W.A.I.L.: “WISDOM THROUGH AGONY INTO ILLUMINATION AND LUNACY VOL. II”

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  7 Responses »
Apr 222018
 

 

Out of nowhere, this album appears like a comet blazing in the heavens.

I nearly didn’t bother to listen. On the surface it seemed like a daunting undertaking — one track more than 24 minutes long and a second one almost 35, and a title just as linguistically daunting: Wisdom Through Agony Into Illumination and Lunacy Vol. II. And it seems that this Finnish band’s name is simply a selective acronym for the same collection of words: W.A.I.L. (I might add that the band’s description of the album’s conceptual foundation (a quite articulate one) runs to 461 words.)

However, after receiving recommendations for the album from a couple of esteemed sources (Miloš and eiterorm, the latter of whom I must credit for the “selective acronym” phrase), I girded my loins and began listening — and emerged stunned. “Visionary” seems like too pretentious a term for this, but the magnitude of the ambition and the scale of the achievement are exceptional, and at times astonishing. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: VURVARAT — “WAKE OF THE FOUL MIND”

 Premieres  1 Response »
Apr 222018
 

 

The French label Atavism Records is devoted to black metal, and its owner has a proven discerning taste for sinister music. Among the label’s releases, we have devoted attention to recordings by Cult of Extinction, Invehertex, St. Barthelemy’s Temple, Funeral Desekrator, and Lvx Hæresis.

While it might be unfair to generalize about the label’s tastes, given the diversity of the music created by the bands listed above, there is annihilating savagery to be found among those releases, as well as unearthly atmosphere, of the kind that reflects an occult spirituality.

One of Atavism’s more recent discoveries is the obscure French project Vurvarat. It is one of those black metal bands that does not disclose the identity of its member (or members), provides no photographs, does not indulge in live performances, and has no social media presence. As the expression of their creative impulses and objectives, the music alone will have to be enough. Continue reading »

WAXING LYRICAL: THE ABSENCE

 Interviews, WAXING LYRICAL  2 Responses »
Apr 212018
 

 

(Welcome to another edition of Andy Synn’s Waxing Lyrical feature. Today he presents a very interesting discussion with Jamie Stewart of The Absence.)

Some of you may have caught my review of A Gift for the Obsessed, the long-awaited fourth album by Floridian Melodeath marauders The Absence, last month (almost exactly one month ago, in fact). And hopefully some of you were inspired enough to go check out the album on your own terms and, ideally, to pick up a copy for yourselves.

If you didn’t catch it, well, here’s another chance for you to check out what you’ve been missing, as I managed to cajole the band’s vocalist/lyricist Jamie Stewart into participating in this edition of Waxing Lyrical, where he talks about misheard lyrics, space madness, and the importance of Hip-Hop to his early musical development! Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: THE BLACK SORCERY — “TRAITOR BOMB THREAT”

 Premieres  4 Responses »
Apr 202018
 

 

The arms race of terroristic metal extremity has a new entrant, a band of unhinged barbarians from the cold north who’ve taken The Black Sorcery as their name. Their debut album And The Beast Spake Death From Above will be released on May 29th by Krucyator Productions and Hammer of Damnation. From that album we bring you the premiere of “Traitor Bomb Threat“.

The annals of black/death war metal are filled with other Canadian bands who have done a damned fine job converting the quivering minds of listeners into shattered wastelands. But while The Black Sorcery are certainly indebted to their countrymen in such groups as Blasphemy, Conqueror, and Revenge, they aren’t clones, and they’ve found some ways to push the bulging envelope of violence even further, while providing music that’s more of a thrill ride than a turgid hurricane of distortion. As proof, we bring you the premiere of “Traitor Bomb Threat“. Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: LET IT BREATHE — “BUCKET OF BULLHEADS”

 Exceptions to the Rule, Premieres  No Responses »
Apr 202018
 

 

We’re about to make a couple of exceptions to our usual rules around here. As the site’s title proclaims, we usually steer clear of vocals that aren’t ugly and abrasive. And it’s a rarity when we pay attention to stoner and psychedelic rock. But it’s 4/20 today, and besides that, this song by Let It Breathe that we’re about to premiere through a video is so… damned… good!

These three dudes — guitarist/vocalist Randy, bassist Rob, and drummer Jason — make their home in Mankato, Minnesota, a town located along a large bend of the Minnesota River at its confluence with the Blue Earth River. Through those waters swim massed schools of bullhead catfish. Some people fish for them, some use them for bait. They’re an ancient oddity, spiny and be-whiskered, with a taste for dead and rotting sustenance, nearly blind but with a keen sense of smell and taste buds packed throughout the skin of its body. They live in the darkness; they’ll probably outlive our own species.

So yeah, they’re weird creatures, but they’re also very much a part of the culture where Let It Breathe make their home, and maybe both aspects played a role in the band’s choice of the bullhead for the cover of their self-titled debut album and for the name of the song we’re premiering: “Bucket of Bullheads“. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): LLNN — “DEADS”

 Album Reviews, Premieres  2 Responses »
Apr 202018
 

 

Deads, the new album by the Danish band LLNN, is a sonic super-weapon, one that operates on multiple levels, inflicting both psychic and physical trauma on a shattering scale. It fires the imagination on multiple levels as well, bringing to mind terrifying vistas of apocalyptic obliteration as well as unnerving diaphonous visions that gleam with astral light. Not surprisingly, given the vast scale of the music and its relentless intensity, the band have explained: “The overall album theme of Deads is about births and downfalls of civilizations in other worlds throughout the universe, from creation to final decay, the depletion of the host….”

Pelagic Records will release the album on April 27th, but we have a full stream of it for you today, preceded by some further thoughts about what LLNN have accomplished on this staggeringly powerful record. Continue reading »

FIVE OF MY FAVOURITE… ALBUM COVERS

 Eye-Catchers  7 Responses »
Apr 202018
 

 

(Andy Synn returns to his irregular series devoted to things that come in five’s, the focus of this one being metal album art.)

The phrase “never judge a book by its cover” was obviously uttered by someone who’d never found themselves stranded in a busy bookshop and frozen by indecision over which of the many, many options to spend their hard-earned cash on.

Of course while I agree with the sentiment in principle – style is no substitute for substance after all, and a shiny package is no guarantee of superior contents – the truth is that human beings are very visual creatures, and an eye-catching cover, one which hints at the themes and manifest delights contained within, can be the difference between finding a new reader and being consigned to the bottom of the bargain bin at the end of the month.

The same obviously applies when we’re talking about albums too. Yes, the move towards a primarily digital market has had an impact on the means and methodology behind how new albums are accessed and presented (though apparently physical sales have been rebounding quite a bit recently), but the importance of good album art still shouldn’t be understated. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD: TAPHOS, SARINVOMIT, MATTERHORN, MORTUUS

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  3 Responses »
Apr 202018
 

 

Happy 4/20. For those of you already feeling a little hazy (correction: even hazier than usual), we have one premiere a bit later today that will suit you very well. But I decided to start the day with a selection of new songs that will scrape the haze right off of you with razors. Sorry about that.

TAPHOS

If you’re a lover of hammering and hideous death metal that thrives on upheaval, Come Ethereal Somberness should be on your radar screen. That’s the debut album by the Danish band Taphos that’s set for release on June 8 by Blood Harvest Records and Helter Skelter Productions. I’ve been too harried to listen to all of it yet, but the two songs you can stream on Bandcamp are very, very promising. I featured one of them (“Impending Peril“) at our site months ago, but now there’s a second one: “Thrive In Upheaval“. Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: SUPREME CARNAGE — “MORBID WAYS TO DIE”

 Premieres  No Responses »
Apr 192018
 

 

There’s garden-variety carnage, with cracked bones and mangled flesh, and then there’s Supreme Carnage, with exploded heads and torsos stomped into a chunky unrecognizable mess. You could expire peacefully in your bed at a ripe old age, and then there are especially Morbid Ways To Die. Supreme Carnage will teach you some of them.

This German old-school death metal band, who have taken their prime influences from the likes of Gorefest, Entombed, Bolt Thrower, Asphyx, and Bloodbath, have already discharged an impressive discography, which includes their 2013 debut album Quartering the Doomed and 2015’s Sentenced By the Cross, but on their forthcoming third record — which of course is entitled Morbid Ways To Die — they sound like they’ve reached a new zenith of audio slaughtering.

The first premiere from the new album (“The Fire Prevails”) was launched at DECIBEL, and we’re very happy to be the bearers of the second one through a lyric video — which is the album’s striking title track. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: GODLESS ENTHROPIA — “PALACE OF FORNICATION”

 Premieres  No Responses »
Apr 192018
 

 

Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to the Palace of Fornication. Please remove your clothes, lubricate yourselves from those vats of blood you see before you, drink from the goblets of bestial desire, and prepare for action.

Alternatively, keep your clothes on, find a comfy chair, and press play below. Godless Enthropia will welcome you to the Palace of Fornication in their own way. Continue reading »

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