AN NCS PREMIERE: AMNUTSEBA — “TABULA”

 Premieres  No Responses »
Feb 272020
 

 

Over the course of two demos released by Caligari Records in 2017 and 2018 (and later released in a vinyl compilation by Iron Bonehead Productions), the enigmatic French band Amnutseba demonstrated a mastery in the creation of unpredictable and unnerving black metal. In reviewing them (here and here), we characterized the first demo as “dissonant, delirious, and disorienting”, “fiery and ferocious, marauding and majestic, eerie and ominous”, and the second one as “pensive and petrifying, brawling and beautiful, unearthly and apocalyptic”. And the reviews included a lot more adjectives besides those.

Amnutseba’s creations on those first demos spawned so many adjectives in this quarter not only because the music was so intricate and labyrinthine but also because it produced so many visceral responses, usually frightening but also mesmerizing, and in its bewildering permutations it was also capable of seeming revelatory.

Little wonder that so many underground-dwellers familiar with Amnutseba have been so anxious for a full-length album by this mysterious entity since falling prey to those first recordings, and now we’re about to get one: On March 27th Iron Bonehead Productions will release the first Amnutseba full-length, the name of which is Emanatism. Not surprisingly, it is wondrously otherworldly — and scary as hell. Continue reading »

SHADES OF BLACK: MYSTAGOS, AMNUTSEBA, SCARIFICARE, NATAS

 Album Reviews, SHADES OF BLACK, SHORT BUT SWEET  2 Responses »
Feb 102018
 

 

It will come as no surprise to anyone who has visited us more than once that I enjoy doing premieres of new music. Sometimes, however, I lose my head: For example, over the last two days we did eight of them. I believe in the worth of each one of those, but they shoved everything else out of the way, including this post, which I started writing last Wednesday and couldn’t finish.

Posting this on Saturday runs it right up against the usual spot for this SHADES OF BLACK series on Sunday, but so be it. I’ll still post another one of these installments tomorrow, and then try to figure out how to catch up on Monday with everything else I’ve neglected over the last two days.

MYSTAGOS

In December we premiered a song from a then-forthcoming EP named Pvrvsha by the Spanish black metal band Mystagos. That song alone (“Drowning In the Sea of Unconsciousness”) was enough to land the EP on my own “most anticipated” list for the early months of 2018. And on February 1, Pvrvsha was released by BlackSeed Productions. It’s available now through Bandcamp, and if you haven’t heard it, you really should give it your full attention. Continue reading »

AN NCS EP PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): AMNUTSEBA — UNTITLED DEMO

 Album Reviews, Premieres, SHORT BUT SWEET  18 Responses »
Apr 202017
 

 

“Amnutseba has risen from the gutters of the Parisian black metal scene to propose a glimpse into the vortex of insanity.” So say the mysterious figures behind this new band, and they have said little else except through the music on their first demo, which will be released today on tape by Caligari Records. But as you’re about to hear, the music speaks with a powerful and mesmerizing voice.

The demo is untitled, as are the four songs it includes (identified only by Roman numerals). The stream we’re providing runs like the tape, as one continuous track rather than divided into four separate streams, though you’ll be able to tell when one song ends and the next begins. Continue reading »