AN NCS PREMIERE: ABOMINATIONS — “INVASION OF UNEARTHLY BEINGS”

 Premieres  4 Responses »
Feb 182018
 

 

The German band Imperceptum (from Bremen), has released two EPs and three albums. I’ve reviewed all of them excerpt the first EP. At the risk of oversimplifying the experience of Imperceptum’s music, it combines elements of atmospheric black metal, funeral doom, ambient music, and post-metal to create long void-faring journeys that are both terrifying and beautiful.

The richly textured music moves from immense hurricanes of cataclysmic fury to slower, earth-shattering, and crushingly bleak expositions of doom, to illuminating drifts through astral planes or across the yawning maw of deep space. Sweeping and soaring movements of vast and alien grandeur are juxtaposed against harrowing, blood-freezing storms of shock and awe. All of the releases are immersive; the songs are long, but for this listener the minutes seem to pass without any consciousness that time is passing.

I provide that prelude to explain the thrill I felt when I learned that Imperceptum’s sole creator (who goes by the nom de guerre Void) has another project, a death metal operation named Abominations. Abominations released two demos in 2016 — Realms of Horror and Darkness and Insanity — and a debut album, Summoning Death, will be released in March. Today we bring you a stream of its first single, “Invasion of Unearthly Beings“. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD ON A SATURDAY (PART 2): THY CATAFALQUE, GRAVEYARD, SKELETAL REMAINS, BLACK ROYAL, OUTER HEAVEN

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  5 Responses »
Feb 172018
 

 

Still playing catch-up after a week devoted mainly to premieres, I picked the following five tracks to conclude this two-part Saturday round-up. I’m definitely not caught up yet, but this will have to do for now. More catching up will happen tomorrow, with the usual Sunday focus on black metal.

THY CATAFALQUE

Tamás Kátai has recorded a new Thy Catafalque album, and I could hardly be more excited to hear it. If perchance you haven’t discovered Thy Catafalque, carve out some time this weekend and go explore the Bandcamp page, which I’ve linked below. I think you’ll find the music distinctive and enthralling.

The new album (the eighth one) is Geometria, and Season of Mist plans to release it on May 4. Tamás explains that this one includes violins, electronica, occasional saxophone, trumpet, and fretless bass, plus the voices of Martina Veronika Horváth (Nulah, Niburta) and Gyula Vasvári (Perihelion), in addition to his own. Viktoria Varga also provides narration. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD ON A SATURDAY (PART 1): AUGURY, THE CROWN, DRUDKH, ROTTING CHRIST

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  6 Responses »
Feb 172018
 


Augury – photo by Mélany Champagne

 

I made a resolution last night: I resolved that henceforth I will post no more than two premieres a day, and only one per day if it’s a full album stream. During the week just ended, I posted 14 premieres, and two of those were full albums.

I might not care about the volume if I could be content to write little more than, “Here — listen to this!”, and then just provide the music stream. But where’s the fun in that? Besides the fun, I feel a compulsion to include reviews with the premieres, even if only the bands or labels might pay attention to what I write. Given that mindset, working on a big flood of premieres tends to constrict my ability to do anything else — such as compile round-ups like this one.

Full disclosure: I’ve made resolutions like this one before, and couldn’t stick to them. Did I mention that we’ll have another premiere tomorrow? It’s really good!

Anyway, as you can see, this is a two-part round-up. I decided to collect some older arrivals in this first part, organized alphabetically. My colleague DGR suggested all of them for a newsy post that would have been timely if I’d been able to get it done when he made the suggestions. Maybe some of these will still be news to a few of you despite the delay. They also involve higher profile bands; I’ve got some lesser-known groups for Part 2. Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: PUREST OF PAIN — “THE SOLIPSIST”

 Premieres  No Responses »
Feb 162018
 

 

Purest of Pain is a Dutch melodic death metal band led by guitarist and principal songwriter Merel Bechtold of Delain (and also a member of MaYaN and The Gentle Storm, with Anneke van Giersbergen and Arjen Anthony Lucassen). In Purest of Pain, her bandmates now include Delain drummer Joey de Boer, guitarist Michael van Eck, vocalist J.D. Kaye, and bassist Frank van Leeuwen.

Purest of Pain’s debut album, Solipsis, will be released on March 1st, building on the band’s 2013 single, “Momentum”, and their 2011 EP, Revelations In Obscurity. Today we present a lyric video for a song from the album called “The Solipsist“. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: SSANAHTES — “LET DOWN”

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Feb 162018
 

 

Let’s begin with the name of this band from Bordeaux, which for someone like me is best copy-pasted to avoid the misspelling that would otherwise inevitably result: It is the Romanian word for Satan — spelled backwards. And there is indeed something about the music of Ssanahtes on their self-titled debut album that is both up-ending and devilish. A couple of songs from the album have emerged so far in the run-up to its March 22 release, and now we present another, the name of which is “Let Down“.

That’s the song’s name, but it will definitely not let you down. A composition that might be thought of as an intersection of post-metal and sludge, it manages simultaneously to be bleak, bone-breaking, and astral (or perhaps “spectral” would be an equally good word). But perhaps above all else, “Let Down” delivers immense, pavement-cracking rhythmic power. In the end, you might feel transported, lifted off your feet, but also battered by the vigorous application of a crowbar to the back of your neck. Continue reading »

SHORT BUT SWEET: STEALING AXION — “ETERNITIES”

 Album Reviews  1 Response »
Feb 162018
 

 

(This is TheMadIsraeli’s review of the new EP by Seattle-based Stealing Axion, which was released on February 13 and is available now on Bandcamp.)

 

Stealing Axion appeared for all intents and purposes finished once the band announced a more-than-likely-to-be-permanent hiatus after the release of the phenomenal Aeons, an album that was one of my absolute favorites of 2014. Ever since their debut EP, I’ve been a devoted and avid fan of the band’s unique blend of progressive metal song structuring, death metal vocal approach, and Meshuggah/Textures-inspired angular rhythmic and melodic strategies. They became one of my favorite bands to emerge from the 2010‘s, a hallmark of what new-age meets old-school transcendent genius sounds like. I guess I’m really hamming it the fuck up here, but I do adore this band.

Stealing Axion announced last year that they would continue without vocalist/guitarist Josh DeShazo, with no real news to speak of after that. As it turns out, Josh DeShazo ended up rejoining the band, and Eternities is a four-song EP born from this reunion. It brings back everything about this band that made them great. Eternities isn’t particularly ground breaking, nor does it see the band exploring new territory per se, but it is definitely a mish-mash of the more energetic direction of the debut Moments combined with the introspective melancholic approach of Aeons, one that forecasts a direction for a future release that I’m eager to hear. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: THUNDERWALKER — “TO NONEXISTENCE”

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Feb 162018
 

 

Forgive me for introducing this song premiere with a personal story. By sheer unhappy coincidence, when I first contemplated listening to ThunderWalker’s “To Nonexistence” early one morning I wanted to end my own existence because I had damaged myself so severely. The combination of lack of sleep and a cataclysmic hangover left me a quivering mass of abject misery. I really didn’t want to listen to heavy metal, or any other sound, although I couldn’t stop the low intermittent groans that seemed to be coming from my own throat. But I played “To Nonexistence” anyway… and an unexpected thing happened.

I felt instantly revived. I couldn’t resist moving my head despite how much it hurt. I did that leg-bobbing thing that dudes do when they’re trying to keep time with rhythmically powerful music (but that women never seem to do). The song put a jolt of electricity through my depleted internal batteries. At least for a few minutes, I didn’t feel like death warmed over. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: STORM UPON THE MASSES — “THE ONES WHO CAME BACK”

 Premieres  2 Responses »
Feb 152018
 

 

The song you’re about to hear doesn’t last long — roughly two-and-a-quarter minutes — but it’s a hell of a fine example of how much can be packed into a short interval by people who know what they’re doing. In this case the song is “The Ones Who Came Back” by the Belgian death metal band Storm Upon the Masses, and it’s the title track to their debut album, which will be released by Dolorem Records on March 23rd.

Clues to the band’s attack can be found in their label’s recommendation of the album to fans of Hour of Penance, Hideous Divinity, and Krisiun, and in the fact that the album was mixed and mastered by Stefano Morabito at 16th Cellar Studio in Rome, who has worked with the first two of those other bands as well as Fleshgod Apocalypse (among others). A further clue might be found in the cover art created by Daemorph (Avulsed, The Black Dahlia Murder, Acranius). Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: SNAKEFEAST — “ITCH”

 Premieres  2 Responses »
Feb 152018
 

 

Late last month The Obelisk premiered a song called “Pyre” from the forthcoming second album (In Chaos, Solace) by the genre-fracturing Baltimore band Snakefeast. When I heard the song, my eyes probably couldn’t have opened wider without my eyeballs falling out. The Obelisk’s take on the music seemed on-point:  “a fusion of jazz, metal, weighted-groove grind and post-hardcore, but however many subgenres they may or may not be throwing into their scorching aesthetic melting pot, they’re unquestionably working on a wavelength of their own….”

Having been so pleasantly surprised and bewildered by that track, I jumped at the chance to bring out another premiere, a song called “Itch” that’s just as boisterous, as disruptive, and as captivating as “Pyre”. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: BYYRTH — “BLOOD WARFARE”

 Premieres  No Responses »
Feb 152018
 

 

Not for nothing is the music of Byyrth heralded as “vampyric black metal”. Not for nothing is their new album entitled Echoes from the Seven Caves of Blood. And not for nothing is the opening track named “Blood Warfare“.

A venomous riff swirls and squalls in the song’s opening moments, setting the stage for a track that packs plenty of hooks and malignant intent, surrounded by an air of rampant savagery. A hammering drum beat kicks in, anchoring the advent of ominous, groaning, and seething guitar noise, accompanying a cacophony of wild, blood-letting shrieks and incendiary cries. And Byyrth also indulge a side of their sound with punk roots, moving the music with a swaggering rock beat and infectious chords… but never pulling back from the murderous blood-lust that gnashes within the boiling black core of the song. Continue reading »

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