Nov 182021
 

(The nights are growing darker, and the hour grows late, but Andy Synn is still finding time to cover a few obsidian gems from the Black Metal scene that you may not have checked out yet)

It’s looking like my annual week-long litany of year-end lists will commence either on the 6th or 13th of December this year, depending on whether or not I end up doing some last minute shows with my own band during either of those weeks.

Either way though, that means there’s very little time left to write up and review some of the various albums which are going to appear on those lists, so some harsh decisions are going to need to be made regarding what gets reviewed, and what gets left by the wayside, over the next few weeks.

Case in point, selecting the three artists/albums which I’ve chosen to cover here today meant I had to skip writing about several big and/or highly anticipated new albums from the likes of Der Weg Einer Freiheit, Plebeian Grandstand, Ars Magna Umbrae, and more.

Hopefully someone else from the NoCleanTeam™ will be able to find time to pen a few thoughts about some of them (and, even if not, at least one of them is scheduled for a Synn Report some time soon) but, in the meantime, I’d like you to instead turn your attention to this trilogy of blackened terror by Bornholm (HU), Demonic Temple (PL), and Whoredome Rife (NO). Continue reading »

Oct 182021
 

 

The fire-breathing band photo of Demonic Temple featured above hearkens back to ancient black metal days, to the fiery expulsions of Quorthon, Frost, and Abbath. Apart from linking arms with the vanguard of black metal’s second wave, the photo also serves as a mission statement for the music of this Polish duo, as revealed through their forthcoming third album, Through the Stars into the Abyss.

The sensations of the album are incendiary, but they also set fire to the imagination, creating both blood-freezing and blood-heating visions that seem both subterranean and celestial. Put differently, the trip through the album is very much what the album title portends — a dazzling but terrifying excursion through the stars above into the abyss beyond.

You will get a very good sense of this by listening to the album’s title track, which we’re premiering today in the lead-up to its November 11 release by Putrid Cult and Dark Horizon. Continue reading »