AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): GOLDENPYRE — “IN EMINENT DISGRACE”

 Album Reviews, Premieres  No Responses »
Apr 182017
 

 

You were meant to suffer, to experience the collapse of empirical foundations you thought could be relied upon, to bend before winds of pestilence, shuddering in a last paroxysm before suffocation claims you and your remains are consumed in a deluge of fire. Raise high a crown for decadence… because Yod Sabbaoth cannot save you.

Judging from the song titles in Goldenpyre‘s debut album, In Eminent Disgrace, all of which I just worked into that first paragraph above, this Portuguese band’s outlook on existence is morbid and brutal… or perhaps not… but they’ve certainly done a hell of a job capturing the ravaging horrors of insanity, disease, and death in their first full-length. The album will be released on April 20 by Signal Rex and a consortium of other labels, and today we present a full stream of its eight songs. Continue reading »

THE COVENANT MONTREAL 2017: A FESTIVAL REPORT

 Concert Reviews  9 Responses »
Apr 182017
 

 

(One of our loyal allies, Conchobar, had the good fortune to attend The Covenant Montreal festival on April 13-15, 2017, at La Salla Rossa, and was kind enough to share the following impressions of the event, along with his photos of the performances.)

 

“Ye Who sow discord, where are you? Ye who infuse hatred and propagate enmities, I conjure you by Him who hath created you for this ministry, to fulfil this work…”

Montreal is one of my favourite cities in this strange, fragmented nation of ours. After the calamity that befell the ill-fated Messe des Morts VI in November, we had an easy decision regarding a return trip after looking at the line-up for Covenant Montreal. Covenant has been active since 2015, the inner circle being composed of members of Auroch/Mitochondrion, Crooked Mouth, and other acts. Continue reading »

LUCIFER’S DUNGEON — “UNCONCIOUS FAITH”

 Metal News  No Responses »
Apr 172017
 

 

The Dark Army Raises is the debut album of the Russian band Lucifer’s Dungeon. It was originally released in digital form by the band earlier this year but is now slated for wider distribution on CD (and digitally) by GrimmDistribution on May 7th. Today we’re helping spread the word about the new release by hosting a stream of the album’s second track, “Unconcious Faith“. And while this may not qualify as a premiere, given the album’s previous digital release, it will probably be the first exposure to the album by many of our visitors.

For that reason, it’s also worth noting that the tracks on The Dark Army Raises do not all sound alike. While black metal shapes much of the album, even in those songs the music diverges. “War”, for example, is alternately brooding and chillingly delirious, while “Burn Your Dogma” is haunting and depressive in its slower movements and anguished in its bursts of speed and intensity.

Yet black metal is only one of this hour-long album’s faces; it also includes ambient tracks, such as the opener, “Dungeon”, in which ethereal choral voices rise up above dark, droning tones that create an ominous atmosphere, and “The Last Day of the World”, which is mystical and hypnotic, gleaming and cold. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): WOLFKHAN — “CYBER NECRO SPIRITUALS”

 Album Reviews, Premieres  1 Response »
Apr 172017
 

 

Even the most serious of musicians, across all genres of music, have been known to take whimsical digressions from their main lines of pursuit. Sometimes the results sound like a joke, and sometimes the result is less whimsical, more accomplished, and more fun than we might expect at first blush. Which brings us to the very strange but very addictive first full album by Wolfkhan, Cyber Necro Spirituals.

Wolfkhan is the side-project of Marcin Gąsiorowski, who is the male vocalist and one of the guitarists for the folk/metal band Thy Worshiper (whose most recent album, Klechdy, came out last year). Cyber Necro Spirituals will be released on April 25th by Arachnophobia Records. Continue reading »

CUT UP: “WHEREVER THEY MAY ROT”

 Album Reviews  1 Response »
Apr 172017
 

 

(In this post TheMadIsraeli reviews the new album by Sweden’s Cut Up.)

As someone who is a complete fucking nerd who enjoys analyzing nuances, subtleties, patterns, and periods within art, or the examples of all those contained within a particular artist’s body of work, I find few things more fascinating within the realms of music than the phenomenon of the extreme metal sophomore album. Mostly I’m impressed by its power to either make or break bands. If you release a killer debut and then a shitty sophomore album, or just one that doesn’t capitalize on the steam of the debut, you can absolutely tank your traction and name right then and there and never recover. Some bands can release a terrible debut and get away with it, but a band who start well take a big risk if they release a sophomore album that is anything less than excellent.

This subject may be worth a digression into a deeper conversation about what a sophomore album should accomplish, and maybe I’ll do an article on that alone someday, but for now the context is Cut Up. Continue reading »

SHADES OF BLACK: BESTIA ARCANA, VULPUS, LOTUS ASH, THROMOS, ARKHERON THODOL, KYRYEM

 Album Reviews, Reviews, SHADES OF BLACK  13 Responses »
Apr 162017
 

 

Salutations, and welcome to another edition of SHADES OF BLACK. As usual, I have a lot of new music I want to recommend that’s mainly in a blackened vein, perhaps more than usual this time. Below you’ll find brief reviews and streams of three complete albums of significant length, along with individual songs from three other recent or forthcoming releases. No two of these bands sound alike, each of them revealing their own distinctive character.

BESTIA ARCANA

In March of last year, Daemon Worship Productions launched a YouTube video which said nothing more than “Bestia Arcana. Holókauston is coming.” After doing further research I was unable to find more details but reported the event anyway, while commenting that the excerpts of music in the video “sound like the gates of Hell have been forced open, expelling great heaving waves of dark, terrifying, unearthly sound… some of it the sound of arcane ritual, some of it the sound of civilization being put to the torch”. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: PURE — “LE JOUR OÙ JE SUIS MORT”

 Premieres  1 Response »
Apr 162017
 

 

Earlier this month I wrote (here) about the two songs that were then available for streaming from J’aurais Dû, the new fourth album by the Swiss black metal project Pure, which will be released on May 13 by Symbol of Domination (Belarus) and Obscure Abhorrence(Germany). And now we bring you the opportunity to experience a third track in addition to those two: “Le jour où je suis mort” (the day I died).

Pure is a solo project founded by Bornyhake, from such bands as Borgne, Enoid, Deathrow, and Darvaza, and also a former member of Kawir. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD ON A SATURDAY: SLÆGT, CRUST, DEAD HEAD, THE RUINS OF BEVERAST, UNYIELDING LOVE, MASACHIST

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  5 Responses »
Apr 152017
 

 

One good thing about Good Friday was that my workplace had a holiday and so I stayed home, and therefore spent some time Friday night working my ears through a list of new metal I made this week instead of getting hammered with my co-workers, which is what usually happens on Fridays after work. As an additional bonus, I felt clear-headed this morning and ready for more listening (though with my head, “clear” is a relative term).

In an effort to keep this Saturday playlist from becoming too bloated, I decided not to write about some things that I figured most of our visitors have probably already discovered. But just in case you missed them, you can use these links to find the full stream of Nightbringer‘s new album at CVLT Nation (which we reviewed here), the first single from Suffocation‘s new album, a new Oranssi Pazuzu EP (Kevät/Värimyrsky), and a new song from the next Impetuous Ritual album.

SLÆGT

As explained in this review, I really, really liked Slægt‘s debut EP, Beautiful and Damned, and I chose one of its electrifying tracks for our list of 2015’s Most Infectious Songs. With an expanded line-up, Slægt have recorded their first album, I Smell Blood, which is slated for release on May 5 by Ván Records. Its name is Domus Mysterium. Continue reading »

DARK DISCOVERIES FROM HAMMER OF DAMNATION: ARTHANUS, AGNIDEVA, EVIL

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  1 Response »
Apr 142017
 

 

This is a holy day for billions of people, a day of fasting and penitence. Here, it’s just another day of discovery. Well, perhaps not just another day, perhaps a day where feelings of resistance, and worship of a different kind, feel more demanding. Anyway, collected here are some new discoveries.

I’m confident that all dedicated fans of metal have favorite labels, whose tastes have proven to connect with our own. My personal list of favorite labels is a long one, due to the wide-ranging nature of my own tastes. But after all this time, I made a new discovery yesterday that struck a chord, a label and distro from Sao Paulo, Brazil, named Hammer of Damnation, whose roots go back more than 20 years under the original name Pure Evil Productions. I don’t know why it took so long for me to make this discovery.

As revealed by its Bandcamp page (here), this label has a very long list of releases associated with its name, but I can tell already that its owner’s tastes intersect strongly with some of my own — and I hope yours as well.

And so the following four songs are from bands whose music will be released by Hammer of Damnation in the near future, or were released quite recently. The sounds are not all the same by any means, but it’s all very, very good stuff. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): ULVEGR — “TITAHION: KAOS MANIFEST”

 Album Reviews, Premieres  3 Responses »
Apr 142017
 

 

The new album by the Ukrainian heathen black metal band Ulvegr is multifaceted, but in all its dimensions it comes across as a deeply personal work, crafted and presented with utter conviction and unrelenting intensity, even in its least incendiary passages. The name of the album is Titahion: Kaos Manifest, and today we present its North American premiere in advance of its April 17th release through Ashen Dominion.

This is Ulvegr‘s fourth album since 2011, created by the band’s two steadfast members Helg (songwriting, vocals, guitar, bass) and Odalv (drums), with significant guest contributions by Astargh (lead and rhythm guitars and vocals), Hyozt (keys and samples), and Zhoth (vocals and voices on three tracks, and lyrics on two). For those new to Ulvegr, both Helg and Odalv are members of Kzohh, Ygg, and Runes of Dianceht, and Helg is also a member of Khors while Odalv also contributes his talents to Twilightfall and Elderblood. Continue reading »

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