AN NCS PREMIERE: BENT SEA / TO DUST — “ASCEND / DESCEND”

 Album Reviews, Premieres, SHORT BUT SWEET  3 Responses »
Jul 212016
 

To Dust-Bent Sea jacket

 

For those who may be unfamiliar with the two bands who participated in the split release you’re about to hear — Bent Sea and To Dust — their collective rosters include current and former members of such groups as Napalm Death, Aborted, Soilwork, Abigail Williams, Black Dahlia Murder, Phobia, and Megadeth. And if that doesn’t seize your attention, then consider this: The two EPs that are combined in this album-length split under the title Ascend / Descend will explode your head — and who doesn’t crave a massive head explosion?

If you’re somehow still wavering, consider the assessment of Cattle Decapitation’s Travis Ryan:

“Bent Sea come out firing on all cylinders with their kick ass blend of modern grind and discordant musings with hints of later-era Gorguts, leaving To Dust to finish you off with a scathing hardcore attack of HM-2 influenced grind!”

Ascend / Descend will be released by Give Praise Records on July 22, and one solitary day before its release we’re bringing you a full stream of this dynamic grindcore detonation. Let’s take these two groups and their contributions to the split one at a time. Continue reading »

TORTURE DIVISION AND BENT SEA: “DOUBLE PENETRATION”

 Album Reviews, SHORT BUT SWEET  2 Responses »
Jul 132013
 

It was barely more than a month ago when Torture Division released their latest three-song assault on the senses (The Worship, reviewed here), and damned if they aren’t already back with another release. And damned if they don’t have company this time, because Double Penetration is a split release by Torture Division and Bent Sea, which is another super-group, and one we haven’t heard from in a while.

I had to crawl all the way back to November 2011 to find the post I wrote about Bent Sea’s debut album, Nostalgia. At that point the band consisted of guitarist/drummer Dirk Verbeuren (Soilwork, Scarve), vocalist Sven de Caluwe (Aborted), and bassist Devin Townsend (you read that right). Devin Townsend didn’t participate in Bent Sea’s contribution to Double Penetration, his shoes having been filled by none other than Napalm Death’s Shane Embury.

The Bent Sea track is a ditty called “Partners In Grind”. It’s a bone-shaker and a neck-snapper, a death-grind marauder with a beastly off-tempo mid-section. I’ve taken the liberty of uploading it to our Soundcloud account so you can hear it. And then of course you should go download it from Torture Division’s web site (more on that later). Continue reading »

AN NCS INTERVIEW: SVEN DE CALUWE (ABORTED)

 Interviews  7 Responses »
Feb 032012
 

We’re as proud as a three-balled tomcat to bring you this very special NCS interview, conducted by e-mail. The victim was Sven De Caluwe, the frontman of Aborted, System Divide, and grindcore trio Bent Sea (which also includes Dirk Verbeuren and Devin Townsend). In part because of his well-known demented sense of humor, we decided to tag-team him with an interviewing duo of Andy Synn and Phro — both of whom also wrote reviews for NCS of Aborted’s ass-ripping new album, Global Flatline (here and here), which is out now on Century Media Records.

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Phro: Global Flatline. Holy fuck. This album impregnated my ears, impaled the aural baby with a clothes hanger, and roasted it over an open flame. This album was originally slated for a 2011 release . . . WHY DID IT TAKE SO FUCKING LONG???

We were too busy jerking off for the past 2 years. As you can imagine, the fine art of auto felatio can take up quite some time. In all honesty it took this long because we wanted to take our time to come up with the best album we could and not rush things out like we have on some past records.

 

Andy: So first off, can you give us some of the themes behind the title Global Flatline? (the less obvious ones I mean, more what it means to you personally).

As you can tell, it deals with the end of man through man. Different probable causes are taken on topics through the album, such as extremists and religion, drug abuse, social apathy and whatever else causes mankind to show its fantastic attributes to the world—and oh yes, let’s not forget feces. The album talks about feces too. Continue reading »