Gigan
(written by Islander)
Poor you, I had lots of time on my hands yesterday, and so made my way through a lot more music than I’m usually able to do, and even had enough time to spill a bunch of words, like kernels from a violently ruptured grain silo.
With this much music in a weekly roundup, I often default to mentally un-taxing organizational strategies like alphabetization. But not today. I made these choices because of connections, and organized them in the way they connected for me. You’ll get it or you won’t, but as always, I hope you find one or more things you’re really glad you found, in whatever order it comes.
GIGAN (U.S.)
Almost exactly seven years have crawled by since we got Gigan‘s last album, Undulating Waves of Rainbiotic Iridescence. A thing or two has happened in the world since September 2017. A thing or two has happened to Gigan as well, but thankfully Eric Hersemann hasn’t abandoned his proclivity for bamboozling album and song titles, witness the name of Gigan‘s new album:
Anomalous Abstractigate Infinitessimus
Also not abandoned: Gigan‘s proclivity for creating bamboozling death metal. Witness the first single from the new full-length, “Erratic Pulsitivity and Horror“, whose name alone is strongly suggestive of what happens.
Gigan waste no time scrambling their listeners’ brains in an effusion of writhing, roiling, and erratically pulsating fretwork, and careening them off the walls with constantly variable drumming. Where the horrors become manifest are mainly in the bestially roaring and screaming vocals, though the delirious madness in the guitar-spasms becomes scary too.
Take a bow gentlemen:
Eric Hersemann – “All electric, acoustic and bass guitars, theremin, otomatone, synths, lyrics, concepts and madness.”
Nathan Cotton – “Drums, percussion and Sunny weather.”
Jerry Kavouriaris – “Vocals and violence.”
Anomalous Abstractigate Infinitessimus will be released by Willowtip on October 25th.
https://gigan.bandcamp.com/album/anomalous-abstractigate-infinitessimus
https://www.facebook.com/Giganmusic/
OLD MACHINES (U.S.)
I don’t pretend to believe that the way I make connections between music is the way other people would do it, but in my head this next little EP made for a fine follow-on to that Gigan song.
Oddly, I found out about this three-song release from our old Orlando-based pal KevinP, who’s about as far across the country from me as it’s possible to get, even though Old Machines are based just a few hours down the highway from where I am in the Puget Sound area.
Kevin got my quick attention in a message by comparing this EP to The Key by Nocturnus, or at least to what he hoped Nocturnus would do after that but never did. Well, after that comparison I damn sure listened, and got my mind blown.
Old Machines describe their music as “Extreme Cosmic Metal”, and their narrative is a tale about the rise of dominating ancient gods in the depths of galactic time. In keeping with that conception, the middle song of the EP, “Backwards Through Space“, is a slow, cinematic, symphonic piece that’s lush, expansive, and as wondrous as nebulae, but ultimately ominous. However, the other two songs on either side of that are breathtaking mind-benders.
Those two also include elements of cosmic grandeur, but they also blaze and blare, skitter and swirl, hammer and harass. The tempos and drum patterns change without warning; the fretwork is like a fast-changing kaleidoscope mounted on a gyroscope that no sooner settles into place than it flies into some new configuration; and the same is true of the rhythm section’s non-stop adventures.
These kinds of intricate and ingeniously conceived alien spectacles demand a pretty damned high level of technical proficiency, and Old Machines definitely have the chops to pull it off.
The barking and declaiming vocals also seem tailor-made for the tale, because they come off like the cruel gnashing of teeth, or like the crazed howling and screaming proclamations of some imperious monstrosity.
This stuff is recommended for fans of Bal Sagoth, Limbonic Art, Sirius, Obsidian Gate — and chiefly Nocturnus.
After some rooting around like a pig in the internet sty, I figured out that the Old Machine lineup responsible for this demo was keyboardist Jason Stares, guitarist/bassist Brian Rush (Skeletal Remains), drummer Chris Craven (Oxygen Destroyer), and vocalist Gary Reavis III (Dominus Nox). The stars lined up when all these dudes somehow got together.
I also happily discovered that this EP is just a teaser for an Old Machines album that will be released by Pale Magus Productions, hopefully sooner than later.
https://oldmachines.bandcamp.com/album/backwards-through-space-demo
https://palemagusproductions.bigcartel.com/category/old-machines
https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61550689574647
https://www.instagram.com/oldmachines_official
FURNACE (Sweden)
Now I’m beginning another connected block of music. Let’s call it the Peter Svensson block, because this creatively prolific Swede is in both this band and the next one.
Speaking of creatively prolific Swedes, I seriously doubt that any reasonably well-adjusted person has spent time trying to deduce how Rogga Johansson parcels out his creative impulses among the quadrillion bands he is a part of or handles solo (maybe there’s an overpaid professor somewhere who’s doing that).
What I do know is that there’s something about his Furnace collaboration with Svensson that doesn’t really sound like anything else he’s involved in. Hell, in the evolution of Furnace alone, each release doesn’t even sound exactly like the ones before it.
This new one is a concept album that tells the story of a man who builds a machine (the Trojan Hearse) to travel to the kingdom of the dead. In the band’s words:
“Initially in search of his dead wife, he encounters various souls including a burnt-out God who couldn’t take the stress of keeping track of humanity anymore. We also learn that our world is run by demons who got tired of the netherworld. The album ends with a surprise twist!”
All the lyrics are at Bandcamp, and you can follow the story through them there. I won’t spoil the surprise ending of what happens when the protagonist returns to the Trojan Hearse for the trip home.
I’m extremely insecure when it comes to likening one band’s music to that of other bands, and so I don’t do it very much at all. But I’ll hold my breath and say that the newest Furnace release, Trojan Hearse, often made me think of some interbreeding of Amon Amarth, Amorphis, Thin Lizzy, and Iron Maiden — though as I’ll explain later, this isn’t a complete list.
There’s an iron-wool distortion in the hook-laden riffs, and an interesting tonal contrast in the leads, which are sometimes sinuous and exotic like a cobra (especially in the swirling and fret-melting solos) and sometimes come close to the mournful tones of a banjo or the wailing guitars in Ennio Marricone‘s spaghetti-western soundtracks.
The melodies blaze and blare, their skittering and ringing glories offset by those grim, gouging, and chugging riffs and the immense guttural and roaring voice of someone who sounds like he wants to devour your guts, with shots of akvavit to wash them down. My kind of heavy metal.
What that list of band references I provided up above omits is an indication of the torment, bleakness, and melancholy that seeps into the moods of the songs, sometimes even when the drums are at full gallop. There’s a lot of fervent striving and hard-charging Scandinavian melodic death metal on display in the album, along with musical manifestations of evil, but those tendrils of darkness are never far away (for a strong early taste of that, check out “Labyrinth of Souls“, or “Never Mine” later on).
And I’ll add that all these songs are damned infectious too, even the darkest of them!
Trojan Hearse was released on August 23rd by Svensson‘s Obelisk Polaris Productions. Along with Rogga (handling guitars and lead vocals) and Peter (handling bass, backing vocals and additional instrumentation), the album includes drumming and percussion by Lars Demoké, and guitar solos by Kjetil Lynghaug.
https://furnacesweden.bandcamp.com/album/trojan-hearse
https://www.facebook.com/blackstonechurch666/
SOLUS REX (Sweden)
Here’s another Peter Svensson endeavor, this one a solo project. I knew this EP was coming, thanks to Comrade Aleks‘ excellent recent NCS interview of Svensson, but didn’t know about the name Solus Rex. Happily, I found this next song anyway.
The name of the first-revealed song from the EP is “Downward Spiral Architect“. Lyrically, it speaks of the narrator’s efforts to reason with someone who is poisoning their life, “riding high / on a downward spiral ride”. Musically, it’s a primal manifestation of gothic doom/death.
Svensson‘s deep, serrated-edge snarls are frightening, and the lurching and stalking riffs raise visions of some red-eyed beast, but the moaning riffage and wailing leads portray a steady descent into misery. The music’s not fancy, not elaborate, but its ichor-dripping hooks are potent.
The title of the EP is The Duellist’s Monologue. It will be released on September 9th by Obelisk Polaris Productions.
https://solusrexsweden.bandcamp.com/album/the-duellists-monologue
https://www.facebook.com/solusrexsweden
ENDLESS CHAIN (Finland)
So, the connection here is a connection to the doomy vibes of Solus Rex, but Endless Chain‘s vibe is a different kind of doominess, one that made me think of my friend DGR‘s affinity for icebound melodic death metal, the stuff of frozen lakes and sleet-storms in the far northern latitudes, shrouded in gothic gloom
At first, I even thought Wolfheart‘s Tuomas Saukkonen had made a guest appearance on this song and video. Maybe you’ll see and hear the resemblance too.
I thought at first that “We Are All Vulnerable” would be too gentle and poignantly sad for my tastes, but the song becomes massively heavier in its crushing stomp, and the plaintive, clean-sung vocals grow more intense. Yet it’s the titanic growls of Aki Salonen which really sent the shivers up and down my spine and caused me to hang on.
Back and forth the music goes, ebbing and powering up in its intensity, with a very moving guitar solo near the end to help sink the melody deep before the final crescendo, which the escalation of the harsh vocals makes even more shattering.
“We Are All Vulnerable” is the closing song on Endless Chain‘s new album Agony, which was just released on August 23rd. It should appeal to fans of Insomnium, Swallow The Sun, Amorphis, and Wolfheart. This song features guest appearances by Sami Yli-Sirniö from Kreator (that guitar solo!) and Samuli Mikkonen from Korpiklaani (great drumming).
https://www.recordshopx.com/artist/endless_chain/agony/
https://hyperfollow.com/endlesschain3
https://www.facebook.com/endlesschainband/
https://www.instagram.com/endlesschainband/
https://linktr.ee/endlesschain
LUSCA (Germany)
Having been pulled slowly into the cold and life-bleeding realms of doom, I let myself be further exsanguinated by this next song, “Monarch“.
Here, the song methodically pounds and punches with gut-bruising heaviness, and the staggering downtuned riffage crackles with pernicious electricity, while the vocals are ragged and roaring, gouging and tormented. Wailing tones slowly meander through the brutish march, deepening the gloom, while more lively percussive variations get their own grip.
Those drum-grooves and the heave of the riffs are potent enough to get people bending back and forth at the waist, while simultaneous drenching their minds with some dark narcotic.
The song is from Lusca‘s fourth album, Blood & Promises, which will be out on September 6th via MT Records. Lusca previously released another single from this new album, a song named “Spires“, and I’m including the stream of that one too.
https://lusca.bandcamp.com/album/blood-promises
https://www.facebook.com/luscaofficial
KOBOLD (Serbia)
When I found this next EP, I kept it in my hip pocket like a switchblade, waiting to flash it at the right time. This seems like the right time, to shift the mood from the trench to getting mugged at flashpoint, with the adrenaline flooding.
Kobold thrash, but their brains are clearly not wired the way of more conventional thrashers. In the first of these three new songs (the title track) Kobold build from eerie pinging tones and gleaming, clanging chords toward a jaw-dropping explosion of scalding screams, jet-powered blasting, and submersive waves of searing riffage.
There are also gang growls in the mix, along with those screams reaching a fever pitch of throat ruination, and even a bit of folkish singing. Those gleaming and clanging notes from the opening reappear, along with a gloriously caterwauling guitar solo that catches us in its crazed slipstream.
Seriously, if that song doesn’t leave you with the whites of your eyes showing all ’round, I’ll be surprised. The other two songs are equally fantastic, which is to say equally berserk and equally surprising.
Among the surprises, in addition to those already mentioned in the context of the first song: a cool spoken-word sample to launch “Estetika Užasa” and some big groaning bass drops in that song, along with another mind-bending solo. And both that song and “Rajski” include further sprinklings of melodious guitar glitter. Of course, both those songs will also blow your hair back like a sudden hurricane, and “Rajski” is again home to some fascinating solos. (The soloing alone is worth the price of admission for this EP.)
The name of the EP, which has quickly become one of my favorite short releases of the year, is Nove Stare Igračke. It’s out now digitally, and will be released on CD by the German label Witches Brew on September 13th.
https://witchesbrewthrashes.bandcamp.com/album/nove-stare-igra-ke
https://www.facebook.com/KoboldSerbia/
THE HYPOTHESIS (Finland)
So now begins a closing block of nostalgia for me, starting with this next song by The Hypothesis and ending with a new thing from Narkose.
I won’t try to sell you the fiction that The Hypothesis are onto something brand new in this song. At least based on this track, they’re more like a time machine, flashing us quickly back (or at least some of us old enough to remember) to an era when metalcore ruled the world. But they’re so damned thrilling that, at least for me, they banished what might have been an “oh, not this again” reaction.
The song here is “Stray“, presented through a video that shows off some barren but beautiful scenery. Powered by flickering and swirling electronics and fretwork, big fast-punching grooves, and skull-cracking drumwork, it also features two-toned vocals — ferociously raging howls and soaring cleans that turn to screams — and a burst of dueling solo fireworks by both guitarists.
“Stray” is from a new album named Evolve, which will be coming out on October 18th via Noble Demon. To be clear, The Hypothesis and their label don’t use the “metalcore” word to describe the album as a whole. Their preferred term is “progressive metal”.
https://music.nobledemon.com/evolve
https://thehypothesis.bandcamp.com/album/evolve
https://www.instagram.com/thehypothesisband/
https://www.facebook.com/TheHypothesisband
NARKOSE (Germany)
I do sometimes like to throw curveballs at people at the end of these roundups, and this is one of those times.
A hell of a long time before I got into metal, I was into punk, beginning with the wave that swallowed up the U.S. with the advent of the Sex Pistols and what followed them in the next few years. Though the Narkose dudes were obviously born decades later, they get what happened then, and wrapped their arms around it.
The name of this final song today is “Geisterstadt“, which means “Ghosttown”. It connects with this info about the band: “Life in a small town on the edge of the Ruhr region in Germany: characterized by frustration, boredom and a lack of a sense of belonging. A sense of hopelessness paired with a dreary and meaningless cityscape.”
It’s therefore fitting that the very cool old-school video accompanying “Geisterstadt” doesn’t let in the light of day, instead lit mostly by flashlights, in barren halls and claustrophobic rooms.
As for the song itself, it has more hooks than a fisherman’s trawler. The raking and ringing guitars do the main work, but the vibrancy of the rhythms adds to the pulse-pounding impact. And the vocals are raw and red-edged in their rage, and do indeed bring Johnny Rotten (and maybe an angrier version of Buzzcocks‘ Pete Shelley) to mind.
The song is from an album named Überleben – Koexistenz (“Survival-Coexistence”). It will be released by the upstart label Bretford Records on September 6th (digital) and October 11th (tapes and vinyl). I have no idea what the other songs sound like, but I’ve bought the album anyway, based on this track alone.
https://bretford.bandcamp.com/album/berleben-koexistenz
https://bretford-records.de/
https://www.facebook.com/BretfordRecords/