Jul 162023
 

If I’ve said it once I’ve said it 100 times (probably closer to 200): I have another job whose demands are very unpredictable. It interfered with my ability to prepare a roundup yesterday, unexpectedly so for me — because I just fucking forgot about a big online meeting that had been scheduled for months (rude surprises have many causes). It started early and went on for 2 1/2 hours (come on, it takes time to coordinate production of pocket-sized fusion reactors!).

I thought about just pretending that today was Saturday and proceeding with a cross-genre roundup, but then thought again, and decided to stick with the usual plan and focus on the blacker arts today. Still, your creaky wagon won’t get stuck in any ruts – these selections will cause it to careen all over the en-thorned dirt road (or so I hope).

DANTALION (Spain)

I decided to start with a quintet of songs from forthcoming releases and then turn to just one recent EP. The first of the advance tracks comes from the ninth album by the long-running Spanish band Dantalion (which my addled brain always tries to read as “dandelion”, though there’s nothing about their music that connects with such an image, unless the flower is dead). Continue reading »

Jan 132022
 


Kryptan

We arrive at the lucky Part 7 of this expanding list. You’ll find the preceding Parts (and an explanation of what this list is all about) through THIS LINK.

Today I’m doing what I did yesterday — choosing songs that I previously picked for a playlist that I and my comrades Andy Synn and DGR shared through one of our Gimme Metal guest DJ appearances last year. I picked them back then because I thought they were damned contagious, and I’m choosing them for this list for the same reason. I also included the last two of today’s trio because I’ve neglected thrash in this list so far, and it’s time to at least partially fill that void.

Continue reading »

Oct 232021
 

 

We’re on “bomb cyclone” watch here in the Puget Sound area of Washington. High winds and lots of rain are expected through the weekend, though official forecasters aren’t positive how intense it’s going to be. The power at our house is likely to go out, but I’m mainly wondering about why no metal band has yet picked Bomb Cyclone as a name (a search for it on Metal Archives yields zero results).

Now that I’ve updated you on freaky local weather conditions, let’s get to the music. Today I mostly focused on bands I consider old favorites, but explored a couple of new names (at least new to me) as well, and I’m throwing a curveball at the end.

MAZE OF TERROR (Peru)

I’ve wished for a long time that the day will come when I can catch Maze of Terror in a live show. I’m not holding my breath, because they’re in Lima, Peru, and I’m 4,969 miles away from there, as the crow flies. But we can dream, can’t we? Now my dreams are even more ardent, having seen their new video for the song “Starbeast” off their latest album. Continue reading »

Jul 312021
 

 

I know I often sound like a broken record, but this is yet another Saturday following a week in which I fell way behind in listening to new music, other than what we premiered and bits and pieces of albums that other NCS scribblers wrote about. I spent hours this morning adding to my listening list and then only scant time darting around that list with the headphones on. Here’s what I landed on that I wanted to share… with a lot more listening lined up for this afternoon.

SUCCUMB (U.S.)

This first song, “Okeanos“, is such an intense squall of sound in all ways, from the brazen and mutating discordance of the riffing to the relentlessly riotous drumming, the bone-smashing impact of the grooves, and the stunning voracity of the vocals. Not so much like crouching indoors during a hurricane and more like charging outside in the midst of it. Continue reading »

Jun 232021
 

 

Lots of good stuff in today’s round-up, with a variety of new black metal, death metal, and thrash, plus a towering exit song. All of the songs are off forthcoming records, with the exception of a just-released EP that I’ve sandwiched in the middle. You’ll see some really good cover art in this collection too.

Even though I and most of the NCS writers are in the U.S., the preponderance of the music we cover (along with half our readers) seems to emanate from outside U.S. borders. Thus it’s unusual that (coincidentally) almost all of the following music comes from U.S. bands.

MODERN RITES (U.S./Switzerland)

The opening song today, “Self Synthesis“, swells in sound, like what you might hear if gradually approaching an industrial metal-mangling machine, and then erupts in a hammering, searing discharge of instrumental and vocal intensity — with eerie, wraith-like tones swirling in sorrow above. It revisits those mangling sensations, which begin to seem apocalyptic…. Continue reading »

Aug 252019
 

 

Yesterday some of you saw a skeletal version of this post because I hit “Publish” instead of “Save” and didn’t realize what I’d done until Andy Synn pointed it out hours later. By the time of my bone-headed goof I had picked the songs I wanted to write about and had uploaded artwork, added the usual links, put in the html codes for the music streams, and copy-pasted info about the releases from press releases, Bandcamp pages, or YouTube streams — but hadn’t actually written anything of my own about the music.

That’s the same process I follow every time I prepare one of these collections. Usually I don’t stop there, but I’m still on vacation and had some carousing to do, so I deferred the writing. Actually, I had already begun the carousing, which is most likely why I hit “Publish” instead of “Save”.

Anyway, hope you like the music I picked for today’s SOB. I’ve made selections for a second installment of the column, but don’t know if I’ll get that finished before the carousing begins again. Continue reading »

Jan 272018
 

 

It’s a shitty situation. Here I am, posting more of this list on a Saturday, the weakest day of the week, measured by how may eyes alight on our site. But I’m doing my best to finish this list by February.

Still, the three songs here deserve a fireworks display more grand than what our Saturday traffic usually provides. Life isn’t fair, and it’s too damned short and miserable, too.

MAZE OF TERROR

I read through my list of candidates for this series every day, because I’m still trying to figure out what to include. When I come to this one, I see 10 asterisk marks next to it. I have a vague memory that I was trying to tell myself many months ago, “Your mind is a sieve, it loses important things every day, but don’t forget this one, you fractured motherfucker, this one you FUCKING HAVE TO REMEMBER.” And so I have. Continue reading »

Aug 272017
 

 

I made a swan dive into a lake of tequila last night at a friend’s birthday party. I surfaced this morning but I’m not swimming very well at the moment. Unfortunately, this means there will be no SHADES OF BLACK column today. I hope I’ll get it finished in time to post tomorrow. But in addition to this morning’s trio of reviews (which I wrote yesterday before the swan dive), I wanted to leave something further with you today.

I guess everything is coming in threes on this Sunday. Here are two videos and one-half of a split that I happened upon yesterday and thoroughly enjoyed. Apart from that coincidence there’s no real rhyme or reason for grouping them together in this post.

NATIONAL SPACE AGENCY

National Space Agency is an organization based in Sydney, Australia. The identities of its members are Classified — literally, their names are all “Classified“. They describe their music as “Cinematic Stoner Metal from Outer Space”. Their stated mission is to “regulate alternate timelines and parallel universes to restore the one true reality”. However, their new video fractured my reality. Maybe the pieces are being assembled into some new shape within my head, or what’s left of it. We shall see. Continue reading »

Jun 022015
 

 

I’m awash in new music, with not enough time to cover everything I want to throw your way. Consequently, and as is usually the case, I’m making this selection on a random basis: These are the last two selections of music I heard in my scurrying through the interhole that I really liked. The first two bands I’ve featured before; the third one is a new discovery.

DEMIURGON

About three weeks ago we premiered a song from Demiurgon’s debut album Above the Unworthy, which was mixed and mastered at 16th Cellar Studios by the masterful Stefano Morabito and  features cover art by the masterful Pär Oloffson. Yesterday it was officially released by Ungodly Ruins Production and the entire album is now available for listening and download on Bandcamp, where it can also be ordered on CD. If you’re a fan of well-executed death metal, you really owe yourself to check it out. Continue reading »

May 102015
 

 

I’m forging ahead with my weekend goal of collecting a dozen of the excellent new songs I discovered since the middle of last week. The first two installments of this extended round-up can be found here and here. There will be a fourth installment coming later today, and maybe a fifth one, because I’ve found even more exciting stuff since starting this project on Saturday morning. Also, Happy Mother’s Day. To celebrate, I thought we’d have some music that wants to tear your head off.

Those of you who regularly hang around here know that I’ve got a serious weakness for old school Swedish-style death metal. The first two songs in this collection are orbiting that particular star.

ENTRAILS

By my lights, Sweden’s Entrails can pretty much do no wrong. I already frothed at the mouth over the first advance track from their new album Obliteration (here), and last Thursday we got another new one courtesy of CVLT Nation. Continue reading »