May 162026
 

(written by Islander)

As you may remember, I spent last weekend working on (and enjoying the performances at) Northwest Terror Fest in Seattle. It was a tremendous three-day event that formed many indelible memories, but it did mean that I had no time for the usual NCS weekend roundups. Because of that, I now find myself with twice the usual number of new songs and videos to consider for this roundup and for the SHADES OF BLACK collection for tomorrow.

I jumped around among many different possibilities, enjoying a lot of what I heard and saw and also (therefore) agonizing over what to choose. I also had to force myself to stop listening with dozens of tabs still open, or else this column would never be written.

But while the agony remains, I’m happy with these selections and hope you will be too. I’m beginning with three bands whose previous music was familiar to me and following with three that were brand new discoveries. Continue reading »

May 012021
 

 

It’s been a long time since I resorted to this Overflowing Streams format for spreading the word about new music I’ve enjoyed, but last week seemed more even more insane than usual — just a ton of new tracks were revealed by old gods, new gods, and assorted minor demons. As bloated as the following collection may seem, it’s still far from complete — I’ll include a few more in tomorrow’s SHADES OF BLACK column.

Without further ado, here we go with lots of sights sounds and not many words, though I do encourage you to add your own in the Comments.

AT THE GATES

Speaking of old gods, I might have included the news about Darkthrone album No. 19 (Eternal Hails), but there’s no music yet, so I’ll wait. You can peep the cover art here. But among the old gods, At the Gates did give us a new song, and I had to lead with it. Continue reading »