SEEN AND HEARD ON A SATURDAY: GREAT FALLS, THE KEENING, DIKASTERION, COPROLITH

 Album Reviews, Exceptions to the Rule, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC, SHORT BUT SWEET  3 Responses »
Aug 192023
 

Well, no unforeseeable calamities befell me or our indomitable site in the last 24 hours, and so I’ve probably set a record for us today with the fourth roundup of new music in a row. If you include tomorrow’s Shades of Black column (barring a calamity), that will be five in a row.

The incredible thing is that even with so many daily installments, one after the other, there’s still a big pile of worthy new metal I haven’t managed to feature, and in that respect there’s nothing particularly unusual about the last week. Every week, the flood just keeps surging.

GREAT FALLS (U.S.)

I fibbed a little. Not everything in today’s collection surfaced during the last week. These first two songs, “Trap Feeding” and “Old Words Worn Thin“, are a tad older than that. They’re both from a new album by this devastating Seattle crew that will be out on September 15th through Neurot Recordings. Continue reading »

AN NCS INTERVIEW: BEN PAKARINEN (COPROLITH)

 Interviews  2 Responses »
Nov 282014
 

 

(We bring you KevinP’s interview of Ben Pakarinen, vocalist/guitarist for Finland’s Coprolith, whose second album Death March was released this past spring by Violent Journey Records.)

 

K:  So you’ve recently returned from a tour in China.  Is this your 3rd time playing there?

B:  Yes, we are back from China. It was Coprolith’s second time touring there. Last fall we toured with my other band, Antagonist Zero.

 

K:  Seems like you have a fairly big following to tour there twice.  Does China give you more “love” than Europe?

B:  Yeah the shows are awesome and the crowds are crazy indeed. And this time we also released our latest album, Death March, as a special edition with 3 bonus tracks. But we have also toured a lot in Europe, the Baltics, and Russia.  I think when it’s a good show and good crowd, it doesn’t  matter which country it is. Continue reading »

WHAT I’M LISTENING TO SO FAR THIS YEAR – PART 1

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  37 Responses »
Feb 262014
 

(Guest writer, deluded NY Giants fan, and hard man to please KevinP rejoins us with the first installment of what may become a series.)

 2013 was a high water mark for metal releases. Seemingly it would be hard for 2014 to match up. But we are already off to a damn good start. Here’s a few things that have ‘wet my whistle’ so far.

MORBUS CHRON – SWEVEN

After carving out their own identity as more than just a “Sweden meets Autopsy” via their A Saunter in the Shroud EP, I was pretty excited for their follow-up sophomore full-length. Much to my surprise, they’ve taken a left turn and kinda gone the route that Tribulation did with The Formulas of Death. A brave move by a young band that’s willing to take chances, stick its neck out, and not just be “another old school death metal band”.

Sweven is out now in Europe and will be released in North America on March 4 by Century Media. Continue reading »

NEW AND NOTABLE: COPROLITH, ORPHANED LAND, AND POWER TRIP

 Exceptions to the Rule, Free Shit, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  4 Responses »
May 222013
 

In this post I’ve collected a small group of new songs that I came across while wandering through the interhole over the last 24 hours.

COPROLITH

I’ve been keeping an eye on this Finnish band (pictured above) since hearing their 2012 EP Hate Infected. When I reviewed it, I characterized the music as “the military-industrial complex of the nether regions, an effective fusion of titanic death metal might and melodic black metal hooks” and compared the band to the likes of Behemoth and Hate. They now have a new album on the way entitled Death March, which will be released in the fall of this year by Violent Journey Records.

Yesterday they released a music video for one of the new songs, “Life=Disease”, which is now available digitally through Amazon and probably elsewhere. The song reminds me less of those Polish behemoths than Hate Infected. It has more of an old-school death metal flavor, with a bit of a charred crust. It hammers and howls forcefully, with teeth bared and claws raking. Continue reading »

SHORT BUT SWEET: COPROLITH – “HATE INFECTED”

 Album Reviews  4 Responses »
Feb 092012
 

In the realm of infernally regal blackened death metal, the bands that continue to rise up first in this writer’s mind are Polish juggernauts Behemoth and Hate, despite the fact that the blackening has worn off them over time, at least in sound if not in attitude. Of course, they are not by a long stretch the only bands who have brought about such a strikingly hellish union of those musical styles. Porvoo, Finland’s Coprolith have done it, as I discovered in listening to their new EP, Hate Infected.

This forthcoming, three-song offering is a prelude to the band’s second full-length album, which is projected for release in the fall of this year, and it follows the band’s 2010 debut album, Cold Grief Relief (which I haven’t heard).

The title track sets the hook right away with a thundering riff and a ripping lead melody. It’s a tasty combo of eminently headbangable groove and occult atmosphere. The melodic guitar solo brought a smile to my face, and so did the vocalist’s deep roars and chilling shrieks. The black hasn’t worn off Coprolith’s death metal.

“Chemical Suicide” proves that the title track was no fluke. A dark melodic lead floats over another killer riff that’s prime headbang material. It sounds like a giant industrial machine shaking the girders in some hellish manufacturing facility, implacably punching out war machines while a horned foreman exhorts the demon workers from a bullhorn. Continue reading »

MORE 2010 SICKNESS (Part 5)

 Forthcoming Albums, Listmania, Metal News  No Responses »
Jun 012010
 

We’re now five months into 2010, and it’s time for another monthly update to the list of forthcoming new albums we first posted on January 1. (All the other updates can be found via the “Forthcoming Albums” category link on the right side of our pages.)  Below is a list of still more projected new releases we didn’t know about at the time of our previous updates, or updated info about some of the previously noted releases.

Once again, we’ve cobbled together news blurbs about bands whose past work we’ve liked, or who look interesting for other reasons. Needless to say (but we’ll say it anyway), these are bands that mostly fit the profile of music we cover on this site.

So, in alphabetical order, here’s our list of cut-and-pasted blurbs from various sources since our last update about forthcoming new releases. Look for the bands you like and put reminders on your calendar. Or if you’re old school like us, just get ’em tattooed someplace you can see without a mirror (because reading stuff backwards is hard).

THE ACACIA STRAIN: “Western Massachusetts’ chuggernauts The Acacia Strain, have completed work on their new album, which will be released July 20th in North American and August 2nd in Europe via Prosthetic Records.”

ATHEIST: “Reactivated seminal technical metal pioneers ATHEIST will enter LedBelly studios in Atlanta, Georgia on July 5 to begin recording their long-awaited, as-yet-untitled fourth album. Engineering the session will be Matt Washburn. Additionally, the band has secured the services of one of metal’s most significant talents of the past decade, Jason Suecof (TRIVIUM, CHIMAIRA, DEVILDRIVER), to handle the mixing of what promises to be a modern classic from the pioneers of technical metal. . . . ATHEIST‘s forthcoming album is tentatively scheduled for a late 2010 release and will be followed by a world tour in 2011.”   (more after the jump . . .) Continue reading »