IMPERATUS: “AT THE MERCY OF THE WIND”

 Album Reviews  No Responses »
Apr 242024
 

(Our Hanoi-based contributor Vizzah Harri wrote the following extensive and extremely enthusiastic review of the debut album from the Vietnamese black metal band Imperatus, which was released last month. This will be followed in the near future by a two-part interview.)

Imperatus means Order or Command (‘imperiously’ comes from the Latin word imperare, which means “to command.” Other words from this same root include empire, emperor, imperial, and imperative.) In order to kick off this faux-imperious review of a band that I believe will command your attention to the max, one might be allowed to err on the side of believing that this could be the jumpstart to a new empirical anomaly not to be fucked with. Emperor’s debut has always been slated as one of the top first albums ever released and they are mentioned for a reason (aural affinity). Just like Imperatus giving recognition to a sound reminiscent of their childhood, it is this listener’s conviction that the riffs found in this here disc be epically imperial. Continue reading »

LOST IN A LIMINALITY OF IM-PURE WRATH AND REFLECTION (READ: REFRACTION) — AN INTERVIEW WITH DØDSSANGER (PART 2)

 Interviews  No Responses »
Apr 192024
 

(This is the second interview that our Hanoi-based contributor Vizzah Harri conducted with Downfall from the Vietnamese black metal band Dødssanger. Find the first interview here.)

Taken from Audio recorded in conversation on February 27th, 2024.

I first met Kyle Newman aka Downfall from Dødssanger when he was still a university student; he’s grown more in all aspects in the last 6 years than I’ve experienced growth over the last 2 decades. The conversation that follows was way more of a general discourse on the Hanoi scene, headphones, live shows and the writing process than an interview, whereas Part 1 was more formal, happened later and attempted to focus more on his stage persona Downfall and the project as such. Continue reading »

LOST IN A LIMINALITY OF IM-PURE WRATH AND REFLECTION (READ: REFRACTION) — AN INTERVIEW WITH DØDSSANGER (PART 1)

 Interviews  1 Response »
Apr 172024
 


Downfall, Dødssanger

(In an effort to help shine a light on metal from Vietnam, our Hanoi-based correspondent Vizzah Harri has brought us the following very erudite and very entertaining interview of Downfall, the person behind the Hanoi-based black metal band Dødssanger.)

Dødssanger is Downfall, writer, multi-instru-mentalist and creator of the depressive black metal project that released their debut last year.

I met with Downfall at the end of February this year but the day job, time-fvckery and taking on too many projects at one time meant that the finishing touches were pushed back. Islander posted my ‘6-word novel’ review of their song Penance in this reader’s most infectious lists of 2023 which can be found here. If you didn’t get the time to read those posts, here is what I said about Penance:

“Hebephrenic grimoire,
hellatious hymnals of ill-grace.”

Those words still stand.

The interview that follows lighted upon musings about live performances, the Vietnamese music scene, as well as their recording process. Dødssanger just released their album in physical format and it can be found/ordered here: and there are only 21 copies left of an original 40. Continue reading »

SLAM CITY METAL FEST II 2024 MARCH 15-16

 Concert Reviews  1 Response »
Apr 122024
 

(Our Hanoi-based contributor Vizzah Harri prepared the following extensive report on the Slam City II Metal Fest, which took place last month over two days in Siem Reap and Phnom Penh, Cambodia.)

SLAM CITY II METAL FEST 2024 officially featured 11 bands from three South East Asian countries. Sadly, Lilith from the Philippines were unable to make it this time due to what the author can confirm as exorbitant flight prices this year. My Chemical Bromance, a metallic-dubstep act stood in for the Siem Reap leg. It was set and executed to occur over two days in Siem Reap and Phnom Penh. And again, this scribe can verify that it was a weekend that will go down in the history of Asian metal as what the underground is all about. Grit, grunge, punk-values, inclusion, and mighty riffage. Continue reading »

TRANSMISSIBLE SPONGIFORM ENCEPHALOPATHIES OF ’23 — PART VI

 LISTMANIA 2023  No Responses »
Mar 152024
 

(Our editor Islander wasn’t able to compile a list of Most Infectious Extreme Metal Songs from 2023, but our supporter Vizzah Harri, a resident of Hanoi, Vietnam, has stepped in to fill the void. We’ve already published Parts 1-5 of his list (find those here), and now we’re proceeding with Part 6 — almost the final part.)

Transmissible spongiform encephalopathies of ’23 – Part VI (of 6.16… because the sacred number is 13, my mom is – no word of a lie – the 13th child and even though they grew up rather Christian, French-influenced paganism still had a strong hold and they called themselves the 12 after you-know-who’s acolytes, seeing as baby #12 sadly didn’t make it.  6+1+6 equals 13 and if isopsephy is mangled by the kind of imposter disordered numerologist that tattooed a clock pointing to 3:37 on his left shoulder seeing as his idol growing up was Anthony Kiedis and Scar tissue was exactly that length, then why not use that number as the final installment?

This gives you an idea where my style sprouts from, ‘that’ Riot Hyatt McCarthy–word-salad spitter, sprinkle in some filth, and garnish it with the dust of your dreams served next to a walled orchard and you get my meander. 666 added up is just eighteen, ask the Greeks, they would know. And yes, I’m therefore doing an Islander and adding one more with links to all the tracks that there is not enough sand in the hourglass for to keep writing about last year. Continue reading »

TRANSMISSIBLE SPONGIFORM ENCEPHALOPATHIES OF ’23 — PART 5

 LISTMANIA 2023  No Responses »
Mar 122024
 

(Our editor wasn’t able to compile a list of Most Infectious Extreme Metal Songs from 2023, but our supporter Vizzah Harri, a resident of Hanoi, Vietnam, has stepped in to fill the void. We’ve already published Parts 1-4 of his list (find those here), and now we’re proceeding with Part 5.)

This series can be seen as a coagulation of forms on psychological de-fractured symbiosis. As in, this isn’t some SCP level troll, I tried to bring the avant-garde into writing about music that appeals to me but on songs from genres and locations that are varied enough that it would appeal to most readers of this site (yes it’s still heavily biased with 14 from the USA, six from Germany, 3 each from Norway and England, two each from Vietnam, Sweden and France, while Denmark, Canada, China, Australia, Hungary, Italy, Belarus, Poland, Wales, India, Russia and Finland each were represented by one band – math ain’t my strong point, there’s a miscount in there somewhere). Continue reading »

TRANSMISSIBLE SPONGIFORM ENCEPHALOPATHIES OF ’23 — PART 4

 LISTMANIA 2023  No Responses »
Mar 062024
 

(Our editor wasn’t able to compile a list of Most Infectious Extreme Metal Songs from 2023, but our supporter Vizzah Harri, a resident of Hanoi, Vietnam, has stepped in to fill the void. We’ve already published Parts 1-3 of his list (find those here), and now we’re proceeding with Part 4.)

Why is NCS posting this so deep into the year already and why does it allow this semi-literate baboon back for more? Well, two reasons, one of which needs a bit more extrapolation.

The editor of this fine establishment somehow lived vicariously through me and took the wrong cup of rượu (rice wine), thereby inducing temporary blindness and resulting in him just okay-ing it… but on a serious note if you’re at all as addicted to year-end lists and particularly the most infectious lists… then we all know it had to happen, no matter how long it took this reader to edit down his sleep-deprived lunar new year frenzy of an essay. I say sleep-deprived when in actual fact my self-induced insomnolence was abetted by experimenting with copious amounts of mind-altering substances, for research purposes of course.  Continue reading »

TRANSMISSIBLE SPONGIFORM ENCEPHALOPATHIES OF ’23 — PART 3

 LISTMANIA 2023  No Responses »
Feb 292024
 

(Our editor wasn’t able to compile a list of Most Infectious Extreme Metal Songs from 2023, but our supporter Vizzah Harri, a resident of Hanoi, Vietnam, has stepped in to fill the void. We published Parts 1 and 2 of his list here and here, and now we’re proceeding with Part 3. The remaining three parts will follow in fairly short order.)

We were awaiting that infectious list with keening anticipation, and it being Islander’s baby, for a while there we were genuinely a bit worried whether he was okay. But as of this writing on the last day of the year of the rabbit (albeit the cat in ‘Nam, and yes it is already deep into lunar January, but Gregorian January and now Feb have been an unequivocal cornucopia of quality releases, so whether anyone is even interested anymore in the year just past is anyone’s guess) we are still blessed with the presence of NCS’ inimitable editor.

I told myself I need to get the second part out before the 1st day in the lunar calendar, today was that day but – like that saying when people imbibe early in the morning – it is certainly noon somewhere in the world (again, it’s almost March as I edit this again so just assume that I work on Africa time, a loose concept in my motherland). Time and the perception thereof, just like any other palpable or imperceptible agent, can inform cultures and so I implore you to disengage from the now and harken back. I ended up cutting up one follow-up into 5 parts… Continue reading »

TRANSMISSIBLE SPONGIFORM ENCEPHALOPATHIES OF ’23 — PART II

 LISTMANIA 2023  No Responses »
Feb 282024
 

(Our editor wasn’t able to compile a list of Most Infectious Extreme Metal Songs from 2023, but our supporter Vizzah Harri, a resident of Hanoi, Vietnam, has stepped in to fill the void. We published Part I of his list here, and now we’re proceeding with Part II. The remaining four parts will follow in fairly short order.)

‘We live in uncertain times’ is both clichéd and antiquated. Fear has been a massive driving-force towards change and, just like anything else, conceivable change is not always good. We understand change as a constant, almost a law as such, yet we fear it and our fear of it more often than not is what drives us towards horrid acts against our fellow human beings.

And so in order to inoculate against fear (of the other), of change, of that which we do not understand, we can take cues from why some of us are so compelled to find that new riff, to experience something for the first time, for our minds not just to open, but to bend around that axis of perdition into a fused vessel. Transported into worlds hitherto unknown. Always keeping a keen ear to the ground and another filled with that which challenges and provokes, that is what keeps us, and therefore also our art, closer to our initial true intentions. Continue reading »

TRANSMISSIBLE SPONGIFORM ENCEPHALOPATHIES OF ’23 – PART 1 (OF AN UNKNOWN NUMBER)

 LISTMANIA 2023  No Responses »
Feb 052024
 

(Vizzah Harri was not necessarily invited to write about the most virulent verses and lullabies of the year just past, but he did ask rather nicely (read: forcefully) whether he could give it a shot in the dark. This guest says he works in education, is an occasional scribbler of self-proclaimed abstract poetry bordering on obscurantism and his only real skill is that of finding mistakes in the work of his (su)peer(ior)s. Not to mention his affinity for keyboard-racing. He resides in Hanoi, Vietnam.)

According to the CDC, infectious diseases can be either bacterial, viral, fungal or parasitic in nature (other than the CDC link, unless you somehow reverted back to troglodytical proclivities and missed it completely this time ’round last year, them be the greatest hits of 2022’s most infectious lists). There also exists a rare group of mephitic and contagious diseases known as transmissible spongiform encephalopathies.

TSEs or prion diseases are a family of rare progressive neurodegenerative brain disorders with long incubation periods; progressing rapidly once symptoms develop, they are always fatal. I’m not saying that this list is so noxious it might kill you, but something has to kill you in the end, albeit the biggest predator here is the presence of overlong sentences. Full disclosure and disclaimer up next: Continue reading »