PHRO TRIES TO REMEMBER WHAT YEAR IT IS AND WHAT FUCKING ALBUMS CAME OUT THIS YEAR

 Listmania, Phro's Posts  41 Responses »
Dec 122011
 

(The time has come.  What time is that?  Why, it’s the time when we begin publishing our own series on the best metal of 2011 — lists created by our writers, guest contributors, and members of metal bands who we’ve specially invited to share with us their lists.  And what better way to start than by turning to Phro for the kick-off?)

Ahhh . . . 2011, how quickly you came and . . . went?  Are going?  Let’s just stick with came for now.

What a year it has been!  I think.  I don’t really remember it.  I think there was something to do with tentacles and a few zombie girls.  Seriously, someone please make the whole zombie/vampire/werewolf thing stop happening.  Please.  I’m begging you.  I can only take so much pithy teen angst foisted upon poor hapless creatures of the night.  GIVE THEM BACK THEIR BALLS, DAMNIT!!!

Seriously.  And wizards, too.  Enough of that shit.

Oh, right, and there was music, too.  Particularly metal music.  Particularly good metal music.  (Anyone who ever utters the words, “It’s been a bad year for metal,” should go out behind the chicken chopping shed and punch themselves in the throat with a rooster.  You fucking lazy scum fucker.)  But it`s the end of the year, and it’s not enough to simply say there was a lot of it.  You people from the Internet want proof all of the sudden!  You freaks with your memes and your porn and your meme porn and your porn memes.  And your rules!!!  So many rules!  Well, I have a new rule for you.  Rule number 0.5.  It states, quite clearly: anything that can be made into furry-rape-scat porn should be made into furry-rape-scat porn and then broadcasted on CNN, FOX, and MSNBC until foxes look sexy.  (But only when they`re covered in poop.)

Poop, poop, poop, poop . . . poop . . . poooooooooooooop . . . Continue reading »

INSOMNIUM: “ONE FOR SORROW”

 Album Reviews  15 Responses »
Oct 112011
 

(NCS writer Andy Synn reviews the new album from Finland’s Insomnium.)

Expectations are funny things. Sometimes they set us up for a fall. Sometimes they serve to prepare us for disappointment. Sometimes they serve only to disappoint us further. But sometimes the simple fulfilment of your expectations can be a wonderful thing.

With their fifth album, Insomnium once again offer you everything you’ve been expecting. Cleanly and powerfully. Proudly and confidently. Consider yourselves satisfied. Consider your expectations not simply fulfilled but effortlessly surpassed. And do not for a moment imagine that you know everything about this album already. Not this time.

The traditional introductory track “Inertia” commences the album in a wholly untraditional manner, its floating, ethereal style and omnipresent keyboard ambience initially bringing to mind their Finnish brethren in Ghost Brigade as it slowly builds in intensity, growing from a tiny seed of melody into a forest of stars and wind-swept harmonies.

From its rolling gait the song transitions naturally into “Through The Shadows”, a powerful number whose thunderous metallic might and grandiose melody is buoyed up by an ocean of shimmering keyboard orchestration. The riffs and vocals strike a potent balance between overwhelming power and restraint, never knowingly aggressive yet effortlessly confident and assured, leading right up to a strident chorus where the clean vocals of guitarist Ville Friman are offset against the familiar, rumbling growl of Niilo Sevänen, offering a tantalising glimpse of a band who have still yet to unfurl all the facets of their glorious wings. A transcendent solo and some magnificent duelling guitar leads crown the second half of the song in majestic grandeur, leading seamlessly into the lengthy and epic vibe of “Song Of The Blackest Bird”. Continue reading »

INSOMNIUM: FULL-ALBUM STREAM

 Metal News  4 Responses »
Oct 102011
 

The new album by Insomnium, One For Sorrow, has been making the rounds here among the NCS staff, and it’s been uniformly drawing praise. Despite a fair amount of clean singing, even I am digging it. In the near future we will have at least one review, from Andy Synn, but the point of this post is to alert you to the news that the entire album is now streaming at a Finnish web site called Inferno. And to get there and start eating up the goodness, follow THIS LINK.

Over and out. Whatever that means.

NEW VIDEOS: GOATWHORE, INSOMNIUM, GRENDEL, AND REVOCATION

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  10 Responses »
Oct 012011
 

I spent some time yesterday catching up on metal news over the last week and came across an assortment of videos I thought were worth sharing.

The first one is footage of the almighty Goatwhore playing a club in Fort Walton Beach, Florida on September 16. What makes this video worth sharing is that they’re playing a NEW SONG, called “Beyond the Spell of Discontent”, and it’s a smokin’ hot piece of black ‘n’ roll. The video quality isn’t great, but the sound is pretty good. I’ll have the vid of that song for you after the jump; video of the band’s entire set can be viewed here.

The second video is a clip of Insomnium playing “The Gale” and “The Mortal Share” at the 2010 Summer Breeze Festival. The band linked to this video on their FB page last night, which is how I found it. Again, the video quality isn’t pro-standard, but the sound is decent, and it’s fucking Insomnium, and I’m getting tremendously tumescent in anticipation of their new album, so yeah. (Okay, this video isn’t exactly new, but I’m going with it anyway.)

The third video is a recent official release by a Finnish band called Grendel for the song “Apocalyptic Rain”. I wasn’t familiar with Grendel before seeing the video, but I likey the song — it’s a headbanging blast of melodic death metal. The video, which is organized around a game of Russian Roulette, proves two things: (1) the guys in this band weren’t very lucky that night; and, as if we needed more proof, (2) dudes will do almost anything for a chick with big knockers.

Last, but not least, I have a recently posted MetalInjection video of Revocation performing “Conjuring the Cataclysm” live. I always have a shit-ton of fun at Revocation shows, and I really like this song, so there. Continue reading »

INSOMNIUM: “THROUGH THE SHADOWS”

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  7 Responses »
Sep 162011
 

At the end of August, Insomnium released the first song from their next album, One For Sorrow, which is scheduled to hit the streets on October 12 in Finland, October 17 in the rest of Europe, and October 18 in the U.S. The song was “Unsung”, and of course we had to put it up on NCS pronto (here). If you haven’t heard it yet, it’s a great song.

Earlier this week, the band and Century Media released the first official video from the album for another song, “Through the Shadows”. That video is now on YouTube and can be embedded, so that’s what we’re doing after the jump.

This is not the Insomnium I know and love. Where “Unsung” included clean vocals, they were brief and I thought they worked well in the song. This new one is at least half clean vocals. Is Insomnium drifting toward the Amorphis end of the Finnish melodeath spectrum?

Yes, you can call me a narrow-minded bigot about clean singing in extreme metal. I plead guilty. I don’t hate this song, but it’s not doing much for me either. I’ll just leave it at that and play the video after the jump, because after all, it’s still Insomnium. Continue reading »

INSOMNIUM: “UNSUNG”

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  17 Responses »
Aug 292011
 

Thanks to a post on MetalSucks, which I saw before getting the news from Century Media, I learned that Insomnium has released a new song from their next album, One For Sorrow, which is scheduled to hit the streets on October 12 in Finland, October 17 in the rest of Europe, and October 18 in the U.S. The song is called “Unsung”, and Century Media is offering it for free download in exchange for your e-mail address (use a real one, because they’ll be sending you an activation code to get the song). HERE is the link for that.

I was wondering in a post at the end of last week whether there is any band that all metalheads like, no matter how divergent their principal tastes might be. I couldn’t think of one then. But MS may be right — Insomnium may be that band (or one of them). I know I like them immensely.

And I like this song immensely, too. It’s dramatic, powerful, sweeping — an archetypal example of what melodic death metal has to offer, that combination of galloping riffs, voracious vocals, and immensely affecting melodic atmosphere. (It has clean vocals, too, but they’re brief and they work beautifully.) The song has already made its way to YouTube, and so we’ll embed it after the jump. But once you hear it, I have a feeling you’ll want to go download it for yourself. (Cool album art, too.) Continue reading »

MORE 2011 SICKNESS (PART 8)

 Forthcoming Albums  10 Responses »
Aug 032011
 


July is behind us, and the last month of the summer has begun. Drifting along even more stupidly than usual, I let the first day of the month come and go without posting our usual monthly  installment of METAL IN THE FORGE. So, we’re late with this, but I have a feeling no one was holding their breath waiting for it anyway.

You know the drill:  In these posts, we collect news blurbs and press releases we’ve seen over the last month about forthcoming new albums from bands we know and like (including occasional updates about releases we’ve included in previous installments of this series), or from bands that look interesting, even though we don’t know their music yet. In this series, we cut and paste those announcements and compile them in alphabetical order.

Remember — this isn’t a cumulative list. If we found out about a new album before July, we wrote about it in previous installments of this series. So, be sure to check the Category link called “Forthcoming Albums” on the right side of this page to see forecasted releases we reported earlier. This month’s list begins right after the jump. Look for your favorite bands, or get intrigued about some new ones. And feel free to tell us about how we fucked up by omitting releases that you’re stoked about. Continue reading »

MORE 2011 SICKNESS (PART 7)

 Forthcoming Albums, Interviews  19 Responses »
Jul 012011
 


June is behind us, July lies ahead. Here in the U.S., we’re about to start the long weekend leading up to Independence Day, when Americans celebrate the birth of the nation by buying explosive ordinance wherever fine explosive ordinance is sold and lighting up the night sky (in addition to blowing the shit out of objects and sometimes themselves). People will also be exposing unsightly parts of their bodies wherever sun can be found and eating large quantities of health food prepared on outdoor grills. Our Founding Fathers would be proud of what they wrought!

Because the last month has ended, that means it’s time for another installment of METAL IN THE FORGE, in which we collect news blurbs and press releases we’ve seen over the last month about forthcoming new albums from bands we know and like (including occasional updates about releases we’ve included in previous installments of this series), or from bands that look interesting, even though we don’t know their music yet. In this series, we cut and paste those announcements and compile them in alphabetical order.

Remember — this isn’t a cumulative list. If we found out about a new album during May or preceding months, we wrote about them in previous installments of this series. So, be sure to check the Category link called “Forthcoming Albums” on the right side of this page to see forecasted releases we reported earlier. This month’s list begins right after the jump. Look for your favorite bands, or get intrigued about some new ones. And feel free to tell us about how we fucked up by omitting releases that we overlooked. Continue reading »

NEWZ FROM ALL OVER (INCLUDING A MASSIVE INTERVIEW FAIL) AND ONE ACTUAL SONG

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  28 Responses »
Jun 222011
 

I’ve never been entirely sure about the point of metal news releases about music you can’t yet hear, albums you can’t yet buy, and tours for which you can’t yet acquire tickets, but people still seem to be interested in this kind of shit. Not me, of course. I’m so fucking zen-like in my outlook that these kinds of pointless cock-teasers just flow over me like a soft summer breeze, barely ruffling my hair. My pulse rate doesn’t move a beat from its normal, slothlike resting state. I remain as steady and unmoving as a hummingbird.

Wait, that didn’t end right. Okay, well maybe it did. Truth is, I am metal-nerd enough to get excited about this stuff, though I can’t provide any rational reason why. In keeping with our unintentional Finn-centric theme of this week’s posts, several of these items focus on Finnish metal.

So, here’s the top-level summary of news for this post: Announcement of two new European tours — one featuring Gorgoroth and Vader and the other headlined by Machine Head; a progress report on Insomnium‘s new album; word of an all-star album (and the label “all-star” is no bullshit) in the planning stages from Finland’s Spinefarm Records; and perhaps the most glaring example I’ve seen in months of an interviewer failing to ask a follow-up question (in this case, about Opeth‘s new album).

While I’ve got your attention, I might as well also throw in some music you can actually hear right now — high-quality footage of Suicide Silence performing a song from their forthcoming new album.  (all that stuff after the jump . . .) Continue reading »

MORE 2011 SICKNESS (PART 4)

 Forthcoming Albums  15 Responses »
Apr 022011
 


Technically, we should have posted this yesterday, but yesterday was April Fool’s Day, and people might have thought we were making up some of this shit. But it’s all true, and nothing happens on April 2 to plant doubt about truth. Except for what causes doubt to be planted about truth on any other day of the year.

Here we are at the beginning of the second quarter of 2011 — the time when for those of us in the Northern Hemisphere, spring is supposed to spring.  Where I live, spring has apparently been victimized by a brutal street mugging and is hospitalized at the moment.  A few plants have been deluded into thinking it’s spring, but for the rest of our local world, it’s still fucking winter.

Fortunately, the change of the seasons have fuck all to do with the release of metal. What we do with these installments of METAL IN THE FORGE is collect news blurbs and press releases we’ve seen over the last 30 days (or in this case, the last 31 days) about forthcoming new albums from bands we know and like (including updates about releases we’ve included in previous installments of this series), or from bands that look interesting, even though we don’t know them yet. And in this post, we cut and paste the announcements and compile them in alphabetical order.

This isn’t a cumulative list, so be sure to check the Category link called “Forthcoming New Albums” on the right side of this page to see forecasted releases we reported in previous installments. This month’s list begins right after the jump. Look for your favorite bands, or get intrigued about some new ones. There’s some awesome shit on the way. Dive in after the jump. Continue reading »

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