SEEN AND HEARD ON A SATURDAY: WAYFARER, ASHTAR, HOUSE OF FLOWERS

 Album Reviews, Exceptions to the Rule, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC, SHORT BUT SWEET  3 Responses »
Jul 292023
 

Dear friends and complete strangers, greetings to you on another diēs Sāturnī. I must be brief today because of an Event I must attend, which begins soon and will extend until the stars come out, when the congregants will have to see each other by firelight.

That Event continues tomorrow, beginning early on dies Solis and again proceeding past nightfall, and so don’t be surprised if my next usual round-up of new music, the blacker one, is also brief or goes missing altogether, even if I don’t fall into the fire.

WAYFARER (U.S.)

Denver-based Wayfarer‘s next album, American Gothic, is said to serve as “a funeral for the American dream”. “Caked in dust, and buried deep in blood and gunpowder, it paints a brutal and beautiful portrait” — so says Profound Lore, which will release the album on October 27th. “What we have now is a world full of oil drillers, and railroad barons. Cattle thieves and company men. This is the new American Gothic”. So says the band.

Along with these announcements came a video for a new album track named “False Constellation“. Continue reading »

WAYFARER: “A ROMANCE WITH VIOLENCE”

 Album Reviews  2 Responses »
Oct 212020
 

 

(Here’s Gonzo’s imaginative review of the new album by Colorado’s Wayfarer, which was released last week by Profound Lore Records.)

In this writer’s humble opinion, there are two hallmarks of truly breathtaking music: 1) It gets better with every listen, and 2) it elucidates vivid imagery when listening to it with your eyes closed.

There are, of course, other criteria for evaluating the quality of music, but when talking about A Romance with Violence, the newest dust-covered output from Denver post-black metal crew Wayfarer, those two items are the perfect place to start. Continue reading »

NEW MUSIC FRIDAY: TOMORROW’S RAIN, DARKENED, WAYFARER, CARCASS

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  No Responses »
Sep 182020
 

 

(Here’s another Friday round-up of new music compiled by Seattle-based NCS contributor Gonzo.)

I, for one, am looking forward to cooler weather.

Not only will cooler temperatures bring about an overdue ending of the wildfires currently making life miserable for the Northwest, but also an ideal environment for listening to your audial brutality of choice.

And while it’s certainly kvlt as fuck to stand in the middle of a Norwegian forest in corpse paint and spiky gauntlets while cranking up the lo-fi black metal, it’s by no means required. Some of this week’s new releases may inspire it, though. Continue reading »

SHADES OF BLACK (PART 1): SKYBORNE REVERIES, DYSYLUMN, WAYFARER

 SHADES OF BLACK  1 Response »
Aug 162020
 

 

I passed a cognitive test this morning. It was even easier than “Person. Woman. Man. Camera. TV.” I turned down the offer to ride around in a golf cart and watch four of my idiot friends embarrass themselves in heat that’s expected to hit 100°F before they finish.

Instead I stayed behind in the place we rented for this mini-vacation with another person who also passed the test, surrounded by vistas of forest and mountains. And I listened to a lot of new black metal, and I wrote this post, which comes in two parts.

SKYBORNE REVERIES (Australia)

The first song in this collection is a fiery storm of sound – synths gloriously burning high overhead, the riffing flowing in scintillating waves and flickering in a mad boil, the vocals a mix of a larynx-lacerating torment and ravaged roars. Continue reading »

OUR LIST OF 2018’S MOST INFECTIOUS EXTREME METAL SONGS (PART 25): PANOPTICON, KVALVAAG, WAYFARER, NEVERENDING WINTER

 MOST INFECTIOUS SONGS-2018  No Responses »
Feb 122019
 

 

As you can see, I decided to really load up today’s installment of the list, with four songs instead of two or three, and I also decided to lean into black metal for this one. I also thought these songs fit together in a way that would make for a good playlist, in addition to each of them being deserving presences on this list. As a bonus, two of these songs were performed at the Fire In the Mountains festival last summer outside Jackson, Wyoming, and I’ve included quality video of both of those, thanks to (((unartig))), as well as the album tracks.

To check out the previous installments of this still-expanding list, you’ll find them behind this link, and to learn what this series is all about, go here.

PANOPTICON

Without advance fanfare, or any preceding reviews, last April Panopticon released the extraordinary double-album The Scars of Man on the Once Nameless Wilderness (I and II), one half devoted to atmospheric metal and the other half focused on Americana (though the division isn’t a rigid one, with some bleed-over going both ways). Austin Lunn shared the album with me in advance of its release, and I wrote a review, holding onto it (at his request) until the release date — and then I never posted it.

I felt that I owed the music something better than the words I’d cobbled together, which struck me as more emotional and stream-of-conscious in their ramblings than they should have been. And then, with the music out in the world, I just never got back to the drawing board in the hope of crafting a better homage. Continue reading »

AUSTIN TERROR FEST 2018: A PHOTO RECORD (DAY 3)

 Concert Reviews  No Responses »
Jul 232018
 

 

The second annual installment of Austin Terror Fest took place in the heart of Texas on June 15-17, 2018, proudly co-sponsored by NCS. It featured performances by 30 bands from around the U.S. (and outside it). It was a great event, and we’re already anxious for ATF 2019 (and yes, work is already under way to present the third edition of the festival next year). We were very fortunate that New Orleans-based photographer Teddie Taylor was there to document the fest through her lenses, and to share her photos with us so that we, in turn, can share them with you.

Last week we presented photos from the first day of the festival and the second, and today the focus is on the performances that took place on the third and final day, with sets by nine bands at Austin’s Lost Well. And without further ado, here’s our selection from the many great images that Teddie captured during these performances: Continue reading »

THE SYNN REPORT (PART 97): WAYFARER

 THE SYNN REPORT  2 Responses »
Jun 012018
 

 

(Andy Synn delivers a SYNN REPORT for the month of May, focusing on the discography of the Colorado band band Wayfarer.)

Recommended for fans of: Agalloch, Panopticon, Oak Pantheon

One of the great things about writing The Synn Report over all these years is how much variety has been involved since its inception, with the collected entries (now nearing a cool one hundred) covering a wide swathe of the Metal landscape as well as a solid proportion of the globe.

Heck, in just the last ten entries we’ve had entries from Norway, Germany, Finland, Sweden, Canada, Poland, and the USA, featuring a mix of Black, Death, Sludge, Thrash, and Post-Metal, and I have plan to visit many more countries and a variety of other genres (and sub-genres) going forwards.

This month’s entry however, as well as being a day late, just so happens to mark the second entry in a row hailing from the good ol’ US of A (Denver, Colorado, to be exact)… and next month’s might just end up making three in a row if things carry on the way they are doing… but I think you’ll find that the strength of the music on offer easily justifies this decision to stick around in the putative “Land of the Free”. Continue reading »

OVERFLOWING STREAMS: WAYFARER, ATAVISMA, NATTVERD, THRONEUM, FINIS, 酸葬儀 ACIDFUNERAL, WITCHSKULL, HAMMERS

 Exceptions to the Rule, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  1 Response »
May 082018
 

 

I had enough time last night to turn myself into a musical glutton. Just kept stuffing myself to the point of swelling up like a dirigible, hoping I’d come across something that wasn’t tasty before I exploded. That didn’t happen, so I had to summon the last vestiges of willpower and make myself stop.

So here’s a whole bunch of music, and only pithy impressions from me.

WAYFARER

Wayfarer’s third album, their first for the Profound Lore label, is described as “a reflection of the Rocky Mountains and high plains of their native Colorado”, “drawing influence as much from the dusty, dark Americana of the ‘Denver Sound’ and the scores of epic westerns as they do the fury and melody of black metal….” Continue reading »

SHADES OF BLACK: WAYFARER, BLACK CULT, HERMÓÐR, ADVERSUM, GROTESQUE CEREMONIUM, KING SATAN

 Album Reviews, SHADES OF BLACK  6 Responses »
Jun 122016
 

Wayfarer-Old Soul

 

I scattered three posts over three days during the last week recommending music in a blackened vein from a lot of premieres and releases I had accumulated on various lists that I keep — and I still didn’t exhaust everything I wanted to recommend. So yes, I’m throwing still more at you today, while resuming my habit of publishing these Shades of Black posts on Sundays.

I have an array of advance tracks from forthcoming releases (including one new video) and a new single, by a total of six interesting and diverse bands.

WAYFARER

In 2014, Denver’s Wayfarer released an excellent debut album (via Prosthetic) in Children of the Iron Age, and now Prosthetic has scheduled June 17 as the release date for the band’s second full-length, Old Souls. So far, three songs from the album can be heard on Bandcamp, and they are well worth your time. Continue reading »

BIG ASS ROUNDUP

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  14 Responses »
Oct 032014
 

 

(Leperkahn continues to pitch in during my round-up hiatus.  Between what I sent him and what he found himself (of which there was quite an overlap), this is a monstrously large collection of recent, recommended goodies.)

Hey all! So a bloody lot of things got put up between when I sent in my last roundup and now, so this is gonna be a long one, since I’m not in the mood to separate them out. Strap in for a wild ride across the metalsphere.

BLUT AUS NORD

A few hours ago a new song named “Clarissima Mundi Lumina” from the new Blut Aus Nord album Memoria Vetusta III — Saturnian Poetry was made available for listening. This follows our own premiere of “Paien” right here. Islander says his review of the album will be posted on Monday, but he says there’s no point in waiting — just go pre-order the album in a special digipack CD edition here or on vinyl here. You can listen to “Clarissima Mundi Lumina” while you’re doing that:

https://www.facebook.com/blutausnord.official
https://www.facebook.com/debemurmorti Continue reading »