OUR LIST OF 2024’S MOST INFECTIOUS EXTREME METAL SONGS (PART 16): PAYSAGE D’HIVER, MERRIMACK, AKVAN

 MOST INFECTIOUS SONGS-2024  No Responses »
Jan 232025
 

(written by Islander)

The unifying theme that explains the grouping of today’s three selections for this list is… black metal… but although they all fit under that large and ever-expanding genre tent, each is quite different from the others.

To explore the songs laid out in the preceding 15 Parts of the list, go here.

PAYSAGE D’HIVER

In Part 6 of this list I included a song by Calcarata that I was confident was the longest song I’ve ever picked for one of these lists in the 16 years I’ve been doing them. That song was 17 minutes long. But today I’m starting with one that’s even longer, the 18+ minute opening track from Paysage D’Hiver‘s monumental 2024 album Die Berge. Continue reading »

BECAUSE WITTY YEAR END LIST TITLES ABOUT RUINING THE HOLIDAYS ARE FOR SUCKERS – THE DGR YEAR ENDSTAVAGANZA PART THREE: 30 – 21

 LISTMANIA 2024  No Responses »
Dec 182024
 

(This is the third installment of DGR‘s year-end Top 50 list, counting down the third group of 10, with the next two groups slated for the next two days ahead.)

I’ve been doing these lists long enough that I’ve developed a genuine fear that I might be repeating myself. I console myself with the fact that no one else seems to have noticed so far since every one of these has been a fantastic exercise in breaking out the thesaurus and learning new words every day – or reminding myself that I used to not be so dumb. I have yet to work “lugubrious” into one of these but you better believe I’m going to damned well take a swing at it at some point.

But it’s the fear of repeating myself that drives me to such inanity, because I am worried that it might seem like I’m wasting your time. I don’t want these to be the ‘if you’ve read one, you’ve read them all’ of the year-end lists. I even gut-checked myself by archiving them all together at one point just to make sure that each stood as its own artistic statement – or at the very least the authorial equivalent of changing the food for the dog every once in a while.

But like I said (twice already), repetition is a big fear of mine. Well, that and accidentally putting releases from last year in here or playing my hand early and putting something that comes out next January on here. Luckily I haven’t been at risk of doing that last one yet, as I don’t think I have any promos from that timeframe in hand nor would I likely acknowledge them. At this point I feel like I’ve taken a round off of the reaper just by making it to next week. Continue reading »

OVERFLOWING STREAMS ON A SATURDAY (TOO MANY BANDS TO NAME)

 Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  7 Responses »
Dec 092023
 

Happy Saturday, or whatever other day you’re in when you come across this collection of new music.

I’m taking a lazy way out here — mainly just spewing a bunch of new metal songs and videos at you without much, or any, of the usual commentary. It’s actually not because I’m feeling lazy, it’s because I’m getting crushed by my fucking day job. Sadly (very sadly for me), it’s going to get worse as we approach the end of the year, and even worser in January.

I’ve never given any details about my job, but it’s not 9-5. Some days it might be Noon-3, but other days it might be 5 (a.m.) to midnight, and I have no control over the schedule. Mostly it leaves me plenty of time for NCS. Now, and increasingly until mid-January, it’s going to choke me.

At some point soon I’ll explain what that’s likely to do to some portions of our annual LISTMANIA extravaganza and the usual schedule of daily premieres, but not now. Now I only have time enough to start the spewing of this new stuff I’ve enjoyed, presented in alphabetical order by band name. Continue reading »

THE SYNN REPORT, PART 86: MERRIMACK

 Album Reviews, THE SYNN REPORT  3 Responses »
Jun 302017
 


Photo by Alizee Adamek

 

(The subject of Andy Synn’s 86th SYNN REPORT is the discography of the French black metal band Merrimack.)

 

Recommended for fans of: Marduk, Enthroned, Watain

 

Black Metal has gone in a lot of different directions since its inception, expanding its horizons and stretching its boundaries in so many different ways that it’s almost impossible to count them all.

But sometimes you just need a dose of pure sonic sadism. Sometimes you need Merrimack.

Over the course of five albums (the most recent of which came out at the start of this month), guitarist Perversifier (the last remaining original member of the group) and his merry merciless men have unleashed their own particular brand of auditory hell upon the world with little to no regard for those innocents who might end up caught in the crossfire, as well as delivering a live show which often teeters on the edge of “unhinged”.

So if you’re looking for something black as pitch, and just as incendiary, then please… read on. Continue reading »

SHADES OF BLACK (PART 2): CORPUS CHRISTII, DO SKONU, MERRIMACK, NYOGTHAEBLISZ, VAINA

 SHADES OF BLACK  7 Responses »
Apr 242017
 

 

This completes the two-part post I started yesterday, collecting music in a blackened vein that I sifted from my discoveries over the last week. Beginning yesterday and continuing today, the music is organized in alphabetical order by band name.

CORPUS CHRISTII

Delusion is the eighth full-length by the Portuguese black metal band Corpus Christii. It will be released on April 28 by Folter Records. In another one of these SHADES OF BLACK editions, I wrote about the album’s powerful first single, “The Curse Within Time”, and now a second one has appeared, which is yet another sign of this album’s excellence. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: MERRIMACK — “APOPHATIC WEAPONRY”

 Premieres  3 Responses »
Mar 092017
 

 

In a career that stretches back into the stygian mists of the mid-’90s, the French black metal band Merrimack have released four remarkable albums… though roughly five long years have passed since the last of those, 2012’s The Acausal Mass. But those of us who have been hungering for more of this band’s brand of fervent and unflinching underground terrorism will have that hunger sated early this summer: On June 9, 2017, Season of Mist will release the band’s fifth album, Omegaphilia. To help prepare the way for its advent, we are helping to premiere a song from the album named “Apophotic Weaponry“.

As the song’s name might suggest, “Apophotic Weaponry” is both physically assaulting and dreamlike, both murderous and mystical. It strikes with cyclonic abrasive power, yet seems to cut through limitations of space and time in search of something formless and timeless. Continue reading »

SUMMER BREEZE 2013 — DAY 2

 Concert Reviews  12 Responses »
Sep 042013
 

(Andy Synn delivers this review of the second day at the recently completed Summer Breeze festival in Germany, and again provides video of the performances. To see his review of the festival’s first day, go here. We’ll have Part 3 of his review tomorrow.)

Day 2 of the festival kicked off (for me at least) with some pure blackened misanthropy courtesy of France’s Merrimack who proceeded to shake the cobwebs out of everyone’s brains with an esoteric take on panzerfaust black metal blasting that recalls Deathspell Omega in places (though considerably more focussed and violent).

The band’s frontman Vestal was a particularly difficult figure to look away from, screeching his savage hymns of depravity whilst physically flagellating himself with both his mic and his bare fists. Combine this with the band’s relentless delivery – all jagged edges and harsh, ecliptic angles, and you get one singularly uncomfortable, yet incredibly compelling, live experience. Continue reading »

MARDUK

 Album Reviews  No Responses »
Dec 122009
 

marduk_1

The day job has had my head in a fucking vise for the last week but now that’s passed. To celebrate last night, I had a few adult beverages with a couple of buds and then some total immersion in Wormwood, the latest offering from Swedish black metal band Marduk. You know what I mean about total immersion. Get either semi- or completely wasted, get comfortable on the floor in a chair or bed, crank up the volume past NIOSH limits, close your eyes, and then just focus your brain on the music. Well, Wormwood turned out to be just what the doctor ordered — if your doctor’s last name happens to be Frankenstein or Faustus. Continue reading »