BEYOND GRACE: “SEEKERS” IS ON THE WAY

 Metal News  9 Responses »
Apr 262017
 

 

Shameless cronyism alert: Andy Synn, my old friend and steadfast NCS comrade for the last six and a half years, is the frontman for the band that’s the subject of this news announcement — Beyond Grace. With that pesky disclosure out of the way, here’s a synopsis of the news we’re announcing (with more detail to follow): Beyond Grace’s new album Seekers is complete; it will be released in July; it features cover art by Michael Cowell; and it will become available for pre-order on Monday, May 1st.

Now for the details. First of all, the image at the top of this post is only the top portion of the cover art created by Michael Cowell (who has a web presence here). This is what the middle and lower portions look like, along with the complete piece: Continue reading »

TORTURIZED: “OMNIVORE”

 Album Reviews  No Responses »
Apr 252017
 

 

(DGR wrote this review of the new album by Germany’s Torturized.)

Here at NCS, we’re proud of the spelunking we do to find underground metal, in between our fawning over the genre as a whole. We also enjoy helping get folks’ names out there — in my case, especially when it comes to some machine-precise death metal.

The idea of musicians as machinery is one that still proves exciting, and hearing a band execute on that idea to crank out some crushing death metal still impresses. Which is how I wound up at the doorstep of Torturized‘s disc Omnivore. Continue reading »

AN NCS SPLIT PREMIERE: FUMIGATION / THE PATH TO R’LYEH — “INVASION”

 Premieres  No Responses »
Apr 252017
 

 

(Austin Weber introduces our premiere of a new split by two Canadian bands, Fumigation and The Path To R’lyeh.)

Split releases are a great way to discover more than one new band at once, and even in the digital age, the split-release tradition runs strong in the metal world. So here we are today offering up an early stream of killer Canadian death metal from Fumigation and The Path To R’lyeh, two bands with quite different sounds within the death metal sphere. A yin and yang type release, if you will, one that I hope our readers will enjoy. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: CRYPT ROT — “EMBRYONIC DEVILS”

 Album Reviews, Premieres  1 Response »
Apr 252017
 

Crypt Rot are a relatively new Ohio band whose line-up includes current and former members of such groups as Homewrecker and Scorched (with whom they’ll be releasing a split later this year). Their debut album Embryonic Devils will be released by Southern Lord on April 28th, and today we’ve got a full stream with which to violate your earholes.

The music on the album is a head-wrecking horror, but the album title could be misleading. These are not embryonic devils. Both Crypt Rot and their songs are full-grown, fully formed devils with a monstrous capacity for spreading pestilence, destruction, and an atmosphere of paranormal terror and derangement. Continue reading »

BARDO METHODOLOGY IN PRINT

 Metal News  9 Responses »
Apr 242017
 

 

Niklas Göransson is a Swedish writer whose impulses and talents have led him to create something very special for serious fans of metal whose interests go beyond the pleasures and enlightenment of the sounds themselves. He named his creation Bardo Methodology.

According to Göransson‘s own explanation of how Bardo Methodology came to be born, he had been intermittently contributing articles to Sweden Rock Magazine, and in late 2015 began the exercise of translating some of his writings into English and publishing them online. In early 2016 he conducted an interview of Deströyer 666, with only two pages allotted to the discussion in Sweden Rock Magazine. And so he “ended up with the vengeful boil in every writer’s posterior; excess material too good to discard.” And as a result, Bardo Methodology was born, as an online vehicle for presenting that interview in full, and one thing led to another.

The site was launched in March 2016 with a collection of translated, stockpiled interviews appearing on the first day. By June, something new was appearing on a weekly basis, and that weekly publication schedule has been followed ever since, like clockwork — here.

Now, Niklas Göransson has taken a further step and has begun publishing a print edition that’s so distinctive I felt compelled to help spread the word about it. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): VERMIN LORD — “MOURNING”

 Album Reviews, Premieres  No Responses »
Apr 242017
 

 

This marks the fourth time we’ve written abut the music of Seattle’s Vermin Lord. The first time was a review of the project’s excellent 2016 album Anguish, and then we wrote about a single that was released in January of this year, followed in March by our review and premiere of a two-song EP (Visions Of A Cursed Warlock). And now we’re spreading the word about Vermin Lord’s new album Mourning, which is being released today.

Part of what makes Vermin Lord’s music so intriguing (and this is certainly true of the new album) is its unpredictable blending of disparate musical influences. This album in particular brings to mind the term “baroque”, which in one of the word’s dictionary meanings refers to a style of artistic expression “marked generally by use of complex forms, bold ornamentation, and the juxtaposition of contrasting elements often conveying a sense of drama, movement, and tension”. Continue reading »

AN NCS EP PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): BLURRING — “CLOUD BURNER”

 Album Reviews, Premieres, SHORT BUT SWEET  3 Responses »
Apr 242017
 

 

(Austin Weber brings us the full streaming premiere of the new EP by Blurring, along with an introductory review.)

 

After the breakup of Brutal Truth, the band’s members have continued on in multiple outfits, one of the finest of which is Rochester, New York-based technical grindcore act Blurring.

Blurring is a new vehicle for legendary bassist Dan Lilker (Brutal Truth, Nuclear Assault, former founding member of Anthrax, countless others) and multi-instrumentalist Erik Burke (Sulaco, ex-Kalibas, ex-Lethargy, countless others) on drums, combining their immense talents with other like-minded top-notch musicians to form one of the absolute best grindcore bands currently active.

While the band had some demos and other releases preceding their 2015 self-titled album, it was that release that really got me hooked on their complex and disturbing brand of grindcore. Some of you might have caught my review for it here at NCS; if not, now’s your chance to check out Blurring — don’t fuck up. The band is set to release Cloud Burner on April 28th, a fantastic five-song EP that we’re streaming early in full today. Continue reading »

SHADES OF BLACK (PART 2): CORPUS CHRISTII, DO SKONU, MERRIMACK, NYOGTHAEBLISZ, VAINA

 SHADES OF BLACK  7 Responses »
Apr 242017
 

 

This completes the two-part post I started yesterday, collecting music in a blackened vein that I sifted from my discoveries over the last week. Beginning yesterday and continuing today, the music is organized in alphabetical order by band name.

CORPUS CHRISTII

Delusion is the eighth full-length by the Portuguese black metal band Corpus Christii. It will be released on April 28 by Folter Records. In another one of these SHADES OF BLACK editions, I wrote about the album’s powerful first single, “The Curse Within Time”, and now a second one has appeared, which is yet another sign of this album’s excellence. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: EVOKE THY LORDS — “LIFESTORIES”

 Exceptions to the Rule, Premieres  1 Response »
Apr 242017
 

 

(Reverend B., a metal musician from Siberian Russia, introduces our premiere of the new Solitude Productions album by his compatriots in Evoke Thy Lords, whose previous works we’ve also enthusiastically covered at this site)

Evoke Thy Lords are a name, as one would say, widely recognized in narrow circles. They are one of the oldest doom bands in Siberia, and they started off as followers of the doom/death wave that was still strong in Russia in those days, but with a twist — they used a flute very prominently in the music. Since those days, one could argue only that flute remained, as they had a very drastic change of sound they’ve been following for several releases now — stoner doom with a focus on the psychedelic aspects of the genre. First Drunken Tales, then Boys! Raise Giant Mushrooms in Your Cellar!, and today, the plainly-named Lifestories reaches us. Continue reading »

SHADES OF BLACK (PART 1): ÆRA, ALL MY SINS, AMIENSUS, ANHEDONIC, CAOIMHÍN

 Album Reviews, Exceptions to the Rule, SHADES OF BLACK, SHORT BUT SWEET  1 Response »
Apr 232017
 

 

I whittled the great limb of blackened music I found over the last week down to a spear, but it was a spear with 10 barbs. I organized the music alphabetically by band name and decided, as I stared at what I’d done, that music from 10 bands was too much for a single post. So, I’ve divided it into two parts, while maintaining the alphabetical ordering. I haven’t finished writing Part 2, so not sure if it will come later today or tomorrow (but probably tomorrow).

ÆRA

Of Forsworn Vows is the debut EP of a two-man project named ÆRA (the creator of all the music seems to be from Chile, the vocalist from Missouri). It was digitally released in February, but it’s now available on tape through Desolated Woods Records, and it appears that Aeternitas Tenebrarum plans to make a CD release (the Bandcamp download has been updated so that the tracks now consist of the CD masters). Continue reading »

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