Feb 032023
 

It’s another Bandcamp Friday today. From my perspective, that’s a mixed bag. On the one hand, it’s good for bands and labels because Bandcamp doesn’t take their usual cut from sales. On the other hand, my e-mail in-box (which is also the main address for NCS) gets deluged with Bandcamp-related messages and notifications, and that’s on top of the usual traffic of 200-300 e-mails to NCS per day. Trying to thoroughly crawl through all that takes more time than I have.

Still, because it’s a Bandcamp Friday I thought I ought to make at least a feeble head-start on the usual Saturday round-up. So here’s what I picked. Mind you, the songs definitely are not feeble.

ATHANATHEOS (France)

This French band is returning with a concept album named Cross. Deny. Glorify. It’s described as one “that follows the paths of three generations of Roman soldiers as they watch their empire decay from within in the wake of Emperor Constantine’s adoption of Christanity as its official religion”. All the songs are described as distinct and different in character, befitting this generation-spanning narrative. Continue reading »

Mar 282014
 

I spent some time last night searching for new music worth recommending. Found quite a lot. Damaged my ear drums in the process, but oh so worth it. (They were so screwed up beforehand that it didn’t really matter. As for you, play this stuff loud enough to cause pain, so I don’t feel lonely in my deafness.)

There’s a lot of music in here — I could easily have spread it across five posts today — but there probably won’t be many other posts on this Friday because I’m on the road again. So, take your sweet time with it.

LORD MANTIS

We already reviewed Death Mask. We’ve heard it all, but most of you haven’t. Some of you will want to run away from it, some of you will eat it up like whatever it is you can’t stop eating even when you know you should. I’m in the latter category — it has made an indelible mark, as deep as all the black tattoos that beautify my limbs. Continue reading »