It’s been tough sledding to pick music for this Sunday’s column. Not because of moguls — there’s no snow outside here in the Pacific Northwest, other than in the black metal, where it’s always snowing or sleeting somewhere. No, the sledding has been tough for the usual reason — too damn many options and not enough time.
Here’s what I chose for today before being thrown into a drift, head down, ass up. I think they will keep you off-balance.
SWAMPWORM (Germany)
Based on their name you might think Swampworm play some kind of murky, rotten-to-the-core death metal, but on their new EP Architeuthis they instead lay into a blast-furnace discharge of dissonant black metal and ruinous blackened grindcore, but with a few variations along the way.
Two nightmarish songs from the EP are now up for streaming. The opener “Koloss” sounds like the demented writhing of wraiths before Swampworm unleashes a sudden sonic avalanche and begins detonating percussive bombs in rolling waves, while simultaneously using dense and dissonant riffage and blood-letting screams to sear the senses on a sweeping scale.
The guitars scream too, drenched in reverb and resembling synths, and eerie wailing and woozy tones also meander through the ongoing fretwork-cataclysms and the heavily rumbling and catastrophically booming drums, which begin to have a ritualistic feel.
The second song, “Überfloss“, gives you only a few quick breaths before it too explodes, shattering listeners with another startling display of monstrously heavy, unhinged violence, mind-shearing waves of shrill antagonism in the stratospheric reaches of their range, and utterly berserk vocals.
I’ve had the chance to listen to the other four songs on the EP. They are also world-enders, but Swampworm does create some variation. Here and there, bursts of towering orchestration add to the songs’ aura of decimation on a planetary scale. Here and there, the pace also slows and the music looms like a titanic tower of skulls.
The songs also sometimes include brief moments of relative quiet, one of them including the dismal ring of piano keys — which make the subsequent detonations and vulcanism even more shocking. Harrowing roars also arrive in tandem with the head-exploding screams.
Yet even with these variations, the music is still a non-stop cavalcade of terrors. I suspect it will especially appeal to fans of early Anaal Nathrakh.
Architeuthis will be released on September 12th. Surprisingly, it’s the DIY work of one person, though it sounds like the work of an army. I’ll share with you a bit more info I received from him:
Lyrically it’s based loosely on a weird hypothesis of an Archeologist, that came up with the idea that ancient Kraken might arranged the bones of their prey in mosaiclike patterns. Also the Kraken gave the EP its Name, since Architeuthis Dux is the latin Name for it.
I added some lovecraftian Ideas of the great old, that silently got in the head of that giant Kraken, whispered abominble ideas to his mind and made him perform a ritual to summon them from their slumber.
So he killed countless innocent creatures, prepared a gigantic grotesque mosaic to initiate the ritual. As that ritual was done, seemingly nothing happened and he thought he was tricked. And he was, but in a very different way. He didn’t summon the great old ones, but only their apparition that took place in his head and displaced his own mind to a tiny corner in his brain. But it was to late to stop them.
So now he can only watch, while ancient creatures are in control of his immortal body for eternity.
P.S. This is Swampworm‘s second EP. The first one, Nahab, is also worth your time. I reviewed it here.
https://swampworm.bandcamp.com/album/architeuthis
ESOCTRILIHUM (France)
I, Voidhanger has landed another squadron of albums, four of them set for release on September 20th and now up for pre-order with songs to hear. The bands are Esoctrilihum, Odious Spirit, Ævangelist, and Paulus. I’m always inclined to support the releases of this distinctive label, and so I picked one of those to include in today’s column.
The one I picked is the first song revealed from Esoctrilihum‘s new album Döth-Derniàlh. Its name is a mouthful: “Atüs Liberüs (Black Realms of Prisymiush’tarlh)“. The song is also a mouthful (or a headful), an ornate sonic tapestry more than 10 minutes in length.
Dancing nickelharpa strings play a lead role, spinning out exotic and ecstatic melodies. Fervent, semi-wailed singing (reminiscent of stylings from ’80s post-punk) also plays a role, going tag-team with ugly, strangled snarls and gruesome growls. The music often has a baroque quality, though the sensations are sweeping as well as many-layered, but it also explodes in blast-beat fusillades and alters into moody acoustic-guitar strumming and rocking beats.
Especially at the end, shining synths also elevate the song into wondrous and mysterious cosmic realms, contrasting with the lonesome poignancy of acoustic picking.
https://i-voidhangerrecords.bandcamp.com/album/do-th-derni-lh
ZEIT DER DUNKELHEIT (UK)
I freely admit I’m a sucker for the use of the hurdy-gurdy in metal, and in this next song the instrument plays a key role.
That lilting hurdy-gurdy melody, harmonized by the electric guitar, is immediately engaging and also quickly brings in an aspect of medieval folk music. But Zeit Der Dunkelheit nearly vaporize that engaging jaunt with a sudden outburst of blasting drums, scathing riffage, and furious screams.
Thankfully, the hurdy-gurdy isn’t vanquished, but reappears. The music also changes in other ways, bringing in skittering fretwork, hard-rocking beats, throbbing bass-lines, ragged gasping proclamations, and maddened exclamations that come close to singing. But you know where the big hook is….
The song is “Scheiß auf die Gesellschaft“, and it’s the latest in a sequence of six singles released by the band this year. I haven’t heard the others but am now curious to do so.
The band have also announced that their debut full-length album, Die Letzten Tage, will be released on September 6th. “Scheiß auf die Gesellschaft” will not be included there, but stands alone. I presume it will eventually find its way to the Zeit Der Dunkelheit Bandcamp page.
https://zeitderdunkelheit.bandcamp.com/
https://www.instagram.com/zeitderdunkelheit/
NOEN HATER OSS (Norway)
Today’s un-balancing act continues with “De Brysomme Guder“, a new song from the forthcoming fourth album by this one-person band from Stavenger.
The song is un-balancing all by itself, even in isolation from the musical variations that have preceded it in today’s column.
It combines livid yells, grim singing, and demonic harsh vocals. It also combines waves of eerily contorting ice-storm riffing, whistling synths, and dismally moaning and feverishly chiming arpeggios tuned to rough tones, along with head-hooking riffs, frantically feverish leads, and a clarion-clear guitar solo that gloriously spirals toward the clouds. It further combines primitive stalking cadences and blasting furies.
Put it all together and you get a head-spinning and hallucinatory experience that’s by turns sinister, fiendish, furious, degraded, and jubilant.
The name of the new album is Kunsten aa gjoere jorden ubeboelig, and it’s set for release by the Dusktone label on September 13th.
https://dusktone.bandcamp.com/album/kunsten-aa-gjoere-jorden-ubeboelig
https://www.facebook.com/noenhateross/
HORRENDA (Ireland)
I guess the pain of starvation and the fear of starving to death might lead someone to murder. It might also cause you to hallucinate, maybe even to believe the Cross will save you.
Well, I wouldn’t know, but that seems to be the message of the next video, which is set in 1847 Ireland, the worst year of The Great Famine, which ultimately took the lives of roughly 1 million people.
The song accompanied by the video is called “Come and See“. It turns out to be a changing experience — changing shades of darkness. At first, it’s a sweeping blast furnace of rage made of intensely feverish and furious riffing, full-bore drumming, and maddened shrieks, accented by deliriously squirming guitar-leads and momentous jolts.
But as the song evolves, wretched screams rise up, an enormous bass rumbles, the drums clatter and tumble, and the waves of vibrating riffage descend into pain and misery. The pain spreads, and a clear guitar solo wails in agony and grief.
“Come and See” is included on Horrenda‘s new EP Think On Your Sins, which was just released on August 2nd. I haven’t had time to listen to the rest of it yet, but based on this song I intend to.
https://horrenda.bandcamp.com/album/think-on-your-sins
https://www.facebook.com/horrendaofficial
https://www.instagram.com/horrendaofficial
VICIOUS BLADE (U.S.)
I have just barely enough time for one more selection before having to shut this down. In keeping with the theme of rocking our visitors off-balance, I chose the opening song on Vicious Blade‘s forthcoming debut album Relentless Force. It’s also the title track.
Prepare to get your blood flooding fast and to thrash your reproductive organs off while a snarling and screaming banshee rides the gale-force winds at your back. The riffing is jet-fast and thoroughly exhilarating, and with more hooks than a fisherman’s trawler. The drumming pumps like overheating pistons. The bass rumbles the guts.
And if that weren’t enough, the song sports a spitfire guitar solo that whips this bat-winged blaze to further heights of blood-spraying ecstasy.
In other words, this song ought to set you up just right for the rest of your day, to vanquish whatever bullshit may come.
Relentless Force will be released by Redefining Darkness Records on September 27th.
https://viciousblade.bandcamp.com/album/relentless-force
https://www.facebook.com/viciousbladepgh/