SEEN AND HEARD ON A SATURDAY: UNDERGANG, CORPUS OFFAL, FUNEBRARUM, BARÚS, VINTREGAL, LACASTA, THERE WERE WIRES, CLASS TRAITOR

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC, SHORT BUT SWEET  1 Response »
Apr 182026
 

(written by Islander)

As I often do, I made a list of links for new songs and videos I wanted to check out in anticipation of this Saturday’s column, i.e., things that had surfaced or that I had noticed since last weekend. Having done that, I counted the number of links, and there were 69 of them (I swear that number is completely coincidental!), including a few I noticed for the first time this morning. It wasn’t even a complete list; I had a bunch of other tabs open on my desktop that I didn’t add to the list because I knew time was running short.

I recognize this is odd behavior. Why make a list that long when you know you won’t make it through even a quarter of the items? Why make a list that long when you know it will only knot up your brain in deciding which of them to check out? I have no answer, though perhaps a trained therapist would have some theories.

As usual, I resorted to impulse. The only calculated part of the process was a desire to mix up bands I already like and others that were new to me, and a further desire to mix up the genres so that visitors here will be at least somewhat caught off guard if they move from one choice to the next and the next. Continue reading »

CORPUS OFFAL: “CORPUS OFFAL”

 Album Reviews  1 Response »
Apr 032025
 

(Our Norway-based contributor Chile has a lot of ghastly and glowing things to say about the debut album from Texas-based Corpus Offal, which erupted in a spray of 20 Buck Spin‘s intestines on March 21st.)

I would say, in general and on average, I am more of a black metal fan than a death metal fan, looking back at both my listening habits over the years and the end-year lists (not yet here on No Clean Singing, so take this as a warning come December). Scientifically speaking, it’s a 65.212 to 34.788 ratio, but who’s counting. Anyway, admittedly, this year has been so far very tempting in that matter, threatening to turn the scales towards a more even split in said preferences.

Reason for this is, first and foremost, this gloriously twisted 2025 being already stacked full of fantastic death metal and we’re only three months in. Smoking hot, fermenting, rotting mounds of body parts stretching as far as the eye can see, what’s not to love? This is not just the onset of putrefaction, it is a full-blown bloom of abnormal flesh.

Poetically appropriate then, that we are visited today by the entity of Corpus Offal which rises from the corpse of another great American death metal band, namely Cerebral Rot, which dissolved last year after releasing two monster albums a couple of years back. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD ON A SATURDAY: BLAZE OF PERDITION, CAVE, CORPUS OFFAL, HIDEOUS DIVINITY, INSECT ARK, THE MONOLITH DEATHCULT, ОБРІЙ (OBRIJ), TEN TON SLUG

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  No Responses »
Mar 232024
 


Blaze of Perdition – photo by Justyna Kaminska

My day job is in an extended period when it’s leaving me alone. This is a double-edged sword for my unpaid work at NCS. I’m able to notice a lot more new songs and videos, but that also leaves me feeling overwhelmed. The flood of new stuff is insane, and equally insane is how much of it is good.

A lot of listeners are so wedded to specific sub-genres that they’re unimpressed by much of what falls outside their solemn vows. I guess I’m wedded too, but am very much a polygamist and feel the need to give all the brides, even the ugliest ones, their fair share of attention.

OK, that was gross, but the point is that I’m enamored of metal from many sub-genres (the more extreme ones), as today’s large roundup demonstrates (though I still think power metal wears too much makeup and flashy clothes). Continue reading »