Feb 022024
 

(Andy Synn has a few words to share about four albums from last month you may have overlooked)

Here we are… one month into the new year… and we’ve already fallen behind.

Of course, that’s nothing new. As I’ve said before (several times, in fact) it’s impossible for any site, let alone any individual writer, to keep up with everything that’s released week after week (which is one reason I don’t trust anyone who claims that they’ve somehow listened to literally hundreds of albums every month – they may have heard them, but I doubt they really listened to them the way they deserve), so even at this early stage it’s no surprise that there’s so many artists and albums we haven’t been able to write about.

To be quite honest though, this is less and less of an issues these days – simply by accepting the fact that there’s always going to be stuff we’re not going to be able to cover, while also acknowledging that we’re definitely going to be featuring some stuff here that other places, and other people, won’t cover, we’ve gotten over our fear of missing out and embraced the idea that our value comes not from covering everything but from providing an interesting and distinct perspective of our own on what we do write about.

So, with that in mind, here’s four artists/albums from January – some of which you may already have been aware of, some of which you may not – that we (or, at least, I) felt compelled to pen a few extra words about so that they didn’t get overlooked following what was, after all, a very packed month of new releases!

Continue reading »

Nov 122019
 

 

Some of you might remember that in the regular Sunday edition of this feature two days ago I mentioned that I had an idea for quickly highlighting a bunch of new albums that I didn’t want to neglect. I referred to it then as a collection of “teasers”. What I meant by that, as you’re about to see for yourselves, is a strategy that’s less satisfying than writing everything I’d like to say about these albums, but better than by-passing them altogether. What I’ve done is to pick just one song from each release as a jumping-off point, in the hope that you’ll go ahead and jump all the way in without further persuasion.

HELL’S CORONATION

The first album I’d like to highlight is Ritual Chalice of Hateful Blood, the debut full-length by Hell’s Coronation, which was released on October 31st by Godz Ov War Productions. The song I’ve picked as a teaser for the album is “Fullmoon Is the Sinister Light of Providence“, which also happens to be the song that’s set up to stream first at the album’s Bandcamp page, although it comes fourth in the running order. Continue reading »

Aug 042019
 

 

Writing today’s column was tougher than usual. While listening to my long list of music candidates last night and planning what I would write about, the news about the massacre in El Paso broke. And when I woke up this morning, planning to inhale coffee and begin writing, I was greeted with the reports of what happened in Dayton, Ohio overnight, when 9 more people were executed and more than two dozen were injured. Those tragedies brought the number of mass shootings in the U.S. this year to more than 250 (defined as 4 or more people shot or killed in a single incident, not including the shooter), and the number of deaths in mass shootings to 51.

I guess depression and rage are among the chief emotions channeled through black metal, but these events still didn’t put me in the best frame of mind for this project, despite being wracked by that same mixture of feelings over the last 24 hours. I do have plans for a second installment of new music in this series, but the best I can hope for is to finish it in time for posting on Monday.

UNAUSSPRECHLICHEN KULTEN

For many of us, Unaussprechlichen Kulten have become one of those bands whose every release is mandatory listening. And so it will be with respect to the fifth album from this Chilean cult, Teufelsbücher, which will be released by Iron Bonehead Productions on October 18th. Continue reading »

Jan 082018
 

 

In an effort to catch up with new music that appeared last week (or in some cases that I only discovered last week), I’ve resorted to a two-part OVERFLOWING STREAMS post. And for those who haven’t noticed the format of these posts, they’re a form of personal surrender to the flood of new music. I enjoy writing thoughts about what I want to recommend, but in posts such as this one I just let the music speak for itself because there’s so much to recommend that I don’t have time to blurt out my own reactions.

In the first part of this post I decided to collect only new split releases that I’ve recently found. To be sure, these aren’t the only splits that I’ve discovered recently — some I intend to listen to but haven’t heard yet. These, I’ve at least listened to once and have had positive reactions, and perhaps you will too. The first one is really hot off the presses, since it just appeared over the weekend. Continue reading »