Maze of Sothoth Archives - NO CLEAN SINGING

AN NCS INTRVIEW: MAZE OF SOTHOTH

Apr 122023

(We have been thoroughly enjoying the new album by Maze of Sothoth (see our review here), which has only been out a few weeks now under the banner of Everlasting Spew Records, and so we’re also happy to present Comrade Aleks‘ interview of band founder Fabio Marasco.)

This technical death metal band from Bergamo, Italy offers quite an intensive experience of dogmatic and morbid cosmic horror. Based in 2009 Maze of Sothoth declared a clear connection with the legacy of H. P. Lovecraft through the few songs of its debut Soul Demise (2017) and then the band disappeared from radars until 2023. Extirpated Light is their new full-length work — as grim, torturous and hostile as those creatures which inhabit the darkness of extraterrestrial plains.

Maze of Sothoth is the one of those rare bands with a relatively stable line-up; at least there weren’t any changes since 2012: Riccardo Rubini (guitars), Cristiano Marchesi (vocals, bass), Matteo (drums), and the band’s founder Fabio Marasco (guitars, synths). And naturally Fabio is the one who can tell Maze of Sothoth’s story better than anyone. Continue reading »

A DEATH METAL HAMMERING: MAZE OF SOTHOTH, BROKEN GLASS SANCTUARY, FORETOKEN

Album Reviews No Responses »

Mar 232023

Maze of Sothoth

(We have DGR to thank for the following trio of reviews, covering two records just released on March 17th and one that’s coming out on March 24th.)

As we draw closer to the end of March we find ourselves with a veritable bounty of music available to us, and while we do a commendable – cue rim shot here – job trying to keep up with the world of heavy metal, sometimes it’s fun to cast off the task of keeping up and just throw yourself into the river of discoveries as they wash over you.

That’s the case with the three groups here, as we travel to opposite coasts of the US after making a journey into Italy. The one big unifier is the constant death metal hammering, but hey, you’re on NoCleanSinging and that is one of our favorites to traffic in. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD (PART 1): MAZE OF SOTHOTH, ANOXIA, STREET TOMBS, TENTACULT, ISOLANT

Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC 2 Responses »

Jan 252023

As of last night I had this round-up all ready to go. I mean, I still needed to do the writing, but I had picked a selection of music from five new releases that I thought would go really well together, and they all had fine cover art too. And then this morning I found some more just-released gems within the Niagara Falls of e-mails that crashed into our in-box overnight. What to do?

As you can tell, I decided to turn this mid-week round-up into a two-parter. Part 1 sticks with what I decided to do last night. Part 2 will include the new stuff I spotted this morning. Part 2 isn’t written yet, which means you won’t see it ’til tomorrow. Something else will probably hit our in-box overnight that will make it even longer.

MAZE OF SOTHOTH (Italy)

We’ve had a six-year gap since this band’s debut album Soul Demise, which we premiered here and reviewed here. But at last they have a new full-length named Extirpated Light that’s headed our way on March 24th via Everlasting Spew Records. And based on the first single, it sounds like the intervening years have brought some changes in their sound, which Metal-Archives previously labeled Technical Death Metal, even though that label was missing a lot of necessary nuance. Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: MAZE OF SOTHOTH — “THE OUTSIDER”

Premieres 2 Responses »

Apr 302018

Last year Maze Of Sothoth come blasting out of the north of Italy with the release of their debut album Soul Demise, and we happily triggered the detonation through a premiere stream of all 10 songs. As good as the album was, it’s inevitable that some people who would have loved it remained oblivious to its existence despite our own enthusiastic efforts (and the efforts of others) to spread it like the plague. And so it’s a happy occurrence that today we get a new chance to infect you, because Maze of Sothoth have created a video for one of the songs off Soul Demise — “The Outsider” — and we’re hosting its premiere in this very post.

In his review of Soul Demise, our writer TheMadIsraeli praised the album as embracing “the most timeless of death metal’s elements combined with a refinement of its greatest decade”, challenging “modern death metal’s gratuitous excess” by defying its “excessive musical ornamentation”, and confounding expectations by upending “humanity’s innate need to find or maintain order”. In his summation, it was (and still is) “a powerful and vicious death metal record”. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE: MAZE OF SOTHOTH — “SOUL DEMISE”

Premieres 2 Responses »

Jan 092017

Today Maze Of Sothoth come blasting out of the north of Italy with the release of their debut album Soul Demise, and today we trigger the detonation with a premiere stream of all 10 songs.

We’ve already premiered one furious, utterly morbid track (“Seed of Hatred”) and followed that with a review of Soul Demise, in which our writer TheMadIsraeli praised the album as embracing “the most timeless of death metal’s elements combined with a refinement of its greatest decade”, challenging “modern death metal’s gratuitous excess” by defying its “excessive musical ornamentation”, and confounding expectations by upending “humanity’s innate need to find or maintain order”. It is, in his summation, “a powerful and vicious death metal record”. Continue reading »

MAZE OF SOTHOTH: “SOUL DEMISE”

Album Reviews 1 Response »

Jan 052017

(TheMadIsraeli reviews the new album by Maze of Sothoth from Italy, which is set for release by Everlasting Spew on January 9.)

Maze Of Sothoth are a staggeringly difficult band to quantify. The Lovecraftian theme certainly points to a band who might enjoy the eldritch, ambiguous, and alien, but whereas extreme metal bands generally attempt to capture all this through sound gimmicks, melodic dispositions, or atmospheric songwriting, Maze Of Sothoth bring forth a style of technical/brutal death metal that tackles that sub-genre from an almost de-constructionist, absurdist, and reductionist point of view.

Soul Demise is rooted in what is still death metal’s best period (in my opinion), which was the ’90s boom that produced a perfect blend of technicality, brutality, and songwriting — they exhibit all the best qualities of this period. In the tradition of that period, Maze Of Sothoth’s sound is also really unique owing to that reductionist perspective. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: MAZE OF SOTHOTH — “SEED OF HATRED”

Premieres 1 Response »

Nov 092016

Metal is mood music. Perhaps like all forms of music, you can use it either to suit the mood you’re in or to change your mood. But it can do either thing in ways more powerful and effective than most other forms of music. Take this next song for example.

What we have here is a track called “Seed of Hatred” by the Italian death metal band Maze of Sothoth. It’s from their debut album Soul Demise, which will be released by Everlasting Spew on January 9, 2017. If you’re current mood is vile, enraged, boiling with hate, and/or teetering on the brink of a violent outburst, “Seed of Hatred” will fit your mood like a fine Italian glove fits your hand — even when it’s curled into a fist.

And if you happen to be in a despondent funk, and want to find some vibrant energy that will shake you out of your gloom, the song can do that, too. Continue reading »