AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE: GRAVESLAVE — “SICK/NASTY”

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Jun 292017
 

 

You may not have noticed, but we had some nasty technical difficulties at our site today, thanks to an update from the company we pay to keep our server from becoming infected with malware (created by among the lowest forms of human life), said update disabling our ability to edit and publish new posts. I’m normally a calm, patient person. Today, for hours, I felt violently unhinged.

Ironically, the principal casuality of this bizarre takedown by our paid protector was a band whose music actually provides the kind of cathartic release that might have prevented me from trying to throttle the throats of the people who caused this mishap if they’d been within reach of my clutching fingers. Listening to Graveslave‘s album one more time tonight, I feel calmer. It is Sick/Nasty, and as you will discover, it is sick and nasty — but it holds other delights as well. Continue reading »

AN NCS EP PREMIERE: LJOSAZABOJSTWA — “SYCHODŽAŃNIE”

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Jun 292017
 

 

Last June, late to the party, I discovered Staražytnaje licha, the debut demo of a Belarusian black/death band named Ljosazabojstwa (which means something like “murder of fate”). The demo was originally released by the band in digital form in December 2015 and was then reissued the following year on CD by Hellthrasher Productions (with a bonus track, the 9-minute opener “Struk u horła chrysta”). I concluded my review in this way: “This is a very, very strong debut with high re-play value that ought to get your head moving (along with the rest of your body).”

Now, Ljosazabojstwa have returned with a new EP (though it’s substantial for an EP, with a 32-minute run-time). This one is named Sychodžańnie, and it will be released tomorrow by the same Hellthrasher Productions that reissued the first one. Today we’re very happy to let you listen to all of it through our premiere of a full stream. Continue reading »

SAVE THE DATES: ANNOUNCING NORTHWEST TERROR FEST 2018

 Metal News  2 Responses »
Jun 292017
 

 

The first edition of Northwest Terror Fest came to an end late Saturday night, the 17th of June, 2017. The response of both the bands and the audience was so enthusiastic, and the festival went so smoothly, that before the last of the festival organizers had left for the final after party, we put down a deposit on the two main venues for Northwest Terror Fest 2018. And today we can make it official: Northwest Terror Fest will take place again next year in Seattle on May 31-June 2, 2018, at Neumos, Barboza, and Highline.

NCS co-presented this year’s NWTF, and I had the fascinating (and sometimes harrowing) experience of being directly involved in it from the earliest planning stages straight through to helping load out the backline gear on the Sunday after it ended. It was exhilarating to watch everything come together as well as it did — and I still plan in the very hear future to share some more detailed thoughts about that experience.

In the meantime, I encourage you to read the beautifully written show reports (and check out the concert photos) that have appeared this week (here and here) at Invisible Oranges (whose editor Joseph Schafer was likewise directly involved in NWTF 2017 from start to finish). Continue reading »

ORIGIN: “UNPARALLELED UNIVERSE”

 Album Reviews  5 Responses »
Jun 292017
 

 

(TheMadIsraeli reviews the new album by Origin, which will be released on June 30.)

Origin are one of death metal’s most unique standouts from the 2000s-era of death metal. Their brand of chaotically fast, noisy, cosmic, techy deathgrind has never been done better, nor even really emulated properly, and that’s because this band has always had a consistent vision. Or rather, Paul Ryan and John Longstreth have had consistent vision. The Origin sound is unmistakable and it has remained so, to their benefit and at their peril.

Unparalleled Universe is Origin’s best record since new vocalist Jason Keyser joined back in 2011, especially compared to 2014‘s Omnipresent, which was received… not as well as the rest of Origin’s discography. I suspect the Origin guys felt this, and maybe even felt that way about Omnipresent themselves after the dust had settled, because Unparalleled Universe is a step up. It has some of the best songwriting, riff-craft, and consistently belligerent sonic matter obliteration they’ve ever created. Continue reading »

HARDCORE COMES CLAWING BACK (THOUGHTS OF IONESCO, LESS ART, ILLUSTRATIONS, MIRACLE DRUG, COUCH SLUT)

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Jun 292017
 


Thoughts of Ionesco, 1999, in Pontiac, Michigan (photo by CJ Benninger)

 

(Todd Manning is back, and brings with him a group of recommended releases from a collection of killer bands whose names you see in the title of this post.)

Roughly a year ago, I wrote an article here discussing several hardcore releases and I mentioned how if Black Metal held sway in the winter, I felt Hardcore lay claim to the sweltering summer. But now I am also willing to consider that there are cycles within cycles, and am reflecting a bit on the genre in its longer trajectory.

While nothing really ever goes completely out of style in these postmodern times, I can say with some conviction that Metal in all its forms kind of steamrolled over Hardcore in the first decade of the new century, at least in terms of overall popularity. Sure, D-Beat has certainly thrived in recent times, but those bands are pretty much settled into the same aesthetic as their Metal brethren, and Death Metal and Black Metal bands alike borrow quite liberally from the genre.

But now, I’m starting to feel that other forms of Hardcore are beginning to claw their way back into the conversation, and I wanted to touch on some recent releases that those who care should definitely make an effort to seek out. Continue reading »

WINDS OF LENG: “HORRID DOMINION”

 Album Reviews  6 Responses »
Jun 282017
 

 

(This is Andy Synn’s review of the new album by Arizona’s Winds of Leng.)

Riddle me this, riddle me that… what do you get if you combine the gruesome riffosity of classic Dismember with the merciless melodic menace of The Black Dahlia Murder?

You get Horrid Dominion, the stunning debut by Winds of Leng, that’s what. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE: CONTRA — “DENY EVERYTHING”

 Album Reviews, Premieres  2 Responses »
Jun 282017
 

 

July 1st is the date set for the release of the debut album by Cleveland-based Contra. Entitled Deny Everything, it will come at you via Robustfellow Productions/Shifty Records. Today we’ve got a full stream of the album for you.

The very first half-minute of the album’s first track, “Human Buzzsaw”, tells you that the Contra crew know how to cook up thick, swampy, bluesy, physically compulsive riffs, and as the song proceeds you find that the band are equally adept at lacing their music with trippy soloing and draping it in a cloak of gloom. You’ll also experience the scraped-raw tirades of vocalist Larry Brent, which help to give the music a hard edge of incipient violence (and mental instability). Continue reading »

LIVERUM: “DISCOVER YOUR LAND”

 Album Reviews  2 Responses »
Jun 282017
 

 

(TheMadIsraeli wrote this review of the debut album by the Norwegian/Polish band Liverum.)

Gojira has disappointed me as of late. Sure, I reviewed L’Enfant Sauvage with enthusiasm at the time, but there were a few conditions my enthusiasm was contingent upon. A: the assumption that the album was a one-off that was not a sign of things to come; B: the hope that the blatantly more commercial elements and attempts to be softer that they’d been teasing at since The Way Of All Flesh were just a phase; and C: the wish that the next album wouldn’t dial back the very essence of this band even further.

While co-writers of mine enjoyed Magma I thought it was nothing short of blasphemy to the Gojira name. Since then, I’ve looked for bands that channeled Gojira, not in precisely literal musical terms but at least in spirit, for sure. Continue reading »

STEED: “SURROUNDED BY COWARDS”

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Jun 272017
 

 

(Todd Manning rejoins us with a review of the debut album by Indiana’s Steed.)

In the age of all things old become new again, we often see modern day Metal musicians looking to the genre’s forefathers for guidance, and Indianapolis-based quartet Steed have certainly learned their lessons well. Their debut full-length, Surrounded by Cowards, was issued near the end of April courtesy of Small Hand Factory Records, who successfully tapped a similar vein recently with Kulthammer’s Oath.

The key here is Steed’s ability to meld the songwriting chops of the genre masters with the grit of today’s underground. Album opener, “Speed Weed Steed” sets the stage with its venomous mix of underground Thrash and Motörhead. There is an undeniable Punk edge to the proceedings as well, the kind of swagger that is sure to keep their audiences drinking and fist-pumping, engaging in all things lawless and belligerent. Continue reading »

ULVER LIVE AT ROADBURN 2017: A PHOTOGRAPHIC ESSAY BY LEVAN TK

 Concert Reviews  No Responses »
Jun 272017
 

 

On the final night of the Roadburn Festival in Tilburg this year, Norway’s Ulver used the main stage as the setting for an album release show, performing all the songs from their latest album The Assassination of Julius Caesar, though not necessarily in the order of the album presentation. Segmented by instrumental interludes and enhanced by a spectacular light show, it was a performance that by all accounts was a great success, even if it might have caught some onlookers by surprise if they hadn’t yet heard anything from this new record (which we reviewed here). On the other hand, for those familiar with Ulver’s musical odyssey, the experience of being surprised is no longer a surprise — it is to be expected.

Many other bands performed on Day Four of Roadburn, but the formidable concert photographer Levan TK — whose photo essays from the first three days we’ve posted previously (collected here) — concentrated on Ulver, talking with Kristoffer Rygg before the show and shooting a multitude of photos during the performance. For this final installment in his pictorial memorial to Roadburn 2017, we present Levan’s selection from those photos. If only we could have been there, too…. Continue reading »

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