SEEN AND HEARD: DYING FETUS, SVARTSYN, BONEHUNTER, FEEDING

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  1 Response »
Apr 202017
 

 

Yeah, I know I did two of these round-ups yesterday, but I’m drowning in new music — but it’s the good kind of drowning, where you see the bright white light at the end of the tunnel and will never figure out in your moment of euphoria before the void takes you that it was just some dude with a flashlight trying to find your corpse in the pond you fell into while wasted.

Where was I? Oh yeah, I’m drowning in good new metal. However, I’m running out of time before I have to tend to my fucking day job, so I’m just going to pick quickly, one each from Columns A, B, C, and D from the genre menu, and cut back on the usual verbosity. Expect another round-up tomorrow.

DYING FETUS

Here’s a video that appeared today for “Fixated On Devastation”, a track from the new Dying Fetus album, Wrong One To Fuck With. It was filmed by Mitch Massie live at the Voltage Lounge in Philadelphia, PA, on March 17th. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: SNARES OF SIXES — “THE MOTHER’S THROAT”

 Premieres  No Responses »
Apr 202017
 

 

Five years ago, during a period of down-time in the affairs of the now-disbanded Agalloch, Jason Walton began working on a new musical endeavor, one in which he indulged a taste (and a yearning) for experimentation that has been manifested in differing ways through other Walton projects such as Self Spiller, Especially Like Sloth, and Nothing. The result is a head-spinning EP named Yeast Mother: An Electroacoustic Mass, which is about to be released under the name chosen by Walton for this particular endeavor — Snares of Sixes.

In order to achieve his kaleidoscopic visions for the recordings, stripped down to the four tracks that appear on Yeast Mother…, Walton enlisted contributions from a significant number of  artists, whose names we’ll list below. But first, here are a few reactions to the track from Yeast Mother… that we’re bringing you today in advance of the EP’s May 5 release by Crucial Blast. Its name is “The Mother’s Throat“ Continue reading »

AN NCS EP PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): AMNUTSEBA — UNTITLED DEMO

 Album Reviews, Premieres, SHORT BUT SWEET  18 Responses »
Apr 202017
 

 

“Amnutseba has risen from the gutters of the Parisian black metal scene to propose a glimpse into the vortex of insanity.” So say the mysterious figures behind this new band, and they have said little else except through the music on their first demo, which will be released today on tape by Caligari Records. But as you’re about to hear, the music speaks with a powerful and mesmerizing voice.

The demo is untitled, as are the four songs it includes (identified only by Roman numerals). The stream we’re providing runs like the tape, as one continuous track rather than divided into four separate streams, though you’ll be able to tell when one song ends and the next begins. Continue reading »

AN NCS INTERVIEW: CHELSEA WOLFE

 Exceptions to the Rule, Interviews  1 Response »
Apr 202017
 

 

(Greek writer John Sleepwalker of Avopolis.gr returns to NCS with this interview of Chelsea Wolfe conducted in advance of her appearance in Athens on April 29 at the Smoke the Fuzz Fest with Amenra, Oathbreaker, and Skull & Dawn. )

 

Your style has reached out to audiences unfamiliar with experimental sounds, thanks to its remarkable accessibility. Do you believe diversity can be an obstacle when aiming at new horizons, and how much do you see your sound further developing? When should we expect a new full-length release?

CW: I think sometimes being difficult to define can hold an artist back from certain opportunities, but I’ve been really lucky to still have support from a lot of really great people despite being sort of in-between genres. When I’m writing a new album I just follow my instincts and pay attention to what my bandmates and I are writing naturally, and then we hone in on that and refine it. We actually just finished recording a new album and if all goes well, it’ll be out later this year. Continue reading »

PROFANITY: “THE ART OF SICKNESS”

 Album Reviews  1 Response »
Apr 202017
 

 

(DGR delivers this big review of the new album by Germany’s Profanity.)

If one were to play the numbers game with German three-piece death metal band Profanity and their album releases, one could say that it has been quite some time since the group’s last full-length album — and basically have it qualify as one of the understatements of the year.

The band, having sprung back into life after a decade-plus of on/off activity since their last release, put out an EP in late 2014 known as Hatred Hell Within, an EP that consisted of three songs but could’ve easily passed as an album, given the denseness of the material contained within.

Profanity like writing big brutal death metal songs. Not big in terms of bombast, but in terms of how much they can pack within the six-plus minutes many of their songs tend to take. This mentality has continued onward with the group’s newest release, The Art Of Sickness, coming in a little under three years since that Hatred Hell Within EP.

Containing a deceptive six songs within its tracklist, The Art Of Sickness leaves its listeners looking like one of those idiot TV show hosts right after ordering a gigantic meal, as the realization finally hits them that there is actually a lot on that plate, despite the overwhelming confidence with which they approached it and the initially deceptive appearance. Continue reading »

AN NCS INTERVIEW: SOLACE (TOMMY SOUTHARD)

 Interviews  1 Response »
Apr 192017
 

 

(In this interview Comtrade Aleks checks in with guitarist Tommy Southard of New Jersey’s Solace.)

This dirty, angry and literally possessed stoner crew is known because of its charged and uncompromising delivery and damn vivid shows. They’ve shaken the New Jersey scene since 1996 and since then have achieved some recognition with three full-length albums, a few smaller releases, and a lot of live gigs.

Solace’s latest work “A.D.” was released in 2010, and that’s okay since the band’s members also play in more sinister and sludgy outfits like The Disease Concept, Social Decay, and Chrome Waves. They’re busy men, and they know well how to play loud and heavy.

I hadn’t heard anything new from Solace for awhile and was worried a bit. As result I got in touch with Tommy Southard (guitars) and he patiently answered my questions, helping with this retrospective interview. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: JYOTISAVEDANGA — “DISINTEGRATION TO ABSOLUTE VOID”

 Premieres  No Responses »
Apr 192017
 

 

Last fall the Indian label Cyclopean Eye Productions released the debut demo of a part-Indian, part-Russian trio who chose Jyotiṣavedāṅga for their name, a name that refers to the Vedāṅga Jyotiṣa, which we’re told is one of the earliest known Indian texts on astronomy and astrology. The demo has the evocative title Cannibal Coronal Mass Ejections. Cyclopean Eye is now releasing that demo in a CD edition that includes not only the original six tracks but also one previously unreleased bonus track, which we have the pleasure of premiering today.

This newly revealed piece of audio murder is “Disintegration To Absolute Void“. Drawing upon musical ingredients that include black metal, harsh power electronics, death metal, and the dying radiations of collapsing galaxies, the song is a shattering, staggering assault on the senses. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: HIGHLAND — “TOWARDS THE ABSOLUTE”

 Premieres  2 Responses »
Apr 192017
 

 

Earlier this month I listened to the first advance track from Loyal To the Nightsky, the debut album by a Los Angeles-based black metal band named Highland, in part because this new album features cover art by one of my favorites, Luciana Nedelea. It turned out that the first single, “Abu Sindi“, was strikingly good. And now we have the good fortune to share with you a second song from this very promising album, “Towards the Absolute“, in advance of the album’s release on May 15th.

Highland is a trio of Armenian-Americans — Narek, Gevork, and Michael — who first began performing together in a speed/thrash metal band named Raze. But as time passed they turned their talents in a different direction, building upon the antecedents of Scandinavian black metal from the ’90s, with a self-titled EP in 2013 as their first work in this direction. They’ve performed with the likes of Absu, Vader, Bölzer, and Marduk, but I suspect this new album is going to elevate their profile even more substantially. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD (PART 2): JUST BEFORE DAWN, AQUILUS, REEK OF MARTYR, LYING FIGURES, DARKREVERIE

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  5 Responses »
Apr 192017
 

 

As mentioned in the first installment of this mid-week round-up earlier today, I have enough items I want to spread around, and enough time to do it, that I’ve divided the collection into multiple segments. There might even be a Part 3, but we’ll see how the day goes.

Part 1 was a sequence of songs specifically organized as a playlist because of a certain flow and mood in the music, at least as discerned by my twisted head. This Part 2 has no unifying theme, other than my own interest in everything here. There are a couple of news items at the outset, and then some very good music.

JUST BEFORE DAWN

Just Before Dawn will be a familiar name to regular NCS visitors, but for any newcomers, it has been the studio project of Swedish musician Anders Biazzi and his drumming ally Brynjar Helgetun, with a changing array of vocalists and guitar soloists. It’s one of my favorite current purveyors of old school Swedish death metal. And now JBD will be moving out of the studio in order to destroy a few stages. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD (PART 1): HELENGARD, NOITUMA, SOLMUND, SADNESS, NACHTZEIT, CHÊNE

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  5 Responses »
Apr 192017
 

 

Last night as I was making my way through my ever-changing list of new music to check out, I had the good fortune of finding many of the songs you’re about to hear. They were scattered among a larger collection of things I listened to, some of which will come in Part 2 of this post, but it dawned on me that these in particular would make for good companions on an interesting (and sorrowful) musical trip, especially if combined with a few others I had heard recently. I’ve arranged them in a way I think makes some sense, with a flow in the changing sounds and moods that I found appealing.

One other thing about this playlist I found appealing is that it represents (mostly) a course change in the music on the site. In recent days we’ve been heavy into various shades of black and death metal. Most of these songs represent a departure from that — and a fairly dramatic one in the case of the first three tracks below. (Thanks to my friend Miloš for sending me the links through which I found two-thirds of these tracks.)

HELENGARD

I should mention that most of the songs in this post are drawn from complete albums or EPs that have recently been released. I wish I had time to write about them more thoroughly, but I’m only going to comment about specific songs and let those guide your decisions about whether to explore the albums in greater depth. The first song comes from Firebird, the new album by the Ukrainian band Helengard, which was released on April 14th. Continue reading »

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