SEEN AND HEARD: THE OCEAN, BEHEMOTH, OBLITERATIONS, SOREPTION

Satan has been a busy little sulphurous bee this week. So many newsy metal announcements, so many new metally songs, more than my addled brain can keep up with. Here are a few of the items I spied over the last 24 hours that I thought were worth sharing. More will come in another post today.

TOURISM: THE OCEAN / SCALE THE SUMMIT / THE ATLAS MOTH / SILVER SNAKES

Who are these people who are constantly blaring that “Metal Sucks” and why are they associating with miscreants such as The Ocean, Scale the Summit, The Atlas Moth, and Silver Snakes? I must add that question to the long list of life’s mysteries to which I must devote my investigative energies. Whoever those people are and whatever obscure impulses motivate them, they are presenting a U.S. tour of the afore-mentioned miscreants, wisely choosing to launch it in The Emerald City, for which I will give thanks by sacrificing a neighbor’s child under the next full moon.

Other less important cities will be visited by this very impressive line-up, and I will list them after the jump for those whose eyesight isn’t sharp enough to discern them on the tour poster above. And speaking of the line-up, though I have been savaged by the first three bands in previous musical performances, Silver Snakes have not had the pleasure of savaging me before, and in fact I was unaware of their existence before those people who blare “Metal Sucks” presented them in this new tour, though I sometimes see silver snakes while on the verge of a blackout drunk. Therefore, along with the dates I will provide a bit of their music, which involves clean singing along with heaviness and lightness.

For more details about the tour, go here:

http://www.metalsucks.net/2014/01/14/metalsucks-presents-ocean-scale-summit-atlas-moth-silver-snakes/

3/05 Seattle, WA — Chop Suey
3/06 Portland, OR – Branx
3/07 San Francisco, CA – Bottom of the Hill
3/08 Los Angeles, CA – The Lyric
3/09 San Diego, CA – Soda Bar
3/10 Tempe, AZ – Yucca Tap Room
3/11 El Paso, TX – The Spot
3/13 Austin, TX – South By Southwest Official Showcase
3/14 Grand Prairie, TX – South By So What Fest
3/15 Houston, TX – Fitzgerald’s
3/16 Metairie, LA – Cypress
3/17 Tampa, FL – The Crowbar
3/18 Pembroke Pines, FL – Talent Farm
3/19 Orlando, FL – The Blackbooth
3/21 Atlanta, GA – Masquerade
3/22 Louisville, KY – Diamond
3/23 Chicago, IL – Subterranean
3/24 Pontiac, MI – Pike Room
3/25 Cleveland, OH – Grog Shop
3/26 Pittsburgh, PA – Altar Bar
3/27 Washington, DC – DC9
3/28 West Chester, PA – The Note
3/29 New York, NY – The Studio @ Webster Hall
3/30 Boston, MA – Sinclair

 

 

BEHEMOTH

For those who have been living in caves (and welcome to all my cave-dwelling brethren and sistren!), Behemoth’s next album, The Satanist, will be released on February 3 in the U.K., February 4 in North America and Poland, February 5 in Japan, and February 7 in the rest of the cosmos. This morning there appeared the second of four “making of” videos related to the “making of” The Satanist. Dark birds fly in slow motion, a hooded man smokes, words are spoken in a foreign tongue, musical instruments are played in a candle-lit room, ambient sounds are heard. My black heart skipped a beat, so great is my anticipation.

 

 

OBLITERATIONS SIGN IN BLOOD

On the day of the winter solstice, 2013, I did review an EP by an L.A. band named Obliterations, which I found pleasingly head-wrecking and inspirational. I observed that the band would have yet another four-song EP (entitled The Hole) coming in January (the 21st, to be precise) via the Volcom Entertainment Vinyl Club. Imagine my gleeful surprise when yesterday I saw the news that Obliterations have inked a deal with Southern Lord for the release of their debut album, which is to be recorded in March at Dave Grohl’s Studio 606.

Imagine also my further gleeful surprise this morning upon discovering that The Hole became available on Bandcamp yesterday. I know what I will be listening to later today.

It was also pleasing to see that even in the electronic age in which we live, the old way of signing infernal pacts has not completely vanished from the earth.

https://www.facebook.com/Obliterations
http://obliterations.bandcamp.com/

 

 

SOREPTION

As the years have passed since the release of Soreption’s debut album, my gnawing hunger for more of their music has grown to the point of a recurring pain in the guts. The hunger shall soon be satiated, because Engineering the Void will be released by Unique Leader on February 18 (and because yesterday we received our advance copy, Hail Satan).

Last month we featured the first advance track from the new album (here), and yesterday the magazine known as DECIBEL premiered its title track. I would like to share it with you right here. To prepare your ears, I will say that the song is a tech-death tornado inhabited by growling wolves and shrieking hyenas in which pneumatic rhythms do battle with spidery guitar workouts and lush synthesizer melody. Delicious.

https://www.facebook.com/soreption