OVERFLOWING STREAMS: AEONIAN SORROW, ARCANE SANCTUARY, BARISHI, CARNAL SAVAGERY, DECAYING, HAIL SPIRIT NOIR, HYZZTEREZIS, LIGHTNING BOLT, ORANSSI PAZUZU, PARADISE LOST, THE RUINS OF BEVERAST

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  4 Responses »
Mar 242020
 

 

For reasons I can’t identify, these days I feel compelled to throw as much music your way as I can. I’ve noticed that, contrary to my expectations, this unnerving shut-in phase that most of us are going through has led to a significant increase in daily visits to our site. Maybe people need music more than usual to get through these dark days. Maybe that’s the source of my greater-than-usual compulsion.

Whatever the reason, it seems like you’ll be seeing more and more of these big compilations (with brevity of words) rather than the more typical SEEN AND HEARD posts. I hope I can do another one tomorrow, because I still have a lot I want to recommend.

AEONIAN SORROW (Finland/Greece)

A beautifully contrasting experience from this multinational funeral doom band, the song juxtaposes graceful and ethereal sounds of mist and mysticism and episodes of ravaging heaviness and splintering sorrow, combining the most harrowing roars and haunting feminine singing, creating moods of stately bereavement and wrenching frenzy. A really beautifully executed new video, too. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: BARISHI — “GRAVE OF THE CREATOR”

 Premieres  3 Responses »
Jul 062016
 

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We’ve been following Vermont’s Barishi every step along their way, with our man Andy Synn reviewing both their 2013 debut album (here) and their 2015 EP Endless Howl (here). Barishi have now prepared a second full-length named Blood From the Lion’s Mouth, which will be released worldwide by Season of Mist on September 16, and today we bring you a stream of the album’s first advance track, “Grave of the Creator”.

Regarding the new track, the band comments: “”Grave of the Creator” came together in the middle of the album’s writing process. The majority of the song was written on an old acoustic guitar in a hundred year old log cabin in the middle of Maine. It’s been fun hearing its transformation since then.”

And the song definitely has transformed since its acoustic beginnings. Continue reading »

BARISHI: “ENDLESS HOWL”

 Album Reviews  1 Response »
Feb 092015
 

 

(Andy Synn reviews the new EP by Barishi from Vermont.)

It was April of last year when I first stumbled upon the self-titled debut by these Prog-Metal ne’er do wells, and by that point their debut was already over four months old. If you’ve read my review (here), you’ll know that I was very much entranced by their unapologetic weirdness and aggressively schizophonic sound, drawing comparisons, at various points, to bands like Intronaut and Poison The Well (amongst others), in an attempt to accurately characterise and situate their cunningly kaleidoscopic Prog-Metal/Hardcore fusion.

So imagine my surprise upon discovering that the band have just released a follow-up in the form of the Endless Howl EP, along with my pleasure when I realised that this time at least, I wouldn’t be so far behind the curve in reviewing it! Continue reading »

BARISHI: “BARISHI”

 Album Reviews  11 Responses »
Apr 212014
 

(Andy Synn reviews the surprising debut album by a Vermont band named Barishi.)

This one only came out at the tail-end of last year, so I think we can be forgiven for missing out on it in the holiday rush. However, the fact that such a strange, yet incredibly compelling, album failed to ping on our radar is one mistake I’m happy to be able to correct.

Over-simplifying things for the sake of brevity/clarity/hyperbole (delete as appropriate), Barishi – whose name which I dearly hope is drawn from the novel Silverheart and not from… other sources –  perform a type of wilfully avant-garde prog-metal, one which mixes Intronaut’s more melodic and psychedelic tendencies with the hardcore bite and bitterness of Poison The Well and the same sort of autistic-savant creativity of Ihsahn’s solo output.

Granted, at first glance it seems like the band’s strange arrangement of sounds and influences is something of an odd conglomeration, opposing styles and off-kilter elements fighting against each other for attention in a crazed cacophony of wild, untamed melody and sudden, spasming aggression. But give it time. It’s not an immediate album. At some point things will start to come together – you’ll tilt your head just so and thing will slot into place. The madness will suddenly make sense, as odd dispositions and disjunctions become conjunction and creativity.

And that’s when things start to get really interesting. Continue reading »