(Here’s another installment of Andy Synn’s irregular series devoted to his favorite things that come in fives. Seems like a good occasion to sound off on what you’re looking forward to as well, so please leave Comments.)
Now this is an easy one… and a hard one… to write.
Easy… because there are SO many awesome albums coming out this year to choose from.
Hard… because there are TOO many awesome albums coming out this year to choose from!
Still, here’s a selection of five to whet your appetite. (Note – some nepotism involved)
LASCAILLE’S SHROUD – INTERVAL 02: PARALLEL INFINITIES – THE ABSCINDED UNIVERSE
The one I’m most immediately looking forward to is the phenomenally ostentatious second album by one-man riff-machine Brett Windnagle, under the Lascaille’s Shroud moniker. It’s bigger, ballsier, and more bat-shit crazy than its predecessor – a double-album of audacious sci-fi power-melodic-death-prog-metal, whose ten songs vary between 02:59 and a whopping 25:38 in length. It comes out digitally tomorrow (28/01/14) and a certain writer might just have a guest spot on it as well…
[Editor’s Intrusion: Three tracks can be streamed below, and that certain writer, whose name begins with Andy, contributed additional harsh vox on a song named “Reborn: The Lamentations of a Dying Universe”.]
Track listing:
1. Integration: Into the Posthuman Continuum
2. Reborn: The Lamentation’s of a Dying Universe
3. Awakened: Not Even Remembered by the Dust of Stars
4. Obscured: The Great Aphotic Barriers
5. Agony: The Sad and Beautiful Face of Death
6. War: A Congregation of Non-Existence
7. Sorrow: The Conversation I Had with Death
8. Disenthralled: Into the Bulk
9. Transcience: A Moment for Our Eternity
10. The Guilt Reprisal
http://lascaillesshroud.bandcamp.com/album/interval-02-parallel-infinities-the-abscinded-universe
HELLISH OUTCAST – STAY OF EXECUTION
The Norwegian death/thrash monsters’ first album, Your God Will Bleed, was one of the best discoveries of 2012 for me. A feral, vicious beast of an album which pulled no punches and showed no mercy in its pursuit of sheer sonic aggression. And, not to show off here, I’ve heard the follow-up and it is, if possible, even more pissed off, even more ravenous, and even more heavy than the first one. Even better, it’s a more agonising, anguished, and more personal record. It’s the sound of a band giving voice to their rage and pain. Like the old adage says, there’s nothing more dangerous than a wounded animal…
[Editor’s Intrusion, again: Keep your eyes peeled to our site, because the very next post will be a few words from Hellish Outcast’s composer and drummer, Mads Lilletvedt.]
https://www.facebook.com/HELLISHOUTCAST
Track listing:
Secret!
CORMORANT – EARTH DIVER
It’s been three years since the fantastic Dwellings teased and tantalised our ears with its infectious brand of “post black darkened prog” (the band’s words, not mine). Three years of trials and tribulations, all of which will have only fed the beast that is Cormorant. The first song debuted from the album “Waking Sleep” (here) surprised many with its more overt blackened overtones, while also introducing us to the savage roar of new bassist/vocalist Marcus Luscombe, and I don’t doubt that the rest of the album will contain just as many sweet surprises.
https://www.facebook.com/CormorantMusic
Track listing:
Unknown!
A HILL TO DIE UPON – HOLY TERROR
I’m eagerly awaiting the third album of titanic blackened death metal might from my second favourite brothers of destruction. It promises to stomp hard, crush deep, and blitzkrieg in the way that only AHTDU can do so well. I contributed to their Indiegogo campaign (which closed some time ago) without a second thought, so hopefully that tells you just how much I’m anticipating this release.
https://www.facebook.com/ahilltodieuponband
Track listing:
1. Cloven Hoof Hava Nagila
2. A Jester Arrayed in Burning Gold
3. Unyielding Anguish
4. Let the Ravens Have My Eyes
5. Hæðen
6. Nekyia
7. Somme
8. Rime (Jerub-Ba’al)
9. O Death
10. Satan Speaks
TWILIGHT’S EMBRACE – BY DARKNESS UNDONE
And last, but by no means least… one of my albums. Well, I say “my”, but most of the song-writing is courtesy of Mr. Ben Sizer, who certainly knows his way around a melancholy riff or two. My role was simply to step in and put words, and a voice, to his misery. And I think I’ve done that pretty well.
https://www.facebook.com/twilightsembrace
Track List:
The Dry Land
Ego Trip
A Subtle Surrender
Fragments
A Legacy of Loss
My Last Breath
By Darkness Undone
32 Responses to “FIVE OF MY FAVOURITE… ALBUMS TO LOOK FORWARD TO IN 2014”
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I’m looking forward more to new Opeth, Agalloch, Abigail Williams, Falls of Rauros, and Black Table. I’m also pretending that Alcest didn’t make an album this year.
I’d agree on all of these, though I’m a bit wary of the new Opeth album (despite them being my favorite band). Heritage Pt.2 is not something I’d want.
Oh, and this caught my eye last night. It sounds promising project: http://jwalton.bandcamp.com/album/hyalite-canyon
“Hiraeth Eschar is a new entity lead by Jason Walton and rounded out by like-minded individuals Jessica Way and Tanner Anderson. The trio explores humankind’s intense reciprocal relationship not only with nature, but with certain places. Hiraeth Eschar is currently writing for a full length album.”
Thanks for that. Sounded beautiful..Hireath Eschar is indeed looked forward to.
Damn, didn’t know about this — thanks for the tip.
Kampfars new record, Djevelmakt (Devil Power) is out today, so that’s one down.
Behemoth is right around the corner. The Satanist is out in precicely one week.
Since reading this post:
https://www.nocleansinging.com/2014/01/24/seen-and-heard-stam1na-noctem-black-mask/
…I’m now looking foreward as hell to Noctem – Exilium, out 03.03.
I’m also waiting for Slagmaurs new album, but they are as unpredictable as Shining. A miniatyre Chinese Democracy every time. Wasn’t they supposed to release Thill Smitts Terror in late 2013? Now its december 2014. Those Bastards! https://soundcloud.com/slagmaur/slagmaur-the-drummer-of
Septicflesh will probably or perhaps release a new album this year.
(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2JWgi9HuLfw)
(Can we hope for another Shining album this year as well? And Carach Angren?)
I normaly perfere to be glad for all the releases that have come out, in stead of using all my energy for waiting, but hey, it’s allways good to have something to look foreward to.
Kampfar out today! Right, off to find where I can get this….
Review coming asap (probably not for a dedicated fan such as yourself, but hopefully to convince more people to let the djevil in…)
Noctem and Behemoth are indeed worth waiting for.
There’s some great stuff coming out, no doubt, but the world could quite happily do without another Carach Angren album.
I have to disagree. Where the Corpses Sink Forever was a bit disapointing, but Death Came Through a Phantom Ship was genious. On the other hand… when a band has delivered a masterpiece ther’s normaly just one way from there…
I have to disagree with your disagreement… they’re cheesy LARP metal. If they were a film they’d be straight to the sci-fi channel, with all the bad cgi that entails.
Hahaha… I had to look up LARP, but it made me smile, allright.
Well, except from their ability to cleverly and seamlessly combine complex orchestral parts with theatrical horror black metal and ghouling ghost stories… I guess thers nothing to them 😉
Hence why I compared them to a sci-fi channel movie. They’re a low-rent version of much better bands.
I definitely don’t get the “genius” or “masterpiece” feeling you get from them.
Budget, maybe. Shallow. Paper-thin. Insipid. Other words to that effect.
Their only saving grace is/are the keyboard/orchestral parts… which seem to be the only thing they put any real time into… and really they just remind me of someone who’s played too many computer games and spends most of their time in their bedroom composing soullessly “epic” battle themes and such.
The “black metal” element is sub Cradle of Filth-esque pantomime… with no depth, no real balls…. and badly played (that live experience of them still makes me shudder), and though they’re not the only ones who deal in stories of ghosts and such, they ARE the only ones who manage to make me laugh…
The “black metal” element do have some Filth from that Cradle you mention, and it would not be able to stand on its own. I can agree with that.
The keyboard/orchestral parts, however, are thoroughly composed, and is what leads the music. It never stays still, it’s got dozens of melodylines in each song, and the multiple variations are done with good transitions all the way. That part could stand on its own if (especially if arranged for and played by a real orchestra).
Still, the combination with this “black metal light” makes it more interesting. I can listen to Vivaldi – The Four Seasons, but it’s a bit boring without any guitars and drums. 🙂 It was interesting to hear Dave Lombardo do the drums for that one on Vivaldi: The Meeting, but the orchestration were thin, and both mixing and sound held poor quality, unfortunately.
There are better bands in the genre, but I still enjoy these Dutchmen.
Lets just agree to dissagree when it comes to Carach Angren.
I don’t agree to that!
LASCAILLE’S SHROUD and TWILIGHT’s EMBRACE sound really, really promising. Luckily the former releases tomorrow (as I’ve read in this post), but when does the latter come out Andy? And when it does, where can I get it? 🙂
Slightly out of my hands at the moment, since I am only the vocalist for TE, but I do know we’re shopping around some options and looking at a late Feb/early March release for it.
Well get your damned hands in it. What good are you?
I actually have an unmastered copy, but that’s all mine.
Excellent. I hope by the time that it’s actually released I hope you’ll do some more shameless self-promotion on NCS so that I won’t miss it 😉
Thanks for the mention guys! Twilight’s Embrace has been floating around on my radar for while, this release I await anxiously!
For me it’s:
Lorelei – this is due within the next few days.
Synthetic Breed – Australian math metal band, their previous release is so fucking good I don’t know how you could top it.
In Dread Response – NZ band, kind of melodic death metal. They’ve been posting vague FB updates about how the album has been delayed by hard times in 2013. And hard times make good metal.
Khonsu
Septic Flesh – I don’t know if there’s a release lined up for this year or not, but in an interview with Christos I saw he was talking about Logan Madder lined up to produce the album and how the new songs sound, so they must be quite far through the writing process.
Funnily enough, over the last few years I’ve tended to find that my ‘best of’ lists come end of the year are mainly filled with bands I’d never heard of at the start of the year, and my guy feeling is that 2014 will be no different.
Nice news! The only one of these I knew about was Lorelei.
Damn! Need more Khonsu!
Woops, obviously that was supposed to say ‘gut feeling’, but hey let’s just go with ‘guy feeling’.. that might lead to some interesting places 😉
One of my most anticipated had been the new Exmortus, but I got my promo a week or so ago. It exceeded my expectations, and suffice it to say that every song is pretty much just as awesome as “Immortality Made Flesh”. Can’t think of anything else that hasn’t been mentioned.
can’t wait to hear new Slayer (if they ever actually go in the studio), Behemoth, At The Gates, Entombed (AD?), and a bunch of other stuff i’m forgetting because i’m never prepared when people ask me this question.
Loudblast
Madder Mortem
Hail Spirit Noir (whichas leaked and is fantastic)
Triptykon
Mitochondrion
Hail Spirit Noir is indeed fantastic and I’m looking forward to the rest on your list as well — except I didn’t know about a new Madder Mortem until this moment.
I didn’t know that Triptykon were up to no good, but hell, that’s something to look foreward to. From theitr homepage: “the groups’ second album, titled Melana Chasmata, will be released on April 14 (Europe) and April 15 (North America), 2014”
GODFLESH