May 232018
 

 

The 2018 edition of Roadburn Festival is in the history books. From April 19th through April 22nd at the 013 venue in Tilburg, The Netherlands, metal fans got the chance to choose from among performances by more than 100 bands across four stages and a fascinating array of musical genres. NCS was fortunate to be represented by the fantastic New Orleans-based music photographer Teddie Taylor, who made a visual record of the event for us.

We left it to Teddie to decide which bands to see; no doubt she had a lot of difficult decisions to make — and we had difficult decisions of our own in determining which of her images to share with you (they’re all really damned good!). We’re dividing this collection of pics into four parts, one for each day of Roadburn 2018. You can find her photos from Day 1 here. Continue reading »

Nov 152016
 

wedrujacy-wiatr-art

 

As I mentioned earlier this morning, we’re rapidly approaching the brink of our year-end LISTMANIA orgy. In fact, on Friday I’ll be soliciting reader suggestions for our annual Most Infectious Song list, and about a week after that I’ll be asking our readers to give us their lists of the year’s best releases — so please start thinking about both of those subjects. Of course, we’ll once again be re-posting year-end lists from select print zines and “big platform” music sites as they appear, as well as publishing “best of” lists by our staff and invited guests, both band members and fans.

In the meantime, we’ll also continue trying to recommend new releases, and there are still some big ones due for arrival before January 1. There have also been some notable ones released quite recently that I fear we’ll never get around to reviewing, and so I’m forced to resort to posts like this one in which I’ll just share the music and sacrifice the words of praise (though in many cases we’ve already written about individual songs). However, we do welcome your own thoughts about these releases in the Comments. Here we go — I hope you’ll give each of these albums at least a sample test.

WĘDRUJĄCY WIATR

Album: O turniach, jeziorach i nocnych szlakach
Released: October 31
Approximate Genre: Atmospheric Black Metal
Country: Poland Continue reading »

Feb 272015
 

 

It’s a true pleasure to bring you a full stream of Nocel by the Polish black metal band Furia. The album was released last fall on CD by Pagan Records, and on March 6 the label will be releasing the album on double-gatefold-vinyl. It deserves that kind of treatment — in a word, Nocel is fascinating.

Furia’s name means “fury” in English, but the music on Nocel is not so easily summed up. “Fury” is only one of many moods expressed in this impressively creative and highly variable work. Over its hour-long course, Furia vividly convey alternating moods of wild freedom, slashing anger, cold isolation, hunger, meditative tranquility, and even despair. It’s so full of contrasts and surprises that it will remind listeners of the avant-garde exuberance of bands like Deathspell Omega rather than the warlike savagery of a group like Marduk. Continue reading »