Jun 082012
 

Enslaved at the Quart-festival, photo: Håkon Mosvold Larsen, Scanpix/NTB

Emperor and Enslaved are two of the most well-known bands in the history of Norwegian extreme metal, and June strangely enough brings tributes to both bands. On June 25th the album A Tribute To Emperor-In Honour Of Icon E will be released, and a week before Önd-A Tribute To Enslaved will see the light of day.”

And so begins an article by Totto Mjelde that appears today on Lydverket, a Norway-based web site affiliated with the Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation, NRK. We’ve written about Totto’s coverage of Norwegian metal in the past, and this most recent piece by him is definitely worth reading. It includes interviews of Raphael Henry (Pictonian Records), the curator of the Enslaved tribute; Ivar Peersen of Enslaved (who, interestingly, plays guitar on Taake’s contribution to the Emperor tribute);  Nocturnal, from Tryzna Productions, which is releasing the Emperor tribute along with Candlelight Records; and Ørjan Nordvik of Helheim., who perform on that tribute.

But that’s not all. Totto’s article also includes exclusive streams of two songs from the Enslaved tribute compilation: Ribozyme’s performance of “To The Coast”, and Vreid’s cover of “Lunar Force”.

GO HERE to read and listen to Totto’s feature. After the jump I’ve included the cover art and track lists for both albums. Continue reading »

Jun 012012
 

I’ve been doing actual paying work all morning. I took a break not long ago and cast my baleful eye around the interhole and my NCS e-mail box to see what there was to see and hear. And these are things I thought worth passing on.

First, that cover you see above is for a tribute album to Emperor called In Honour of Icon E, which will be released on June 25 by Metal Swamp. It’s a very nice piece of art, created by Wolkogniv of Folkingrimm Art.

It also looks like it will be a very nice album, with Emperor covers by the likes of Demonical, Helheim, Horna, Taake, and Setherial. I’ll give you the full tracklist rundown after the jump, but the news for today is that the album has gone up on Amqzon for pre-order, which means you can hear snippets of each song here. Continue reading »

Feb 272011
 


We’re jumping the gun on this post, since the month doesn’t end until tomorrow. Why? Uh, because this post is ready to go and we don’t have anything else finished for today yet. Work and other shit interfered with our grand plans for a Sunday post.  We might still get another one up later today, but for now, feast your eyes on the barrage of metal headed our direction.

What we do with these installments of METAL IN THE FORGE is collect news blurbs and press releases we’ve seen over the last 30 days (or in this case, the last 27 days) about forthcoming new albums from bands we know and like (including updates about releases we’ve included in previous installments of this series), or from bands that look interesting, even though we don’t know them yet. And in this post, we cut and paste the announcements and compile them in alphabetical order.

This isn’t a cumulative list, so be sure to check the Category link called “Forthcoming New Albums” on the right side of this page to see forecasted releases we reported in previous installments. This month’s list begins right after the jump. Look for your favorite bands, or get intrigued about some new ones. There’s some awesome shit on the way. Continue reading »

Feb 072011
 

I just took a break from what I usually do during daylight hours to check happenings in the world of metal, and that proved to be quite a long and interesting diversion. It may not be mid-day where you are, but maybe you still need a diversion or two, or three. That’s what we’re here for — to divert you, for better or worse, depending on your alternatives.

DIVERSION ONE

Regular NCS visitors know we’ve got a pathological weakness for anything Finnish, so when I saw a come-on for a new video by a Finnish band called Mygrain, of course I had to watch it. Besides, I’ve been meaning to check out this band ever since I read about the release of their self-titled third album on January 12 (via Spineform Records) — especially because it was mixed and mastered by Dan Swanö (Edge of Sanity, Bloodbath, Nightingale).

The video is for a song called “Trapped In An Hourglass”. Very cool music — fast-paced, Finnish-style melodic death that’s both catchy and cathartic, with two admirable guitar solo’s (one of which is a jazzy bit of picking at about the 3:00 mark), some clean vocals that even I like, and evidence that Finnish howlers can even shriek underwater.  (more after the jump . . .) Continue reading »

Nov 232009
 

So you all have probably read some things by the author islander, but there’s a new girl in town! I’ll be writing about the music I love and things I’m passionate about. Here is the music I love Continue reading »