BEHEMOTH: “THE SATANIST”

 Album Reviews  16 Responses »
Feb 032014
 

(BadWolf reviews the new album by Poland’s Behemoth.)

Behemoth’s The Satanist is, without a doubt, the first highly-anticipated 2014 metal release by any band, in any sub-genre. Metal writers have been salivating over its impending release for years, and I am no exception—the NCS crew actually squabbled a bit over who would have the privilege of reviewing it. In light of this, the most important thing I can say about The Satanist is that even if it were another record, by a different band, I would still be listening to it daily.

Many people will listen to The Satanist on repeat, and write volumes about it. Most of those reviews and think pieces will fail to capture the album. Instead, they will be lost in the maelstrom of rich narrative history surrounding the creation of the record and the life of Behemoth’s frontman Nergal during the past few years.

For those unaware, a quick recap of those circumstances: Nergal got engaged to the biggest pop star in his native Poland, faced blasphemy charges in his native Poland, was acquitted of said charges in his native Poland, contracted leukemia in his native Poland, beat leukemia in his native Poland, broke things off with the biggest pop star in his native Poland, judged an American Idol-style singing show in his native Poland, was fired from said show in his native Poland, faced even more blasphemy charges in his native Poland, headlined the inaugural Decibel Magazine tour albeit not in his native Poland, made the cover of Newsweek in his native Poland, and was also acquitted of that last round of blasphemy charges in his native Poland.

The takeaway from all this drama: nothing Nergal has recently done has any relation to making music with Behemoth. Continue reading »

BEHEMOTH PREMIERE ANOTHER NEW SONG: “ORA PRO NOBIS LUCIFER”

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  4 Responses »
Jan 282014
 

Pray for us, Lucifer, because Poland’s Behemoth have just released another new song from their forthcoming album The Satanist. And the song’s name is “Ora Pro Nobis Lucifer”, which is Latin for… pray for us Lucifer.

The song stream comes in the form of a lyric video that includes artwork and text from inside the digipak booklet. Nergal wrote the music. The lyrics were written by Nergal and Krzysztof Azarewicz.

The song provides yet further cause to be excited for The Satanist. It rumbles, it rolls, it stalks in a solemn procession. The guitar melody drills like a weapon and rings like chimes. Nergal, of course, sounds like he thoroughly believes in his pronouncements. Listen next. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD: THE OCEAN, BEHEMOTH, OBLITERATIONS, SOREPTION

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  5 Responses »
Jan 152014
 

Satan has been a busy little sulphurous bee this week. So many newsy metal announcements, so many new metally songs, more than my addled brain can keep up with. Here are a few of the items I spied over the last 24 hours that I thought were worth sharing. More will come in another post today.

TOURISM: THE OCEAN / SCALE THE SUMMIT / THE ATLAS MOTH / SILVER SNAKES

Who are these people who are constantly blaring that “Metal Sucks” and why are they associating with miscreants such as The Ocean, Scale the Summit, The Atlas Moth, and Silver Snakes? I must add that question to the long list of life’s mysteries to which I must devote my investigative energies. Whoever those people are and whatever obscure impulses motivate them, they are presenting a U.S. tour of the afore-mentioned miscreants, wisely choosing to launch it in The Emerald City, for which I will give thanks by sacrificing a neighbor’s child under the next full moon.

Other less important cities will be visited by this very impressive line-up, and I will list them after the jump for those whose eyesight isn’t sharp enough to discern them on the tour poster above. And speaking of the line-up, though I have been savaged by the first three bands in previous musical performances, Silver Snakes have not had the pleasure of savaging me before, and in fact I was unaware of their existence before those people who blare “Metal Sucks” presented them in this new tour, though I sometimes see silver snakes while on the verge of a blackout drunk. Therefore, along with the dates I will provide a bit of their music, which involves clean singing along with heaviness and lightness. Continue reading »

TOURISM: METAL ALLIANCE 2014 WILL BRING BEHEMOTH, GOATWHORE, 1349, INQUISITION, AND BLACK CROWN INITIATE TO NORTH AMERICA

 Metal News  13 Responses »
Jan 132014
 

I nearly fell out of my chair when I saw the announcement that’s the subject of this post. And as I wobbled in a sudden affliction of vertigo, the words “holy shit” repeatedly escaped my slack-jawed mouth. About all I’m capable of doing at the moment is re-printing the official press release. Grab hold of something solid in case you feel faint, and read on…

The Metal Alliance Tour is back for their fourth ferocious year of wrecking heads. Festival organizers Dan Rozenblum and Steve Seabury of High River Entertainment are proud to welcome to American soil the mighty Behemoth as their 2014 headliner. This will be the first time in over a decade that Behemoth will tour North America in support of their new record The Satanist released on April 2nd through Metal Blade Records. The tour will be rounded out by New Orleans natives Goatwhore, 1349, Inquisition and the buzz worthy unsigned act Black Crown Initiate.

“This tour is no exception for our love of all things heavy.” states Rozenblum. “This tour is for metal fans by metal fans.” adds Seabury. “this bill explores our appreciation for the dark and black side of metal. Behemoth have been a favorite of ours and we are stoked to have them headline the fourth edition of the Metal Alliance Tour!”  Continue reading »

CATCHING UP (PART 1): BEHEMOTH, ISKALD, SKÁLMÖLD

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  9 Responses »
Dec 102013
 

The pace of metal is molten, as in the pace of a pyroclastic flow. So much news and noteworthy new music erupts each day that I can barely keep up with it even when I’m paying attention. And over the last two weeks while on vacation, I wasn’t paying attention, or at least not much. Trying to catch up with everything that happened while I was away would be foolhardy — because while digging back through even two weeks’ worth of events I’d be missing a lot of what will happen over the next two weeks.

Having said that, I do want to make at least a partial stab at catching up, based in part on messages I received from my NCS co-writers and in part on a few random forays of my own while on vacation. There’s a high likelihood that many of you already know about what I’ve chosen to feature in this multi-part “Catching Up” series, but some may not, so I’m forging ahead. In this first part of the series I’m collecting release information plus new songs or videos by three excellent bands, in alphabetical order.

BEHEMOTH

These Polish titans have a new album entitled The Satanist that will be released by Nuclear Blast on February 3 in the UK, February 4 in North America and Poland, February 5 in Japan, and February 7 in the rest of Europe and the world; it’s now available for pre-order in Europe here. While I was gone, the talented artist Denis Forkas Kostromitin revealed the album’s cover art, which you can see above. It’s a piece entitled “Chalice of Severance” and is described as “acrylics, gilding and blood on linen” — the blood being that of Behemoth’s frontman Nergal. Continue reading »

A BEHEMOTH UPDATE

 Metal News  3 Responses »
Nov 152013
 

We know that next year Poland’s Behemoth will be bringing us a new album named The Satanist. Now we know that on December 4 a Behemoth EP will be released. Blow Your Trumpets Gabriel will come in a limited 180-gram 12-inch vinyl edition, hand-numbered and signed by the band. The title track will be the first single from the album, and the EP will also include two non-album tracks — “If I Were Cain” and a cover of a song by a Polish post-punk/new-wave band named Siekiera. That should be interesting.

The 12″ EP can be pre-ordered now via Behemoth’s webstore as well as at www.indiemerch.com/metalbladerecords and www.nuclearblast.de. There will be no digital or CD version of the vinyl edition, but the single from the album will be released on iTunes.

We also now know that on December 4 the band will be releasing a music video for the “Blow Your Trumpets Gabriel” song. Two teasers for the video have been released so far, with the second one coming yesterday. You can see both after the jump.

And finally, the band have also announced that on December 4 they will be unveiling the album’s cover art, which is a painting by the Russian painter Dennis Forkas, whose work we have featured on other occasions at NCS. For this piece, Nergal’s own blood was mixed with the paint. Yum. Continue reading »

UPDATES: PESTILENCE, BEHEMOTH, OBLITERATION, AND LUMBAR

 Metal News  3 Responses »
Sep 122013
 

Collected in this post are a handful of news items I spied earlier today. Unlike most of these daily round-ups, no new music is included (other than a teaser for one band’s new album). But read it anyway, won’t you?

PESTILENCE

We’ve been keeping our eye out for new information about Obsideo, the next album by Pestilence, because for fuck’s sake, it’s Pestilence. Today we all get to see the album cover ,and now we also know the release date (by Candlelight Records in North America): November 11.

Although I’ve seen some expressions of anxiety and pessimism about this new album given the generally lukewarm reaction to the last one, I choose to have faith in Patrick Mameli and the 8-string guitar he used to record these new songs. Also, he says, “We have gone beyond our human limits to achieve the highest form of brutal music . . . it is really ten of the most demanding songs written in death metal.”

Bring it on. Continue reading »

NEW BEHEMOTH SONG! “BLOW YOUR TRUMPETS GABRIEL”

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  6 Responses »
Aug 112013
 

Last week we received the disappointing news that the release of the upcoming tenth studio album by Poland’s almighty Behemoth (entitled The Satanist) would be delayed to early 2014. However, the band played one of the new songs — “Blow Your Trumpets Gabriel” — at the BRUTAL ASSAULT festival in The Czech Republic last night (August 10), and a fan-filmed video of the performance has now surfaced.

The song is an absolute monster. It begins as a slow, black crusher and then it fuckin’ explodes at the mid-point. The fan video has the usual imperfections, but you can hear the song pretty well and the visuals are amazing, notwithstanding the imperfections. Strobing lights, explosions of flame, great plumes of smoke — combine all that with the power of the song, and it’s quite a thing to see and hear. Which you can do right after the jump. Continue reading »

RUMBLINGS OF THE BEAST: BEHEMOTH, IMPIETY, ZATOKREV, AND DIABLERIE

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  8 Responses »
May 312013
 

Normally I would have used the “Seen and Heard” label for this round-up of items I found yesterday while rooting through the interhole. But there’s something about these four items that suggested an alternate title . . . .

BEHEMOTH

Poland’s Behemoth have been busy recording their tenth full-length album — which is now projected for release by Metal Blade this coming fall — and yesterday the band announced that they’ve picked a name for it: The Satanist. Despite fame, some degree of fortune, and Nergal having survived multiple trips to court defending against charges brought under Poland’s laws against giving religious offense, Behemoth don’t fuckin’ back off, do they? Here’s a statement from Nergal that accompanied the news about the album title:

“It took us over two decades to come up with a title that…says it all. While our new songs artistically take surprisingly adventurous directions, our message stands steadfast—Proud and Radical. THE SATANIST stands for undying yearning for liberation and love for freedom in all aspects of life. Considering all our life experiences that often took dramatic curves I couldn’t think of more appropriate and fitting statement of who and where we are now.”

There will undoubtedly be a steady drumbeat of album updates from the band and Metal Blade over the summer. Undoubtedly we’ll post most of them here, too. Because, Behemoth! Continue reading »

SHADE EMPIRE, DEATHEMBER, MOSS, AND BEHEMOTH

 Exceptions to the Rule, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  7 Responses »
Mar 292013
 

Time for another round-up of new music. What grabbed my attention this morning were the following new songs from Shade Empire (Finland), Deathember (Sweden), and Moss (UK), plus a small video announcement by Behemoth (Poland).

SHADE EMPIRE

Shade Empire are a Finnish metal band whose massive, 74-minute-long fourth album — Omega Arcane — will be released by Candlelight Records on May 3 in Finland, on May 6 in the rest of Europe, and  sometime in June in North America.

June is so far away that it might as well be Pluto, but although patience will be tested, I’m absolutely convinced the wait will be worthwhile. Why? Because Shade Empire have just released an official video for an edited version of the album’s first single, “Ruins”, and it’s really impressive.

The song is scathing, sweeping, and soaring, a riveting mixture of styles that include elements of black metal, melodic death metal, and doom, with orchestral touches that enhance the drama rather than clog the arteries with cheese. Fans of bands such as Insomnium and In Mourning would do well to pay attention — especially because the video itself is just as magnetic as the music. Beautifully filmed and edited, it’s a badass feast for the eyes. Continue reading »

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