CRAFT: “WHITE NOISE AND BLACK METAL”

 Album Reviews  2 Responses »
Jun 252018
 

 

(This is Wil Cifer’s review of the new album by the Swedish black metal band Craft, which was released on June 22nd by Season of Mist.)

Either bands change or they become stagnant. Going into this album I hoped the venom this Swedish band would unleash might make black metal hate again. It stands to reason, however, that after 20 years in existence the band’s fifth album might find them tiring of the punk-tinged aggression that drove the first four. I loved how Void (2011) was a big middle finger, and that is the soundtrack I think the world needs, but these guys have other ideas.

This is obvious right from the smoother guitar tone of the first song (“The Cosmic Sphere Falls”). Normally I would tell you how I have grown weary of blast beats and want black metal bands to not depend on them. Blast beats prove not to be the problem, as the band creates enough of a sonic sprawl that they don’t sound like they are just playing color-by-numbers with only marginally different shades of black, Instead we are getting a dark coat of gray dripping from these songs. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD: CRAFT, ACT OF IMPALEMENT, LURK

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  1 Response »
May 142018
 

 

Well, it seems I had a little free time I didn’t expect to have this morning after completing the writing and editing of posts planned for this Monday, so I thought I’d compile this small round-up of new discoveries, two of which appeared today and one of which arrived last week. Brighten (or darken) your fiendish hearts with these three tracks:

CRAFT

White Noise and Black Metal is the name of the new album by the long-running Swedish black metal cult Craft, their first one in seven years. The release date, through Season of Mist, is June 22nd. In April the label released the album’s first single, “The Cosmic Sphere Falls“, and today brought us another one, and it represents something of a switch from the first. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD: CRAFT, OVATE, NICK VASALLO, JØTNARR

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  2 Responses »
Apr 112018
 

 

I’ve been away from home since last Friday morning, mainly working on the things I do when I’m not throwing music at your heads at NCS, but having some fun here and there. I shudder to think what havoc the loris horde have wrecked at the NCS compound while I’ve been gone. I’ll find out tonight; I’ll be leaving for the Philadelphia airport, bound for Seattle, as soon as I post this hurried collection.

The huge list of new songs I had created before leaving Seattle torments me; I’ve grown more tormented looking at what popped up in my e-mail and web-surfing last night and this morning. Just too damned much intriguing metal being vomited forth every day. This is a tiny fraction of what I found most recently.

CRAFT

White Noise and Black Metal is the name of the new album by the long-running Swedish black metal cult Craft, their first one in seven years. The release date, through Season of Mist, is June 22nd. Continue reading »

YOUR FILTH FOR THE DAY: PISSGRAVE, UNDERGANG, RUINOUS, FORNICATION, SATANIC RIPPER — AND SOME NEWS ABOUT CRAFT

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  8 Responses »
Jun 042015
 

 

Some days you wake up and you want some soothing, pretty music. I’m talking about soothing, pretty METAL music, because obviously I’m not a completely tasteless moron who left his nuts at the checkout counter of Abercrombie & Fitch. But some days you wake up in the mood for filth. You just want to bathe yourself in a slurry of warm fecal matter, pus, and fresh afterbirth. You know what I’m talking about, so don’t deny it.

Well, that’s how I felt this morning. And while I was waiting for the bathtub to fill and lighting the scented corpse-flower candles, I went looking for some appropriate musical accompaniment. Here’s what I found.

PISSGRAVE

This morning Profound Lore posted that cover art up there, the one with a photo that looks very much like what’s filling up in my bathtub, except with bones. I don’t like bones in my bath because sometimes they get stuck in my hidey-hole as I’m lowering myself into the broth. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: MORDBRAND – “CONSUME THEM” FROM “KOLUMBARIUM”

 Album Reviews, Premieres, SHORT BUT SWEET  No Responses »
Aug 162012
 

Mordbrand is a three-man death metal juggernaut from Sweden whose work has appeared frequently at NO CLEAN SINGING and drawn considerable attention elsewhere, too. Consisting of vocalist Per Boder (ex-God Macabre), guitarist/bassist/backing vocalist Björn Larsson, and drummer Johan Rudberg, Mordbrand have chosen (so far) to release their music in small portions. There was a 2010 split with Evoke, an attention-grabbing EP in 2011 entitled Necropsychotic (reviewed here), and a split with Bombs of Hades released earlier this year under the title No Life (featured here).

Since the release of the No Life split, Mordbrand have recorded two more songs destined for release by Deathgasm Records as a 7″ vinyl bearing the name Kolumbarium. The two songs are “Consume Them” and “Let Them Slumber”. The second one features guest vocals by Nox from the excellent Swedish band Craft.

Originally expected this summer, manufacturing delays have pushed off Kolumbarium’s availability — the latest word is that it will be released by late September or early October. However, because we are awesome, we have been allowed to hear the two songs in advance. Because you are awesome, you will also get to hear one of them before you finish reading this post. Yes, in a moment of weakness, Mordbrand agreed to allow NCS to provide the world premiere of “Consume Them”. And man, does it rip hell. Continue reading »