SEEN AND HEARD: IMPALED NAZARENE, DIOCLETIAN, GOJIRA, THE BODY

I’ve collected here some things that made a big impression on me when I discovered them over the last 24 hours. Perhaps they will make an impression on you, too.

IMPALED NAZARENE

2014 will see the release of the TWELFTH (!!) album by Finland’s Impaled Nazarene. Although I haven’t listened to even half of those dozen, I’ve listened enough to know that although their sound might not be entirely predictable from album to album (not a bad thing), it’s always likely to be a skull-hammering good time. From what I’ve heard of the new album, that will hold true yet again.

The new one’s name is Vigorous and Liberating Death, and the album cover was painted by Taneli Jarva. It’s scheduled for release by Osmose Productions on April 14. It includes 13 songs, almost all in sub-three-minute territory. You can get a sense of what’s coming via a track named “Kuoleman Varjot” that recently appeared on SoundCloud. Plus, the band have released a lyric video for the album’s title track. You can check out both below.

“Kuoleman Varjot” just rips like a feral, thrashing, black-metal beast from start to finish, but it’s awfully damned catchy at the same time. The title song pulls back slightly on the speed to generate a more atmospheric aura, but the writhing, whipping riffs are no less compelling. It’s infernally good.

https://www.facebook.com/ImpaledNazareneOfficial
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Osmose-Productions/192865300755575

 

 

 

 

 

 

DIOCLETIAN

New Zealand’s Diocletian have completed a new album under the title Gesundrian, which will be coming from Osmose Productions in May. Though the band discharged a few shorter releases in 2012, the last time they delivered a full-length was in 2010. Although I haven’t seen an official identification of the artist who created the cover art, it looks very much like the work of Paolo Girardi. To see the full gatefold artwork, go here.

In January we featured the first advance track from the album, a song named “Zealot’s Poison”. Today, Osmose put another one up on SoundCloud, and its title is “Steel Jaws”.  From the bone-grinding bass notes in the first seconds, to the the razor-edged riffs that drive the song, to the militaristic drumming and the clawing vocal assault, the music is utterly gripping. It seethes and boils and crushes, a hellstorm of scathing ferocity that makes me even more eager to hear all of Gesundrian.

https://www.facebook.com/DOOMCULT
http://www.diocletian.net

 

 

 

 

 

GOJIRA

And now for a change of pace.

Gavin Shapiro resides in Brooklyn and spends time making “motion graphics”. He’s also a fan of those French metal titans in Gojira. He made a short animated clip to accompany an excerpt from “Flying Whales”. He introduced the clip with these words: “Whenever I listen to the song ‘Flying Whales’ by Gojira, this is what I imagined in my head, so I had to make it.” I’m sooooo glad he did. I soooo wish this were longer.

(via Metal Sucks and numerous tips from NCS readers.)

 

Flying Whales from gavin shapiro on Vimeo.

 

 

 

THE BODY

To wrap up this round-up, let’s have yet another change of pace.

The Body’s new album is I Shall Die Here. I haven’t heard all of it yet, but what I have heard is a revelation. The band’s previous works have been uncomfortable but unforgettable, and while darkness still pervades what I’ve heard from the new album, The Body’s collaboration with producer Bobby Krlic (who makes electronic-oriented music as The Haxan Cloak) has pushed I Shall Die Here into new aural territories.

What I saw this morning was a beautifully made short film directed by Jason Evans that uses music from I Shall Die Here as its soundtrack. The film is called “At the Mercy of It All”. A gaunt, haunted-looking man treks through the snow for water, lights candles in an isolated cabin, prepares to play a piano, tears pages from a book, reviews the memories of the wreckage of his life, watches them burn, feels the earth on his face… He is haunted, and the film will haunt you, too.

Two of the album tracks are streaming on Bandcamp, and I’ve included them below as well. Amazing stuff… the sound of existence coming apart at the bloody seams.

https://rvng.bandcamp.com/album/i-shall-die-here
https://www.facebook.com/pages/the-body/334047229514
https://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Haxan-Cloak/157897796801