimpses of hope that are too often revealed as phantom dreams.

Vesperine have located themselves within a long lineage of French storytellers and poets, fueled by the spirit of such imposing national figures as Hugo, Lamartine, Mallarmé, Rimbaud, and Verlaine, taking up “the eternal mantra of France and its passions”: “to hope, to sink”.

Musically, the sounds can be located within the darker spheres of post-hardcore and post-metal, with progressive and noise elements in the mix. References might be made to the likes of Amenra, Cult of Luna, Impure Wilhelmina, Neurosis, and Rosetta — but better than references, we have the music itself, one excerpt from their debut album Espérer Sombrer in advance of its March 22nd release through Apathia Records. The song we present today is “Nous, si photosensibles“. Continue reading »

OUR LIST OF 2018’S MOST INFECTIOUS EXTREME METAL SONGS (PART 29): WITCHING HOUR, IN THE WOODS…, AORLHAC

 MOST INFECTIOUS SONGS-2018  3 Responses »
Feb 192019
 

 

If you’ve been visiting us every weekday since January 8th, hungering for new installments of this list like famished wolves waiting to be fed, you undoubtedly noticed that the wolf-keeper had no flesh for you yesterday. Various events conspired to prevent me from finishing and posting the latest installment before my blog time ran out. In a small effort to make up for that, I’m beginning today’s posts with this new trio of entries instead of making it the last post of the day, which is what usually happens.

WITCHING HOUR

The first minute-and-a-half of this song was all it took to ensure its place on this list. I was convinced the first time I heard those opening 90 seconds. The rest of the song just reinforced the conviction, though it’s often very different from the solo guitar instrumental that comes first. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: LEATHER GLOVE — “REFLECTIONS OF DESPAIR”

 Premieres  3 Responses »
Feb 182019
 

 

Expectations for Perpetual Animation, the debut album by Leather Glove (which will be released on March 8 by Sentient Ruin and Dawnbreed Records), have run very high in these quarters, based on nothing more than the descriptions of the people involved in its creation, and of the musical conceptions manifested through its eight tracks.

As for the people, Leather Glove is principally the musical vehicle of Greg Wilkinson, owner of the famed Earhammer Studios in Oakland, CA, known for his engineering work with such bands as Noothgrush, Necrot, Autopsy, Vastum, Acephalix, Mortuous, Undergang, and many, many others; a member of Brainoil, and Deathgrave; and a former member of Laudanum and Graves at Sea.

For this new album, he was aided aided by drummers Chad Gailey (Necrot, Vastum, Mortuous, Atrament, etc) and Dustin Ferris (Apraxic, Pleasure Cross, Engorged, etc), with guest guitar solos performed by Sean McGrath (Ghoul, Impaled), Shelby Lermo (Vastum, Ulthar, Extremity), Eric Cutler (Autopsy), and Danny Corrales (Autopsy, Abcess). Continue reading »

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