SEEN AND HEARD ON A SATURDAY: BLACK ROYAL, MOTHER OF GRAVES, ANAGNORISIS, OFFERNAT, STATIC ABYSS, LACONIST

 Album Reviews, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC, SHORT BUT SWEET  No Responses »
Aug 222026
 

(written by Islander)

My short vacation which spanned last weekend prevented me from writing both this Saturday column and the usual one on Sunday. So for today I had two weeks’ worth of possibilities to choose among, along with many more on my list from previous weeks. Deciding what to recommend is always difficult, but today’s decisions were monumentlly difficult. That will be true for tomorrow’s column as well.

I think I’m best advised to cut this introduction short and get right into the music. Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: HAINTGROVE — “I DREAM IN A TONGUE I CANNOT SPEAK”

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Aug 212026
 

(written by Islander)

On Juneteenth (June 19) Texas-based Haintgrove released “Starless Passage“, the project’s debut single and first track from a forthcoming album. I paid attention in part because I’m originally from Texas and spent nearly half my life there before moving to the Pacific Northwest, but mainly because of the song’s inspiration and lyrical themes, which Haintgrove described as follows:

“Starless Passage” serves as the opening chapter of a larger concept centered on the experiences of enslaved Africans in the colonial South. Rather than presenting history as a straightforward narrative, the project approaches it through atmosphere, landscape, memory, and emotional perspective. Coastal shorelines, flooded forests, forgotten crossings, and the natural world itself play a central role in the music’s identity.

The song proved to be quite impressive — and I’ll re-share my thoughts about it before we reach the end of this article, but the main subject is a second single from Haintgrove that we’re premiering today (along with a captivating video), a song called “I Dream in a Tongue I Cannot Speak“. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: DETHRASHED — “AVARITIA”

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Aug 212026
 

(written by Islander)

As their name suggests, Dethrashed are a death/thrash band. Having been founded just last year in Tbilisi, Georgia, they’re a new group (and a young one), but they’ve wasted no time in showing listeners what they can do. They independently released their debut album Existence Under Pressure in May of this year, and they’ve already got a second one waiting on the launch pad.

The name of their second album is The Weight Of The Vortex, and it will be released by Satanath Records on October 20th. To help spread the word, today we’re premiering a song from the album called “Avaritia“.

The label has given us this description of the album’s lyrical themes: Continue reading »

SHOW REVIEW: PSYCROPTIC AND RIVERS OF NIHIL — MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA, AUGUST 15, 2026

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Aug 212026
 

(Our Australia-based contributor Tør is back with us today, providing a report on a show in Melbourne last weekend headlined by Psycroptic and Rivers of Nihil. He also provided a lot of good photos that we’re also sharing with you to help commemorate the experience of a great show.)

I almost miss the entire show because of a longer-than-usual day at work. By the time I arrive at Max Watts in downtown Melbourne, locals Growth and Sydney’s Slaughtercult have already finished most of their sets. As I get my wristband and descend the stairs to the main stage, I catch the final seconds of Slaughtercult. The room is already charged. I head straight to the bar, grab a beer, and make my way into the crowd.

Then Rivers of Nihil take the stage. Continue reading »

YOU’RE NOT HARDCORE UNLESS YOU LIVE HARDCORE: CHICO / DEAD TIRED / R.O.S.A.

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Aug 202026
 

(Andy Synn is a punk rocker… yes he is… for today, at least)

There’s been some interesting discourse – and for once I do actually mean “interesting” and not “irritating” – about the difference, if there is one, between the terms “Hardcore” and “Hardcore Punk”, and what the use of either (or both) of these terms says about the person using them.

You see, even as someone who prefers their Hardcore on the more “Metallic” side (including a lot of the current wave of Death Metal/Hardcore crossover) it feels like the “Punk” side of the scene is getting a little boxed-out (with one or two large exceptions, of course) in favour of breakdowns, beatdowns, and chunky-chuggery.

Purely by coincidence, however, I recently stumbled across a trio of albums that definitely err more towards the punkier end of the spectrum, and it’s these I want to talk about today.

Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: BOÖTES VOID — “PANTA RHEI”

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Aug 202026
 

(written by Islander)

On September 4th Vendetta Records will release a new album named Panta Rhei by the German black metal band Boötes Void. It follows a demo (The Alder’s Sleep), an EP (Alders Heresy) and two previous albums (C.O.L.D. and Singularity).

As disclosed on Metal-Archives (and probably elsewhere), the band took their name from “a region of space hundreds of millions of light-years in diameter and containing very few galaxies, also known as a supervoid”. And yet their new album is based upon the surviving writings of the vastly influential pre-Socratic Greek philosopher Heraclitus.

It is a very interesting concept, and an unusual one as the inspirational basis for black metal, and so we want to share Boötes Void’s statement about it before we get to the main focus of this feature — our premiere of the new album’s title song, which includes guest vocals by Lukas Gosch (Ellende). Continue reading »

AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: EXITIUM SUI — “UNTIL THE END HATH FOUND US”

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Aug 202026
 

(written by Islander)

We have been closely following the works of Exitium Sui since its inception, but for those who might be newcomers, it is a one-man band created in 2020 by E.S. (vocalist of the black metal band Deadspace) from Perth, Australia, and at a high level the music could be branded as a fusion of atmospheric black metal and funeral doom.

Breaking a two-year silence, Exitium Sui will be releasing a new album named Unravelling in cooperation with Meuse Music Records on September 4th. It is described as an album that confronts “the dark chasms of the human psyche” and “negotiates liminal space between utter chaos, complete seclusion, and fathomless depravity”.

Two of the songs have been revealed so far, and today we premiere a third one — “Until the End Hath Found Us” — which arrives as the subject of a shattering video. Continue reading »

BLACKER THAN THE BLACKEST BLACK: BJES / GROUSE / PETRICOR

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Aug 192026
 

(Andy Synn has three more albums for the more Black Metal inclined among you)

I’m a busy, busy man at the moment, both in my personal life (it turns out selling a house is hard), and my musical one (did I mention we’ve got a new EP out?).

But I’m still making sure to find time to listen to – and, just as importantly, to write about – new music that I think our readers might appreciate.

And with my recent focus being mostly on various forms of Death Metal and/or Hardcore I felt this week it was about time to get back to our more “blackened” roots with a collection of three relatively recent records dedicated to the glory of Black Metal.

Continue reading »

AN NCS EP PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): TERATUM — “ORDNANCE OF SPIRITUAL WARFARE”

 Album Reviews, Premieres, SHORT BUT SWEET  No Responses »
Aug 192026
 

(written by Islander)

The Swedish group Teratum rose up from the ashes of the band Beastiality in 2024, and the next year they viciously announced themselves with a two-song promo tape made available in extremely small quantities. They are now following that with a debut EP named Ordnance of Spiritual Warfare, which will be widely released by Dying Victims Productions on August 21st.

The EP includes re-recorded versions of both songs from the demo, and two more. For those who weren’t exposed to the demo tape, Teratum’s music does draw upon the violent black/thrashing antecedents of Beastiality, but it has other dimensions as well — and we’re revealing all of them in our premiere of the EP in its entirety. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: SEV LEZU — “MAN’S EVIL GIFT”

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Aug 182026
 

(written by Islander)

Sev Lezu is a relatively new bi-coastal U.S. black metal band whose three members are drummer, vocalist, lyricist, and producer Sasha Stroud (Belexum, Onw), guitarist Melissa Moore (Crossspitter, Sonja), and bassist FW (Manat). Their debut album Blood Conscript also includes a guitarist/songwriter guest appearance by Mia Priest (ex-Impiety) on the track “Corpse Step”.

Some or all of those names should grab the attention of listeners based on the music of their other bands. But if there’s any justice in the world (and of course that’s as rare as hen’s teeth), the “Grinding, Melodic Black Death”  of Seb Lezu should grab just as much attention.

Here’s how the press materials describe the band’s musical intersections: Continue reading »

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