NO CLEAN SINGING

SEEN AND HEARD ON HALLOWEEN: DIRGE, VALKYRJA, CLOAK, INTEGRITY, WINDHAND

Nov 012018

I didn’t go trick-or-treating last night, or dress up for a costume party, or make any ritual sacrifices of kids in the neighborhood, much as I wanted to. No one came to our door asking for handouts either; the human heads impaled on spikes apparently did a good job protecting the perimeter of the NCS headquarters, though the ungodly screams coming out of the loris compound may have also played a role.

I was left to celebrate Halloween by listening to new metal, and man, there was a shitload of it to catch up with. There might be another day of the year when more metal bands and labels release new music than on Halloween, but I doubt it. Releasing cover songs also seems to be a Halloween thing. I picked just a few tracks to share around today… though I’m beginning with one that didn’t come out yesterday, though last night was when I first got around to hearing it.

DIRGE

In March of 2014 we had the privilege of premiering a full stream of the sixth album by the Parisian band Dirge, and I’m mentioning that because I decided to quote myself as a way of introducing their new seventh album. There are few things I enjoy more than quoting myself. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: FEED THEM DEATH — “BLOODSHED THEATRE”

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Oct 312018

Every year on this day both print journalists and scribes across the internet remind us about, or perhaps discover for the first time, the pagan roots of Halloween. This year is no different, though this particular piece today in The Washington Post is better than most. It recounts Christianity’s co-opting of Samhain and other ancient feast days, and then the gradual capitalistic morphing of such events into the entertainment of doorbell-ringing and sexy avocado costumes. But it goes further, and uses Halloween as an example of modern disengagement from imminent mortality (at least in the U.S.).

“Halloween is supposed to be about death,” the authors write. “Part of the power of these rituals is to make death into a known quantity, something to be accepted, even embraced, rather than feared,” but modern death “has been sanitized and sequestered away from the world of the living”, and our ignorance of death “breeds fear, uncertainty and avoidance”.

And with those thoughts in mind, it seemed fitting on this particular Samhain day that we would be able to premiere a song by a band named Feed Them Death, who shy away from nothing but revel in crushing and slashing the life from their listeners in a “Bloodshed Theatre“. Continue reading »

AN NCS EP PREMIERE: SVPREMACIST — “BOOK BURNER”

Album Reviews, Premieres, SHORT BUT SWEET 5 Responses »

Oct 312018

I can’t quite claim that Svpremacist has provided the bookends for my metal listening in 2018, but it’s close. ‘Twas early February when I encountered this Israeli band’s debut EP, with the smile-inducing title of Black Fuck You Metal, and now on this Samhain day they’ve just discharged a follow-on EP, the news of which I’m happily helping to spread around through this post.

The title of the new one is Book Burner, but have no fear, the band continue to proclaim loudly: “Svpremacist plays Black Fuck You Metal exclusively!” They have dedicated this new release “In honor of South American Metal warriors past and present”. Continue reading »

A DGR REVIEW COLLECTION (PART 1): BENIGHTED, CHTHONIC, BEYOND CREATION

Album Reviews 3 Responses »

Oct 312018

Benighted

(As Andy Synn did before him, DGR seems to be making a late-season effort to get caught up on planned reviews before year-end LISTMANIA drowns us all. Three reviews today, and some undisclosed number of further ones ahead.)

What you are reading is the beginning of a feature that has taken way too long and gotten way out of control. Meant to be like its older band-roundup-review siblings in the shorter review realm, the reviews in this post become the subject of a whole lot more talking and yapping since I found so much to enjoy on each release. As a result, the finish line continually moved further and further back.

In fact, the Beyond Creation review was about half-written by the time our own Andy Synn posted his (alongside his review of Gorod’s Aethra for those who missed out) and almost wound up being deleted so as to not commit the NCS “Sin” of double-talking over each other. But pride won out on that front, because I was waaaaaay too fucking proud of the opening paragraphs to let it go, which naturally meant one needed to run his mouth for another….ten. You can see how this is playing out.

Needless to say, there are a few other reviews forthcoming that will have us traveling the world, hopefully to catch us up with all of the music that has washed over us in the past few months (not likely! there’s been so much!) in the form of big name releases, celebratory collections, even an alternate universe debut album from a local Sacramento group. What you’ll find here, therefore, is only the start, beginning with some late-September/early-October releases and carrying on from there. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: VOODUS — “THE GOLDEN”

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Oct 302018

The Swedish black metal band Voodus came to unholy life under the name Jormundgang more than a decade-and-a-half ago. Following the release of several demos and an album, the band adopted Voodus as their new name, and since then have released a pair of EPs, and now a new album fittingly named Into the Wild. This new full-length will be released by Shadow Records on November 26th, and it’s our pleasure to share with you today one of the new album tracks, also fittingly named: “The Golden“.

The dynamism of the track is one of its strengths. It sears like a firebrand yet is also reflective. It mixes savagery with moodiness and majesty. And in its penetrating melodies, it becomes gloriously incandescent. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: ZAPRUDER — “HALF STACHE MAN”

Premieres 2 Responses »

Oct 302018

Three years ago we had the pleasure of premiering a song from Fall In Line, the debut album by the French band Zapruder, whose explosive blend of post-hardcore and mathcore adamantly refuses to fall in line. And now Zapruder are roaring back with a new self-titled album that will be released by Apathia Records on November 23rd, and once again we have a Zapruder premiere for you.

Where Fall In Line was a frequently harrowing and doom-shadowed experience, the new album is described as a remembrance of the band’s origins and a celebration of “friendship, fun, and rock ‘n’ roll”. As a further clue to what the album holds in store, it may help to know that it was recorded over 15 days that included “drinking, walking naked, and doing bodybuilding with bags filled with bottles”. But maybe a better clue is the cover art created by Chien Bleu. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: OMGEVING — “VII – STILLE VERNIETIGING”

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Oct 302018

Clear your mind of detritus, if you can. An open mind, freed from distractions, is the best preparation for experiencing the music we’re about to present. Closing your eyes is also advisable, or sitting in a dark space where the music alone will provide its own strange light behind your eyes, without competition.

Granted, our advice may be difficult to follow, so it’s worth mentioning that the music itself is the kind that tends to clear the mind by itself, and to replace whatever might have been there with other conceptions, creating a partnership in which the sounds induce visions that are in part Omgeving‘s creations and in part your own.

Actually, before you clear your mind, take a look at the cover art for this Dutch experimental project’s debut album Wijde Wijdte, even though what the Polish artist Kuba Kujawa has created will be difficult to forget once you’ve seen it: Continue reading »

AN A-Z OF EVERYTHING WE’VE MISSED

Album Reviews 10 Responses »

Oct 302018

(Despite what the title of this post says, Andy Synn hasn’t managed to review every fine 2018 album and EP we’ve heretofore failed to write about, but he does catch up with more than two dozen of them.)

While lots of blogs/zines are already (or soon will be) switching their focus away from covering new releases and towards consolidating their annual “Best Of…” lists, here on NCS island we’re still doing our very best to bring as many new (and some not so new) albums/artists to your attention as possible.

Of course the truism that “there’s simply too much music out there” remains as painfully accurate as ever, and it pains me to admit that I/we simply can’t cover all the releases we want to, in the depth we want to, no matter how hard we try.

So consider this article a voluntary mea culpa acknowledging our limitations and a (probably futile) attempt to make amends a little bit to all the bands and artists who we may have missed or ignored over the last several months, as well as to shine a light on a couple of upcoming releases you’ll probably want to keep your eyes/ears open for. Continue reading »

AN NCS INTERVIEW: PSICORRAGIA

Interviews 5 Responses »

Oct 292018

(In this new interview Comrade Aleks conversed with Mario and Marco, founders of the long-running Peruvian death-doom band Psicorragia, who are at work on a new album.)

Psicorragia is representative of Peruvian underground. Formed in Lima in 1994, the band slowly developed in the shadows and nurtured their own macabre death-doom metal. Spanish lyrics, southern passion toward death in all its forms, and a grim, sinister delivery have remained Psicorragia’s trademarks from the release of their debut album La Pasión De La Mortal until now.

Their latest album Madremuerte appeared two years ago, but as the band are already working over new gifts of Death and Misfortune we’ve managed to organize this interview with the guys. Continue reading »

CERTAINLY DEMENTED: “INHALING THE FRAGRANCES OF INSANITY”

Album Reviews 2 Responses »

Oct 292018

(Vonlughlio prepared this review of the new album by Certainly Demented, which will be released on November 15th by the Russian label Lord of the Sick Recordings.)

For me this year in Brutal Death Metal has been another good one. I’ve found new bands, and more familiar ones have released new material that’s been better that their previous efforts. In my last appearance at NCS my small write-up was for a band called Insidious Squelching Penetration that I recently discovered and just fell in love with at first listen, and I mention that because I’m now turning to another band that came out of nowhere to take over my soul.

The band is Certainly Demented (and they certainly are), with their debut album Inhaling The Fragances of Insanity, to be released via Lord of the Sick Recordings this November 15th. Continue reading »

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