Nov 152019
 


Constellatia (photo by John Second)

 

(Andy Synn prepared this collection of reviews of six albums, some brand new and some from a bit earlier in the year.)

Phew… I am absolutely swamped at the moment. Writing, recording, practicing… oh, and that pesky day job… are all keeping me exceptionally busy. Plus I’m currently tackling a (thankfully) mild dose of the flu. All of which means I’m more behind than usual when it comes to reviewing new (and not so new) albums.

Still, I’m not going to let a little thing like a complete lack of time stop me from ending the week on my own terms, so here’s a handful of albums for you all to check out over the weekend. Continue reading »

Oct 122019
 

 

It’s been a hell of a week, and I do mean HELL. I’ll spare you the details, because no one likes a whiner (except the core supporters of our current President), but mishaps befalling a loved one and demands by my fucking day job have interfered (again) with my NCS time. These round-ups are always the first casualties when such things happen, so I thought I’d use this relatively placid Saturday morning to catch up a little.

I picked the following songs a couple of days ago after a rare opportunity this past week to do a bit of listening. Many other new songs have come out since then, adding to the long list that already existed, but I decided not to listen to anything else new and just get this done.

GRUZJA

Jeszcze Nie Mamy Na Was Pomysłu is the name of the second album by the Polish black metal band Gruzja, whose line-up includes members of Furia, Mentor, and Biesy (among other groups). It’s set for release (CD and digital) on October 22nd by Godz Ov War Productions, but the whole album is already streaming on Bandcamp. Google Translate tells us that the album’s title, in English, is “We don’t have an idea for you yet”. But Google Translate has a habit of mangling its translations of the Polish language, so I wouldn’t put too much stock in that rendition.

When I began the process of selecting music for this round-up, I only found one song from the album (“800 ZŁ”), which grabbed me in a head-lock, and only this morning discovered that the whole record had been launched on Bandcamp. Consequently, my impressions of the album as a whole may be a bit mangled, too, and have certainly been rendered hastily.
Continue reading »