AN NCS PREMIERE: UNDRASK — “BATTLE THROUGH TIME”

 Album Reviews, Premieres  2 Responses »
Jan 262017
 

 

‘Twas the night before Christmas, and all through our house, all the creatures were stirring, even the mouse — because on that day we posted “Conscripted”, a song by Undrask. Further stirring of a frenzied kind will be happening today, because we now have for you a full stream of this North Carolina band’s debut album Battle Through Time, this time on the eve of its January 27 release.

The album chronicles the story of “a man lost to eternity — forced to fight and die repeatedly throughout time and alternate realities.” That sounds like my typical work week at NCS. However, the actual (glorious) sound of the music is more consistent with a saga unfolding on a grander scale. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: A TRIO OF TRACKS FROM THE DISTURBING WORLD OF SLAGMAUR

 Premieres  8 Responses »
Jan 262017
 

 

The gestation of Thill Smitts Terror continues, but now we have a birth date: On March 30, 2017, Osmose Productions will release this new album conceived by the twisted imaginations within Slagmaur. We have for you today streams of three songs to disturb your peace of mind.

Thill Smitts Terror is the third album by these masked Norwegians, separated from its next-oldest sibling Von Rov Shelter by roughly six and a half years. Almost three years have now passed since I first began writing about the album. My intrigue began in the summer of 2014, when I came across pre-production versions of two songs, “The Drummer of Tedworth” and “Werewolf”, and promptly wrote about them. Two years after that, versions of two more songs appeared — “Kom Igjen Norge” and “Bestemor Sang Djevelord” — and I wrote about them, too.

Those tracks have disappeared from the place where they were once available for streaming, and what we have now are the finished album versions of three of those four tracks — “Drummer of Tedworth“, “Werewolf“, and “Bestemor Sang Djevelord“. Continue reading »

LATE DECEMBER AND EARLY JANUARY GEMS (PART 4): PLASMODIUM AND CZAR

 Album Reviews  No Responses »
Jan 262017
 

 

(This is Part 4 of a now-five-part series by Austin Weber about noteworthy January releases and a few from the end of last year.)

Plasmodium – Entheognosis

There’s something about truly dark and disturbing metal that connects with me in a deep way, as it also does for an assortment of other odd individuals too. Trying to understand the reason for that is the more difficult part, but overall, I think it has something to do with finding some odd sense of peace in hearing sounds that reflect the bleakness and harshness of the world all around us.

Forming a cathartic energy which we can lose ourselves in, that’s exactly what the otherworldly music from Melbourne, Australia-based Plasmodium has to offer. Continue reading »

OUR LIST OF 2016’S MOST INFECTIOUS EXTREME METAL SONGS (PART 17): WARCRAB, HEAVEN SHALL BURN, UR

 MOST INFECTIOUS SONGS-2016  13 Responses »
Jan 252017
 

 

In this 17th part of our 2016 Most Infectious Song list, I’m adding three songs that were all made for headbanging, or at least vigorous head-nodding, knee-bobbing, and toe-tapping, even though they’re scattered across different parts of the metal musical map.

WARCRAB

I’ve been meaning to write about WarCrab and their 2016 album Scars of Aeons (released digitally by Black Bow Records) but so far haven’t succeeded. The album did appear on Grant Skelton’s year-end list, where he wrote: “Warcrab’s breed of deathened sludge (sludgened death??) is certain to quench your rapacity for beefy slow-to-mid death metal”. And on May 1 of this year, the album is going to be released on CD for the first time by Transcending Obscurity. Continue reading »

SHORT BUT SWEET: POLARITY OF LIFE — “BEGINNING / END / BEGINNING”

 Album Reviews, SHORT BUT SWEET  No Responses »
Jan 252017
 

 

(TheMadIsraeli prepared this brief review of the new EP by Polarity of Life from Croatia.)

At least in terms of its global profile, Croatia seems to be a very underrepresented part of Europe, given the quality metal that its bands are always producing. Lots of the best aspects of Polish, Finnish, and German metal are fed into a blender, and the result is often killer, as well as something that seems uniquely Croatian.

Polarity Of Life are a Croatian melodic death metal band, of a more deathly, old school sort. The proper majestic, epic, sweeping melodies are present, but they exist amidst a torrid storm of heavyweight haymaker riffing with German weight and Polish military march. Insomnium meets Vader meets Heaven Shall Burn is definitely a fair assessment as references. Beginning/End/Beginning is an impressive sophomore release, and I’m eager to hear more. Continue reading »

GET TO THE POINT: ACHILLEAS KALANTZIS (AENAON, KATAVASIA, VARATHRON)

 Interviews  1 Response »
Jan 252017
 

 

(KevinP returns to NCS with a new episode of his short-interview series, and this time talks with Achilleas Kalantzis, guitarist of the mind-bending Greek black metal band Aenaon — whose new album Hypnosophy was released late last year — as well as Katavasia and Varathron.)

 
K: You’ve had some lineup changes for Hypnosophy. What was the impetus and did this affect the sound/direction of the new material?

A: Indeed. Unfortunately it was really hard for Thyragon (bass) to keep up with the band’s schedule and Anax (guitars) had to join the obligatory army service, so we recorded without him (he is still a member now though). On the other hand Orestis was already playing the Sax for us since Extance, so becoming a permanent member wasn’t a big change. Astrous (vocals) and I are usually building the first demos of the songs, so the core of the creational process was the same (no matter the final arrangements). What made a big difference to me was that I also composed and performed the bass guitar. That gave me as a composer the ability to use it in a more prominent way, leading to groovier arrangements. Continue reading »

THE GREAT OLD ONES: “EOD: A TALE OF DARK LEGACY”

 Album Reviews  4 Responses »
Jan 252017
 

 

(Here is Andy Synn’s review of the new old one by The Great Old Ones from France.)

As much as I generally like to give my reviews some sort of concept or over-arching theme, sometimes there are only two questions which really matter – “is it a good album?”, and “is it as good as their last one?”

In the case of EOD: A Tale of Dark Legacy, the third album by French cabalists The Great Old Ones, the answers to those questions are:

  1. Yes
  2. Not quite…

Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: SAURON — “KLASZTOR”

 Premieres  2 Responses »
Jan 252017
 

 

The Polish band Sauron first took shape in 1991, discharging their first demo Hellish Requiem in 1993 and a second one named The Baltic Fog in 1995, helping to introduce the sound of pagan black metal within their homeland. The band broke up in 1999 but resurrected themselves in 2003, and since then have released four albums, including the powerful Wara! in 2016 (which we wrote about here).

Now, Wheelwright Productions is re-releasing The Baltic Fog in a new remastered vinyl LP edition, with a release date of March 3. In advance of the release, we’re helping to premiere a single from The Baltic Fog named “Klasztor“, which includes cover art for the single created by Robert A. von Ritter (Outre, Witchmaster, In Twilight’s Embrace, etc.). Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: DEMONIC RESURRECTION — “MATSYA – THE FISH”

 Premieres  1 Response »
Jan 252017
 

 

Every country on the planet has distinctive folk music and ethnic music traditions, and while the melodic tonalities, rhythms, and instruments may sound common and familiar to the people of that country, they often sound exotic to the ears of listeners from distant lands. Combining such distinctive folk music traditions with the aggressiveness and weight of heavy metal can produce riveting and fascinating outcomes, in which each of these disparate elements enhances the other, and they can also fall flat. The song you’re about to hear is one of the successes.

The track we’re premiering today through a lyric video is named “Matsya — The Fish“. It’s by an Indian band we’ve been following for many years — Demonic Resurrection — and it comes from their new album Dashavatar, which will be released on March 15th of this year. It has quickly become one of my favorite DR songs, and in my humble opinion one of the best of their creations over the length of a discography that goes back more than 15 years. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: AEGRI SOMNIA — “AD AUGUSTA PER ANGUSTA”

 Premieres  No Responses »
Jan 252017
 

 

The opportunity to premiere the fascinating debut album by the Spanish band Aegri Somnia is a special pleasure for me, and therein lies a story that I will tell — and part of that story includes commentary about the music by a friend of mine who I think of as a Renaissance man, an American close to my own advanced age who spent much of his younger formative years living in Madrid, and hasn’t ever lost his fascination for the country and its people. For this purpose I’ll refer to him as Oudekerk.

But first, an introduction to the band and the music. Continue reading »

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