SEEN AND HEARD: PSYCROPTIC, FEN, CONDUIT, SUFFERING QUOTA, SKELETAL SERPENT, THEURGIA

 Album Reviews, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC, SHORT BUT SWEET  No Responses »
May 282026
 

(written by Islander)

We had an 11th-hour cancellation of a premiere I had committed to write for today. With the unexpected free time dropping in my lap like that, I thought I ought to get a head-start on the coming weekend roundups.

A head-start is sorely needed because the backlog of new music I haven’t had a chance to include here has swelled to humongous proportions, thanks to me shirking my duties while at Maryland Deathfest last weekend. The swell has become even more swollen in light of all the new songs that have surfaced just since last Sunday.

To reduce the swelling, we’ll lance the infection and let the following new songs and videos spurt out. (Yeah, that was a gross analogy, but the music isn’t gross, although a lot of it is indeed infectious.) Continue reading »

SHADES OF BLACK (OVERFLOWING STREAMS EDITION): COMMUNION, FEVER, HIMELVARUWE, KOMMANDANT, SANGUINARY TRANCE, SKELETAL SERPENT, THE SPIRIT OF IUVENIUM, TAUR-IM-DUINATH, TETH-NAHASH

 SHADES OF BLACK  3 Responses »
Jul 292018
 

 

I have a lot of black (and “blackened”) metal I’d like to recommend this Sunday. But because of a two-day picnic that Ms. Islander and I are hosting this weekend at the NCS compound for co-workers and other friends, I don’t have time to write much about each song or album that I’ve chosen. So I’m resorting to a thing I’ve done in the context of the SEEN AND HEARD posts during the work week when I’ve been in a similar metal-flooded, time-short situation, which I’ve called OVERFLOWING STREAMS, for obvious reasons.

Here’s a big torrent of music, with fewer words of review than usual, and I hope it’s not so much metal that you’re deterred from investigating for yourselves. I’ve arranged the music in alphabetical order by band name,

COMMUNION

In December of last year I posted about a stream of a song called “Witching Thrust” by the Chilean black/death band Communion. It came from their second album, The Communion, which was then set for release by Hells Headbangers on January 26th. The whole album popped up in a Bandcamp alert I received late last week, which might mean that it only recently became available as a digital download. Or maybe it was just a reminder. Either way, I got all fired up again listening to the song “Witching Thrust”. Continue reading »