Reviews Archives - Page 27 of 556

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): MNAJDRA — “IN THE NAME OF THE GODDESS”

Aug 092024

(Writtenby Islander)

Last year the mysterious U.S. band Mnajdra made a splash with its self-titled debut album. Granted, it was a splash in a far corner of the small tributary of metal that spikes away from the vast ocean of music on a broader scale, but it still sent ripples, especially through devotees of terrorizing yet surprising musical extremity.

We attempted to review the album here, from which this is an excerpt:

The music isn’t easy to sum up, because it draws from scattered wellsprings of black metal, death metal, sludge/doom, post-metal, and psychedelia — whatever works to create wide-ranging sensations of catastrophe…. [B]e prepared to have your head spun and your dreams disturbed.

It is a relief that the secretive people behind Mnajdra, who clearly had done other things before that album, decided not to make the record a one-and-done effort. Instead, they’ve recorded a second album, and we’re thrilled to premiere it today — on the day of its release by Fiadh Productions and Snow Wolf Records. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): MEKIGAH — “TO HOLD ONTO A HEARTLESS HEART”

Album Reviews, Premieres No Responses »

Aug 092024

(Writtenby Islander)

Metal-Archives currently brands the Australian band Mekigah “Gothic/Doom Metal” based on the band’s first four albums. Based on Mekigah‘s forthcoming fifth album they may have to put an “(early)” parenthetical next to that genre description. But what will they put in front of “(later)”? What kind of genre label does the fifth album suggest? That turns out to be a very tough question.

Mekigah itself describes the new album as “a purposely designed ugly, drawn out, raw, awkward journey,” with “no attempt or desire to either embrace the slow slow doom, to aggressively technically impress or to build upon previous motifs”:

“Everything is caught between worlds, as Mekigah itself is caught between worlds. Nothing is where it belongs as things are uncomfortably forced together through the sheer necessity of only gaining satisfaction via sonic self sabotage and harm, creating audial-mazes which then have to delicately be navigated through.”

What does this mean? We’ll find out together, through our premiere stream of this new album, To Hold Onto A Heartless Heart, now due for release on August 15th via the Aesthetic Death label. Continue reading »

AN NCS INTERVIEW: MOON INCARNATE

Album Reviews, Interviews No Responses »

Aug 082024

(Today we present Comrade Aleks‘ excellent discussion with Christian Kolff and Matin Vasari, with the focus being on their band Moon Incarnate, whose debut album was released earlier this year by Iron Bonehead Productions.)

The death-doom coalition Moon Incarnate was created by experienced members of the German underground: Christian Kolff (guitar, bass, synths), the leader of the prog death-doom act Valborg and five other projects of different directions, as well as Matin Vasari (vocals, synths) from the death metal band Beyondition.

Hymns to the Moon is seven small fantasies on the theme of death-doom of the ’90s, the fruit of love for the legacy of The British Three, Tiamat, Katatonia, Samael, as well and others like them. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): ANOXIDE — “MORALS AND DOGMA”

Album Reviews, Premieres 2 Responses »

Aug 072024

Twelve years have passed since the birth of Anoxide somewhere in London. In that time they have released a pair of EPs, a demo, and a couple of singles, but nothing in the last six years. And so it comes as something of a surprise that two days from now they will release an album via Ghastly Music, their full-length debut at last.

They’ve titled it Morals & Dogma, and packed it with 9 songs (one of them an instrumental) that explore such subjects as the influence of misinformation in a media-saturated world, inescapable cycles of systemic corruption within society, the exacerbation of socio-economic disparity and the devastating effects of austerity policies on the working class and marginalized communities, the resurgence of far right ideologies, and visions of dystopian futures produced by suffering and inequality.

Weighty subjects to be sure, and there’s powerful heft in the music too, but also head-spinning adventures, as you’ll discover through our full album premiere today. Continue reading »

PRIVATE PRISONS – EXCOMMUNICATION

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Aug 062024

(Andy Synn signs up for a life sentence with Private Prisons)

The joy of discovering new music is something I hope never leaves me.

Sure, everyone loves a good bit of nostalgia now and then, and I’m a big fan of long-running bands continuing to put out excellent work, but there’s something about stumbling across a new band or album that just instantly “clicks” with you that just feels right.

Heck, it’s one of the big reasons I enjoy writing for NoCleanSinging so much in the first place, as it gives me the chance to keep up with new releases and encounter fresh new faces in the scene and then share that experience and my enthusiasm with our readers.

So, without further ado, let’s get nasty with the new album from Californian crushers Private Prisons.

THINGS YOU MAY HAVE MISSED (BUT SHOULDN’T)

Album Reviews No Responses »

Aug 052024

(Andy Synn presents four albums from July which may have passed you by)

So apparently it’s August already? How the hell did that happen?!?

And spare me your scientific hocus-pocus about “the linear passage of time” and “the direction of entropy”… all I know is that it was just yesterday I was doing one of these “Things You May Have Missed” columns for June, and someone needs to answer for where all that time in between went.

Now, I know that there were some people who felt like July was a bit of an “off” month – both in terms of quantity and quality – but I’m here to tell you that those people are fools and not to be trusted.

Heck, I could have done an entire separate piece on “Black Metal You May Have Missed” (in fact, I did just that last week) and the number of artists/albums which ended up on the proverbial “cutting room floor” this month was enough to cause me almost physical pain.

Still, I think you’ll enjoy the four records I’ve selected for this month’s article, which cover a pretty decent spread of styles/genres, meaning there should be something for almost everyone.

SHADES OF BLACK: SWAMPWORM, ESOCTRILIHUM, ZEIT DER DUNKELHEIT, NOEN HATER OSS, HORRENDA, VICIOUS BLADE

Album Reviews, SHADES OF BLACK, SHORT BUT SWEET No Responses »

Aug 042024

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. Continue reading »

GONZO’S HEAVY ROUNDUP, JULY 2024

Album Reviews 3 Responses »

Aug 012024

(With July now in the rearview mirror, Gonzo has brought us another monthly collection of recommended albums.)

As a reasonably respectable writer who can form coherent sentences, I’d sooner die than kick off this column with some banal trope like “Summer’s heating up, and so are these new releases!”

Fuck that nonsense. But I suppose it’s worth mentioning that I’m sitting here in my air-conditioned apartment while temperatures outside flirt with triple digits, and that means staying inside and listening to music is a much more preferable option than sweating it out in that godforsaken heat.

And….sigh. Yes, these new releases are pretty goddamn spicy, so feel free to form any heat-related tropes at your own discretion. Just listen to these albums first.

BLACKER THAN THE BLACKEST BLACK

Album Reviews No Responses »

Jul 312024

(Andy Synn catches up on some of last month’s bumper crop of Black Metal)

Despite what some people might believe, we’re big fans of the ol’ Black Metal genre here at NCS.

Sure, there’s certain artists we don’t fuck with, for reasons which are entirely our own, but considering how rich and fertile the field is right now (as today’s article so adamantly demonstrates – right down to the fact that I didn’t have time to also include the likes of Coldcell, Limbes, and Unholy Altar) there’s more than enough great options out there to keep us busy until the inevitable heat death of the universe.

So – since I didn’t want the next edition of “Things You May Have Missed” to be all Black Metal – here’s four short-but-sweet write-ups of some recent albums I thought would put a smile (although I guess it’s more of a grimace) on your corpse-painted faces.

SHADES OF BLACK: RAAT, PAYDRETZ, STARER, GEISTERFAUST, HAND OF OMEGA, SALQIU, MANṢŪR, MORK

Album Reviews, SHADES OF BLACK No Responses »

Jul 302024

Hopefully you noticed that we began the last NCS Sunday with a premiere. That song and video by Weald & Woe were well worth the time required to prepare the write-up, and it would have fit well into the usual Sunday roundup of new black and black-ish metal, but it did leave me with less time than I needed to pull together the usual Shades of Black column.

So, I’ve taken an extra two days to finish gathering together what I wanted to recommend this week. I’m very happy with these eight selections and hope you’ll also find all of them well worth your time. (Yeah, there’s a lot here — bookmark it, try a little here and a little there, in between trying to make a living, drinking yourself silly, washing your cat and your clothes, bathroom breaks, sleeping, etc.)

RAAT (India)

As steadfast visitors to our site are well aware, I’ve been enthusiastically following the progression of Raat‘s music since early days, and thus was eager to delve into the band’s fourth album, Enchantment, which was released about 10 days ago. Continue reading »

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