Abnormality Archives - NO CLEAN SINGING

ABNORMALITY: “SOCIOPATHIC CONSTRUCTS”

May 142019

(Here’s DGR’s review of the new album by Abnormality, which was released by Metal Blade Records on May 10th.)

The blindingly-fast, whirlwind death metal crew Abnormality’s newest album Sociopathic Constructs starts off on an interesting note if you’re a longtime fan, with an opening song entitled “Monarch Alpha” — recalling the days of the group’s song “Monarch Omega”, which began the album Contaminating The Hivemind way back in the yonder days of 2012.

That earlier song could easily bore its way into your skull due to the repeated “MONARCH OMEGA” roar that tore its way through the track. Bringing up the spectre of that song and starting the new one in a very similar manner of going zero-to-one-hundred in the span of .5 seconds (not unlike other releases this year) makes it so that the two are tied in together. In much the same way that Massachusetts-based Abnormality have mastered the art of the frighteningly technical/caveman-stupid branch of death metal, so too does “Monarch Alpha”, an addition to an already vast collection of headspinningly-fast death metal songs. Continue reading »

OUR LIST OF 2016’S MOST INFECTIOUS EXTREME METAL SONGS (PART 15): CENTINEX, ABNORMALITY, VOLTURYON

MOST INFECTIOUS SONGS-2016 2 Responses »

Jan 212017

For the 15th installment in our Most Infectious Song series I decided to create a death metal immersion, with three songs that all have old school flavors, the first most strongly of all, but are all different from each other in interesting ways, too. I’ll also mention that all three of these tracks were recommendations from my comrade DGR, who has a thing about speed and a certain kind of drumwork, although a couple of these songs were also on my own list of candidates that grew as 2016 rolled along.

For those who might be joining this rollout only now, you can browse the previous 14 parts by clicking this link.

CENTINEX

After eight albums going back to 1992’s Subconscious Lobotomy and a dozen shorter releases, Sweden’s Centinex disbanded in 2006 — but they crawled out of their grave in 2014 and released a comeback album named Redeeming Filth, which was a hell of a comeback. And I put a deliciously morbid track from that album (“Moist Purple Skin”) on my 2014 Most Infectious Song list. In 2016 they released a killer follow-up with Doomsday Rituals, which is the source of the first song in this installment of the 2016 list. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD: AENAON, OBSCURE SPHINX, SATAN’S WAR MACHINE, AND THE ABYSMAL PREDATOR TOUR

Exceptions to the Rule, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC 10 Responses »

Aug 292016

Happy Monday! I mean that sincerely, despite the usual depressive aspects of the day, because this Monday brought us three exciting new song premieres that I discovered soon after caffeinating myself strongly enough to stun a bull, plus an announcement of an exciting U.S. tour. And here’s what I found:

AENAON

As our regular readers are well aware, we have become ardent followers of the Greek band Aenaon since discovering the wonders of their 2014 album Extance, which made no fewer than four different year-end lists published at our site, as well as a host of our reader’s lists. It was also the source of a song (“Grau Diva”) that I included in my list of 2014’s Most Infectious Extreme Metal Songs. You may then be able to imagine how eagerly we have been awaiting the band’s new album, Hypnosophy. Continue reading »

AN NCS INTERVIEW: ABNORMALITY (MALIKA SUNDARAMURTHY)

Interviews 6 Responses »

May 112016

(Our friend Vonlughlio interviews vocalist Mallika Sundaramurthy of the Massachusetts death metal band Abnormality.)

This time around I have been given the opportunity of doing an interview with Mallika Sundaramurthy (vocalist of Abnormality) and to talk about metal and the band, amongst other things.

First of all, the band formed back in 2005, in Massachusetts, and since then have released a demo in 2007, the EP The Collective Calm in Mortal Oblivion in 2010, and their debut album Contaminating The Hive Mind in 2012. Last month on the 29th they released their sophomore effort entitled Mechanisms of Omniscience via Metal Blade Records.

I discovered the band in 2012 but don’t remember who sent me a YouTube link with one of their songs. I do recall that person saying that the band had a great BDM/Technical balance in their song structure and delivery and a woman as their vocalist. I must confess that I was skeptical at first, since up to that point I wasn’t familiar with women performing at the front of a band in this type of genre. Yes, shame on me, and once I heard the song I was blown away by the pure talent that all the musicians displayed. Long story short, their debut album ended up in my top 25 of that year: Continue reading »

ABNORMALITY: “MECHANISMS OF OMNISCIENCE”

Reviews 6 Responses »

Apr 282016

(DGR reviews the new album by Boston’s Abnormality.)

For a long time Abnormality were one of my pocket bands to always recommend to everyone whenever people were having their death metal offs, sharing their most brutal bands, their quickest groups, the ones they felt more people needed to hear. Abnormality have always been a good hybrid of those three reasons, and hence always ended up with me asking if people had heard of them: They were quick, brutal, and I honestly felt that they got better with each release and that more people needed to hear them.

Abnormality are a five-piece whirling machine of brutal death metal hailing from Massachusetts. They’ve been around for some time now, with a demo that hit in 2007 and two other releases to their name — a fantastic EP known as The Collective Calm In Mortal Oblivion, and an equally awesome album in Contaminating The Hive Mind. When news came out that Metal Blade had picked up the band for their most recent release, Mechanisms Of Omniscience, there was a sense that someone had finally gotten the hint. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: ABNORMALITY — “SWARM”

Premieres 3 Responses »

Mar 242016

Just about 10 days ago we excitedly reported about the advent of the title track to the first album since 2012 by Abnormality from Massachusetts — Mechanisms of Omniscience — which is coming our way on April 29 via Metal Blade Records. And now we get to bring you the premiere of the new album’s opening track: “Swarm“.

You’d better be sitting down before punching the play button on “Swarm”, because it detonates like a megaton warhead right from the start. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD: ARKHĒ, MITOCHONDRION, AUROCH, VANHELGD, ABNORMALITY

Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC 13 Responses »

Mar 122016

It has been a crazy week for new metal. Even if I had posted round-ups every day, I still would have fallen behind — or to be more accurate, more behind. Yet for various reasons, I couldn’t do that. So here I am, sitting on an enormous number of new songs and announcements that I want to throw out there. What I’ve decided to do is collect just four of the most recent ones in this post, and then tomorrow I’m going to surrender and do a link dump for a lot of the rest.

ARKHĒ

When KevinP linked me to this next video, he described the song as “Spacey prog Rock/metal from the bassist/vocalist of Sear Bliss“. The mention of Hungary’s Sear Bliss was more than enough inducement, and now that I’ve heard the song I’d probably add “goth”, “doom”, and “electronica” to Kevin‘s string of adjectives. And lest some of you think the song is too close to pop at the beginning, András Nagy does break out the growls and snarls before the song ends, in addition to his vaulting clean vocal melodies. Continue reading »

VIDEO BONANZA (Pt 2): ABNORMALITY AND FORCEPS

RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC No Responses »

Apr 182013

Yesterday turned out to be a banner day for new music videos, and I’ve collected the ones I didn’t have time to write bout yesterday, dividing them into two posts. This one is Part 2, and it’s devoted to the new vidz from Abnormality (U.S.-Mass.) and Forceps (Brazil).

ABNORMALITY

DGR reviewed this Boston band’s 2012 debut album Contaminating the Hive Mind last July, calling it “solid brutal death with very little in the way of compromise or ridiculousness . . . a meat-and-potatoes death disc with a lot to offer genre fanatics and [that’s] also accessible enough to lure new people into the madness”.

Yesterday Metal Injection premiered Abnormality’s music video for the track “Fabrication of the Enemy.” The video is sure to be controversial — especially the narrated preamble and its claim that for most of the world, it is the U.S. who are the terrorists. The fact that the video appeared only two days after “Marathon Monday” will no doubt inflame the controversy. Continue reading »

FREE SHIT FROM THE PHOENIX

Free Shit 3 Responses »

Aug 012012

The Boston Phoenix is one of many “alternative” weeklies around the country published by the Phoenix Media/Communications Group. The Boston weekly goes back a long way — all the way back to 1966, when it was started under the name Boston After Dark. Today, the parent company announced that it is going to combine The Boston Phoenix and another local publication into a glossy weekly mag simply called The Phoenix.

More or less to commemorate the event, The Phoenix did something pretty awesome: It released a 17-track compilation of music for free digital download. It’s called “Vol. 2” because unbeknownst to me they released another comp last year. This new one looks killer.

It includes a track (“Weight of the World”) from Shadows Fall off their May 2012 album, Fire From the Sky, as well as Doomriders covering Devo (“Girl You Want”) and that awesome “Trucker Bombed” song from Sexcrement’s 2012 album Sloppy Seconds. It also includes a song from Abnormality (“Schismatic”), whose new album DGR reviewed for us just two days ago. It includes songs from Morne, Tenebrae, Wormwood, and a whole lot more.

I’m not familiar with more than half the bands on the comp, but the ones I do know I like — which tells me this whole comp is probably worth checking out. Besides, you can download it for free off Bandcamp right now, and that makes it pretty much a no-brainer.

Stream all the tracks after the jump if you’d like to get a taste before you leap over to The Phoenix Bandcamp page. Continue reading »

ABNORMALITY: “CONTAMINATING THE HIVE MIND”

Album Reviews 2 Responses »

Jul 302012

(In this post, DGR reviews the new album by Abnormality from Marlborough, Mass.)

I’ve covered Massachusetts-based death metal up-and-comers Abnormality before. Granted, that site burned down and rests in ashes, but if you were following TNOTB in mid-2010 then you likely saw my review of these guys’ (and gal’s) EP The Collective Calm In Mortal Oblivion. I had gotten familiar with the group’s appearance prior to that in one of the Rock Band games, but was still impressed with their style of brutal death with some grind guitar work. They’re a five-piece consisting of four guys on instruments and one very talented lady handling the death growls.

Abnormality have kept going since then and have returned two years after Collective Calm with a full eight-song debut album that keeps going with the wordy titles — Contaminating The Hive Mind. Since I enjoyed Collective Calm, it was pretty much an unspoken rule that I’d be checking out this one in hopes that they could kick out eight songs of solid brutal death. The group have changed their sound slightly, due to some better production that makes them a little easier to hear, but yes, they have indeed given us eight songs of solid brutal death with very little in the way of compromise or ridiculousness. It’s a meat-and-potatoes death disc with a lot to offer genre fanatics and is also accessible enough to lure new people into the madness.

Contaminating The Hive Mind is a slab of death metal, about thirty-five minutes in length, that picks its foundation and sticks to it pretty rigidly. Abnormality have got the chops to hang with a lot of the more popular bands in the genre these days, but they’ve also become a bit more mathematical and machine-like in their writing. They make heavy use of a start/stop formula that sees the whole band picking up speed only to completely stop for a quick second and then picking right back up as if nothing happened. Those quick moments of silence are your only real reprieve from the low-end grinders that this band like to throw out. Title track and album closer “Contaminating The Hive Mind”, for instance, has a somewhat common beginning rhythm that bounces up and down before moving into a battering of blasts. Continue reading »