ROTTEN SOUND: “SPECIES AT WAR”

 Album Reviews, SHORT BUT SWEET  5 Responses »
Jan 042013
 

Rotten Sound’s new six-song EP Species At War is scheduled for release by Relapse Records on January 22 in North America. Yesterday TheMadIsraeli and I had the privilege of listening to the EP, and after calmly reflecting upon it, we each had some thoughts about the experience that we wish to share with you.

TheMadIsraeli

Some collections of music serve as nothing else but a vessel through which the hand of God himself smites you with a swarm of cannibalistic locusts with teeth soaked in battery acid.  This EP is literally the sonic equivalent of being punished for your sins.

I mean, you think you’re some tough motherfucker right?  You ain’t above punchin’ rats.  You don’t give two fucks.  I’m afraid, however, Rotten Sound begs to differ.  From the opening salvo of “Cause”, which turns itself into weaponized audio, filling the listener full of holes and eventually obliterating you like an AA12 (for those who don’t know, that’s a fucking fully automatic shotgun), Species At War serves more as an epic-length single song by grindcore standards, split into parts, eight minutes in total of total fucking… I don’t even.

First must-own EP of 2013. Get it. We all deserve this kind of beatdown once in awhile. Continue reading »

12-12-12 (WITH INFANT ANNIHILATOR, ULCER, AND ROTTEN SOUND)

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  2 Responses »
Dec 122012
 

Today is a milestone day. It’s really just an unusual alignment of numbers in the Western world’s completely arbitrary way of measuring the passage of time on a calendar, but it’s cool nonetheless: The last 100% repetitive date that most humans now alive will ever see. It’s a long wait until January 1, 2101.

So, how shall we commemorate this arbitrary milestone? In the same way we commemorate the advent of every blessed new day: with some fucken metal. Here are a few things that caught my eyes and ears since last night (and we’ll also have an eviscerating video premiere by Krisiun coming up soon).

INFANT ANNIHILATOR

We have flogged the name Infant Annihilator mercilessly since discovering their artistic, bunghole-plugging video for “Decapitation Fornication”. And now the day has arrived when the band’s debut album The Palpable Leprosy of Pollution has been vomited forth in a steady stream of incendiary munitions and vocal filth guaranteed to fracture spines and necrotize flesh.

After the jump, press play — and then duck and cover. You can buy the album on Bandcamp via this link. Continue reading »

MORE 2011 SICKNESS (PART 2)

 Forthcoming Albums  No Responses »
Feb 012011
 


The first month of the year has come and gone. January brought those of us in Seattle some typically ass-sucking winter weather, though it wasn’t nearly as bad as the brutality dished out by the weather gods on our metal brothers and sisters in the Midwest and Northeast of the U.S. And of course, our readers ins places like Russia, and Finland, and Sweden are probably laughing their asses off reading our complaints about our winter weather. So, we’ll just shut up about that.

Besides, January brought all sorts of great new metal to our tender ears, so who gives a shit about the weather anyway? And you know what else January brought? It brought news of still more metal goodness on the way — great bursts of audio sunshine in our collective futures that will part these winter clouds and leave them whimpering in cloudy tatters.

Okay, maybe we should leave poetry to the poets and just get on with this next monthly installment of METAL IN THE FORGE, where we collect news blurbs and press releases we’ve seen over the last 30 days about forthcoming new albums from bands we know and like, or from bands that look interesting, even though we don’t know them yet. And in this post, we’ve cut and pasted the announcements and compiled them in alphabetical order. Look for your favorite bands, or get intrigued about some new ones:

AJATARRA: “AJATTARA — the Finnish band featuring former AMORPHIS frontman Pasi Koskinen (a.k.a. Itse Ruoja Suruntuoj) — will release its seventh album, Murhat (“Murders”) on February 2 via Osasto-A Records. Murhat is available for streaming in its entirety on the AJATTARA Facebook page.”  (much more after the jump . . .) Continue reading »

HEAVINESS

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  4 Responses »
Jan 202011
 


This will be quick because my fucking day job calls.

“Heavy” is a word we apply to some forms of metal but not others. Howl is heavy. Very fucking heavy. Up above is video evidence of that fact. It’s high-quality footage of the band playing at SXSW. There are three songs on this video: “Heavenless”, “Oma”, and “Horns of Steel”.  If you’re interested in more info about this band, you can check out our review of their 2010 album Full of Hell here.

UPDATE: The fucking embed code to that Roxwel video doesn’t appear to work. You should still watch the video, though I almost hate to send you to the Roxwel site because they pretend to give you an embed code, but it doesn’t fucking work. But I like HOWL well enough to provide the link anyway. Here it is.

But wait, there’s more. After the jump, we’ve got a just-released song from Finland’s Rotten Sound off their forthcoming new album Cursed. Listen to it and let us know what you think.  Gotta go now. Continue reading »

THE FINNS ARE COMING (AGAIN)

 Metal News  14 Responses »
Jan 102011
 

No, we’re not re-starting our seemingly endless series on Finnish metal. This is just a heads-up that the second installment of THE FINNISH METAL TOUR is on the horizon. The first installment last year was one of the best shows we saw in 2010, and the next one is already causing near-sexual forms of arousal here at NCS.

Okay, maybe that was too much information. Let’s just say we’re looking forward to the new tour and leave it at that.

Here’s the arousing line-up: Finntroll, Ensiferum, Barren Earth, and Rotten Sound.

Up above is a video trailer for the tour hosted by keyboardist Kasper Mårtenson (ex-Amorphis) and guitarist Sami Yli-Sirniö (Kreator) of Barren Earth. And in case your eyes cross as you try to read the dates and places as they scroll across the bottom of the video, we’ve got the full schedule after the jump.

Be still my beating . . . heart. Continue reading »

2011: MORE SICKNESS AHEAD

 Forthcoming Albums, Listmania  7 Responses »
Jan 012011
 


HAPPY NEW YEAR!  Did you see what we did?  We had to change the logo for this edition of SICKNESS.  Because 2010 is behind us, and the new year lies ahead.

We spent the last 30 days, as we’ve been doing for the last year, collecting news blurbs and press releases about forthcoming new albums from bands we know and like, or from bands that look interesting, even though we don’t know them yet. And in this post, we’ve cut and pasted the announcements and compiled them in alphabetical order.

All of our previous monthly updates can be found via the “Forthcoming Albums” category link on the right side of our pages, and because we’re not keeping a cumulative list, you might want to check the last couple months of these posts if you want to get a full picture of what’s coming. The list that follows, in alphabetical order, are albums we didn’t know about at the time of our last installment when November ended, or updated info about albums we’d previously heard were on the way. And be forewarned: This is a really long list. There’s a massive slag of new metal coming our way, and man, does it look hot.

So, without further ado, let’s get started. See if there’s anything on the list that makes you moist, or tumescent, or just generally slobbery.

ABORTED: “Good news is that we are starting pre-productions for our upcoming record on January 4th. This means we will demo all the songs for the record, make sure everything sounds good and make the necessary adjustments to make sure they are all more lethal than a chainsaw in Mr. Leatherface’s hands. We’re all very excited about the material thus far and can’t wait to get this over with and proceed to the actual recordings later this year. Expect a fall 2011 release through our culprates in mayhem Century Media.”

AGNOSTIC FRONT: “The Godfathers of New York Hardcore, Agnostic Front, have just finished recording their highly anticipated follow up to their 2007 release, Warriors. The yet to be titled album features 13 new powerful and anthemic songs laid down by Erik Rutan (Madball, Goatwhore, Cannibal Corpse) at his Mana Recording Studio in Tampa, FL under the watchful guide of producer Freddy Cricien of Madball. The record was mastered by Alan Douches (Nile, Mastodon) and will be released in Europe of March 4, 2011 and in North America on March 22, 2011.”

(the list continues after the jump . . .)

Continue reading »

MORE 2010 SICKNESS (Part 3)

 Forthcoming Albums, Listmania, Metal News  No Responses »
Mar 312010
 

We’re now a full three months into 2010, and it’s time for our third update to the list of forthcoming new albums we posted on January 1.  (See the original list here, the first update here, and the second update here.) Below is a list of still more projected new releases that we didn’t know about on January 1 or at the time of our last two updates — and the new sickness is still spreading in epidemic proportions.

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).

ANAAL NATHRAKH: “U.K. extreme metallers ANAAL NATHRAKH have commenced work on material for a new album, tentatively due before the end of the year.”

ANNIHILATOR: “Canadian thrash metal veterans ANNIHILATOR will release their 13th, self-titled album in Europe on May 17 via Earache Records, in Japan through Marquee and in Australia via Riot Entertainment.”

ARISE: “A two-minute video trailer for The Reckoning, the fourth album from Swedish death/thrashers ARISE, can be viewed below. Due on March 22 through Regain Records, the CD features guest appearances by Jonas Kjellgren (SCAR SYMMETRY, ex-CARNAL FORGE), Mikael Stanne (DARK TRANQUILLITY) and Jake Fredém (NOSTRADAMEUS).” [NOTE: the album is now scheduled for release on April 6.]

(more after the jump . . .) Continue reading »

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