AN NCS INTERVIEW: KONVENT

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Mar 082022
 


photo by Sebastian Apel

(The Danish quartet Konvent have a new album named Call Down the Sun that’s set for release by Napalm Records on March 11th, and so the timing is good for us to present Comrade Aleks‘ interview of the band’s bassist Heidi Withington Brink.)

Danish Konvent managed to shock the public in January 2020, when Napalm loudly presented the band’s first album Puritan Masochism. Being one of the very few death-doom bands with only ladies in the line-up, Konvent drew attention with their tense, powerful delivery and the absolutely infernal growls of Rikke Emilie List.

The pandemic interrupted their glorious take-off, and another band might have given up in such a situation but not Konvent. You probably saw their videos for the new songs ‘Grains’ and ‘Pipe Dreams’, and of course you know that Napalm announced that the second Konvent album Call Down the Sun is to be released on the 11th of March. And as that date fast approaches here we have a talk with the band’s bass-player Heidi Withington Brink. Continue reading »

AN NCS INTERVIEW: SKEPTICISM

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Feb 172022
 

 

(Comrade Aleks has brought us his interview with Eero Pöyry from the Finnish funeral-doom lords Skepticism.)

Skepticism has been a funeral-style standard for 30 years. Founded in Riihimäki, Kanta-Häme, in 1991, the band personifies an integral element of the funeral doom scene, its sound essential, its image flawless. And I see no problem regarding the relatively short Skepticism discography. Their latest album Companion (released by Svart Records in September 2021) is the sixth full-length in their list, but look – I have a feeling that they are always here.

The band’s presence is constant. You know what to expect from them, yes, and it… soothes. Each of their albums is like a part of a journey through a forest: You can walk this or another path listening to different albums, but “the forest” is the same and yet different. But I don’t see a reason to further waste our time with metaphors. Here’s the interview we started with Eero Pöyry (keyboards), let’s say, some time ago. It took some time to complete it, but it’s now a good, actual thing. Here we meet in shadow of (our pale) Companion. Continue reading »

AN NCS INTERVIEW: SULLEN GUEST

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Feb 082022
 

 

(Comrade Aleks has brought us the following great interview with two members of the Lithuanian band Sullen Guest, whose latest album was released in February 2021 and who have a new EP on the near horizon.)

There aren’t many doom metal bands in the Baltic region, and Sullen Guest are one of very few representatives of the genre in Lithuania. I guess you’ll find everything you could imagine about death-doom in any of their releases. It’s all about misery, death, despair, and doom as well.

The band had enough time to grow, and nowadays they are far from the point where they started seven years ago with their first EP Will You Greet the Sullen Guest as an Old Friend? With the new album Chapter III (Metallurg Music, 2021) they turn to be even more bitter and desperate as their musical palette has become more saturated and expressive.

Sullen Guest’s founder Tenebra (guitars) and Inanitas (vocals, guitars), who joined the band in 2019, reveal details of the band’s new EP in this fantastic interview. Continue reading »

AN NCS INTERVIEW: PSILOCYBE LARVAE

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Feb 042022
 

 

(In this interview Comrade Aleks spoke with fellow St. Petersburg resident Vitaly Belobritsky, a founder as well as vocalist/guitarist of the Russian band Psilocybe Larvae, whose newest album (their fifth) was released last December.)

Psilocybe Larvae turned out to be a constant element of Saint Petersburg’s metal underground. Being formed in 1996 on the Baltic shores of Vyborg, they relocated to the Russian “Northern capital” soon and firmly established there. Usually they tagged their music as “melodic death doom” but they were always different genres in-between.

Psilocybe Larvae developed from album to album and if you compare, let’s say, Stigmata (2000) and The Labyrinth of Penumbra (2012), you’ll find both a lot of common ground and a lot of differences. It’s always a pain in the ass to categorize Psilocybe Larvae’s material, but it’s the last thing they care about, and that’s the right attitude indeed.

The band’s only remaining founding member Vitaly Belobritsky celebrated Psilocybe Larvae’s 25th anniversary with the release of their fifth album Where Silence Dwells in late 2021, and for me, as always, it’s easier to talk with the music’s author than to waste my time trying to explain an author’s  intentions. Continue reading »

AN NCS INTERVIEW: DEATH HAS SPOKEN

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Feb 032022
 

(The Polish death/doom band Death Has Spoken released their excellent second album three months ago, and it prompted Comrade Aleks to reach out for an interview, which we now present.)

I don’t remember how I discovered the Polish death-doom band Death Has Spoken, but I decided to interview them as soon as I found titles of H.P. Lovecraft’s stories in their second album Call of the Abyss (2021). Lovecraft and death-doom metal – that’s enough for me to reach out and get in contact with the band.

Thus the interview with Death Has Spoken‘s collective mind was an absolutely spontaneous thing, so heed the ‘Call of the Abyss’ and feel ‘Lurking Fear’ in our discussion with vocalist and guitarist Karol Pogorzelski! Continue reading »

AN NCS INTERVIEW: FOREVER FALLING (AND MORE)

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Jan 272022
 

 

(In this new interview Comrade Aleks had a conversation with John Suffering, vocalist/lyricist of the international doom/death band Forever Falling, and a member of Chalice of Suffering and Solemn Echoes.)

Forever Falling is a virtual project of Italian multi-instrumentlist Tullio Carleo (Gods of Sadness, Voyage Noir) and American vocalist John Suffering (Chalice of Suffering, Laceratory, Solemn Echoes). Tullio is into black and gothic doom stuff, as John registers deep guttural growls and does his best to make doom great again. They found a common ground in death-doom territories naturally, and this common interest led to the creation of Forever Falling and the recording of the album Suspended Over the Immanent.

John told us a few things about this project, as well as about other things he’s occupied with  nowadays. Continue reading »

AN NCS INTERVIEW: MALAURIU

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Jan 252022
 

 

(In this new interview Comrade Aleks had a conversation with Schizoid, the mastermind of the Italian black metal band Malauriu, whose latest release was a 2021 split with Malvento and Abigail.)

I have a very vague impression regarding the Italian black metal scene, and this interview with Schizoid (a.k.a. Asmodeus) helped me to learn a bit more about the Sicilian non-doom underground.

Schizoid started in the thrash / black duet Urlo Nero in 2011, then after its disbanding in 2013 he founded Malauriu (black metal) and its far less productive twin Sintenza (black metal). A year ago he returned to his thrash / black roots with the Ossario band, but after all Malauriu remains his main creature.

So how do the dark powers work through this band? Schizoid knows. Continue reading »

AN NCS INTERVIEW: FELLED

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Jan 112022
 

 

(In this new interview Comrade Aleks talked with members of the wonderfully multi-dimensional Oregonian black metal band Felled, whose debut album The Intimate Earth saw the light of day last summer via Transcending Obscurity Records, and which we reviewed here along with a song premiere.)

Transcending Obscurity Records has given a big push to a lot of great extreme metal bands, choosing from among the best of the worldwide underground. Folk / black metal band Felled from Eugene, Oregon is one such band.

Cavan Wagner (guitars, vocals) and Jenn Grunigen (drums, vocals) started as Moss of Moonlight in around 2010 but the project was renamed in 2014, and soon Isamu Sato (bass) and Brighid Wagner (violin, vocals) joined them. Since then only the 2017 demo Bonefire Grit was published until The Intimate Earth full-length album was released in July 2021. It was worth of the wait, with five tracks presenting to listeners the dramas of Nature and the anguish of its witnesses, showing the best of “Cascadian black metal”.

True to tell, I didn’t know this genre name before… well, I knew bands like Agalloch or Wolves in the Throne Room but I didn’t have a clue what “Cascadian BM” was. Thus we got in touch with Cavan Wagner to sort it out, along with other matters, but in the end other members contributed to this interview too. Continue reading »

AN NCS INTERVIEW: ELDERWIND

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Jan 072022
 

 

(Comrade Aleks delves into atmospheric black metal with this interview of Vyacheslav Oboskalov, founder of the Russian band Elderwind, whose latest album is 2021’s Fires.)

You can’t avoid atmospheric black metal nowadays. It’s sort of a cultural phenomenon, a friendly offspring of the most scandalous and extreme metal genre (as it was in ‘90s) which nevertheless doesn’t lose its connection to what came before it. Most of these bands prefer to channel different aspects of Nature through their music, some declare “a celebration for the death of man” and it seems to be a logical development of the genre. The growing popularity of atmospheric black metal, its connection with ambient and post music, just proves a suggestion that the scene lives and grows on its own.

The Russian atmospheric black metal act Elderwind was started by Vyacheslav Oboskalov twelve years ago. His home city Yekaterinburg is located on the Iset River between the Volga-Ural region and Siberia. A good place to play black metal. Elderwind’s albums’ titles Volshebstvo Jivoy Prirody (“The Magic of Nature”) and Chem Holodnee Noch (“The Colder the Night”) demonstrate the band’s ideology, and Elderwind built a good reputation with those releases — good enough to release a new album, 2021’s Fires, DIY and continue to get new listeners despite a lack of big labels behind them. It may be early to tell about the new album’s success, but if it is a success, then it’s well-deserved. Vyacheslav is here tonight to tell Elderwind’s story. Continue reading »

AN NCS INTERVIEW: KANONENFIEBER AND LEIÞA

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Jan 062022
 

 

(Comrade Aleks delivered to us this interview of the German artist Noise, who is the man behind both Kanonenfieber and Leiþa, and a project named Impious. Due to no fault of Aleks or Noise, we allowed more than a month to go by before publishing it — but reading it now (and listening to the music) makes for a very good way to help begin the New Year.)

Black /death metal one-man band Kanonenfieber, which is focused on themes of World War I, and the depressive black metal project Leiþa have common origins – both are based in Bamberg, Bavaria and both are run by Noise. He launched Kanonenfieber’s first full-length Menschenmühle in February 2021 and Leiþa’s Sisyphus followed it in June 2021. It’s not just cool furious outbursts of anger and desperation but two very different works with very different stories behind them. And I’m glad what we managed to do this interview with Noise, which is here for you to read. Continue reading »

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