GONZO’S HEAVY ROUNDUP, MAY 2022

 Album Reviews  5 Responses »
Jun 072022
 


Nechochwen

(With another month now in the history books, we welcome back Gonzo, who again has recommendations for you of wide-ranging albums released in the preceding month – somewhat delayed only because our editor completely lost track of time while at Maryland Deathfest.)

When doing the legwork that goes into these monthly columns, there are some months when I have to reach deep into the metal underbelly to extract whatever hidden gems I stumble across, and there are others where the onslaught of new releases just looks downright overwhelming and perhaps menacing.

May turned out to be the latter. I actually had to trim this one down from what I had originally planned out, if for no other reason than the fact that I’m disappearing into the mountains for most of the weekend without many plans to be in front of a computer. Fuck that nonsense, I say. I get enough of that during my 9-5 job, and any excuse to hit the road for an escape is a good one.

Read on and prepare to abuse your eardrums with the best of what I stumbled into through May. Continue reading »

OUR LIST OF 2021’S MOST INFECTIOUS EXTREME METAL SONGS (PART 5): WORM, SUFFERING HOUR, MARE COGNITUM

 MOST INFECTIOUS SONGS-2021  4 Responses »
Jan 112022
 

 

As I’ve remarked before about this series, the songs many of us find highly infectious are not necessaruly truly great artistic achievements, nor is there any necessary connection between an infectious track and a great album. But as it happens, I truly do believe that all three songs I’ve chosen for this Fifth Part of the list are great songs and they come from great albums.

Of course I’m far from alone in thinking these three albums are great ones — all of them achieved high praise when they came out, and made frequent appearances on year-end lists across the interhole, including those at our own dank hole.

WORM (U.S.)

Earlier today we posted a 2021 “List of Lists” that aggregated 97 year-end lists from 26 international critics, magazines, blogs, and other publications. In what was undoubtedly the biggest surprise (except for people who’ve actually heard it), Worm‘s album Foreverglade took the No. 6 spot, and only narrowly missed placing in a very closely packed Top 5 that included much more well-known names. As the person who compiled that list proclaimed, Worm “made funeral death/doom cool again”. Continue reading »

SUFFERING HOUR: “THE CYCLIC RECKONING”

 Album Reviews  3 Responses »
Feb 122021
 

 

(We present Andy Synn‘s review of the second album by Minnesota-based Suffering Hour, which will be released by Profound Lore on February 19th.)

It remains a true pleasure, pure and unsullied, to watch a band grow and ascend from humble beginnings towards true greatness.

Such is the case with Colorado terror-trio Suffering Hour, whose second album, The Cyclic Reckoning, may quite possibly be the first truly “great” record of 2021. Continue reading »

SINMARA AND SUFFERING HOUR: NEW MUSIC AND A U.S. EAST COAST TOUR

 Album Reviews, Metal News, SHORT BUT SWEET  No Responses »
Apr 052019
 

 

NCS isn’t really a “metal news” site, unlike some places that dutifully copy-paste press releases every day, with announcements of new tours, forthcoming releases, line-up changes, etc. About as close as we come are the SEEN AND HEARD posts, but those are devoted almost entirely to streams of new songs and videos, and commentary about them. If the recommended tracks happen to come from records that are on the horizon, we’ll include that info. In other words, the music is the main thing. Trying to keep up with every day’s newsy announcements is just too daunting a task, given the limited time that the NCS slaves have to devote to their slavery.

But here we have both an announcement and new music, which are connected. Normally I would have included both in a SEEN AND HEARD post, but my fucking day job has been slamming me hard this week, and I haven’t had time for one of those round-ups. But I do have just enough time for this before turning to today’s premieres. It concerns both a new EP by the U.S. black/death band Suffering Hour and a U.S. East Coast tour that begins tomorrow, which combines the talents of Suffering Hour and the Icelandic black metal band Sinmara. As you probably know if you’re a regular NCS visitor, both bands are favorites of our putrid site. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): SUFFERING HOUR — “IN PASSING ASCENSION”

 Premieres  7 Responses »
May 222017
 

 

Suffering Hour’s In Passing Ascension is the kind of debut album that makes an immediate positive impact because it so convincingly displays the band’s sure-handed mastery of their own sound, and because it’s a soundscape that’s distinctive rather than a re-treading of long-familiar territory.

At a very high level, the album inventively fuses dissonant black metal and harrowing death metal to create an experience that’s both eerily atmospheric and punishingly heavy, full of fire-storming ferocity and skin-shivering otherworldliness — and it somehow manages to be quite memorable as well as persistently unsettling. It’s our pleasure to bring you a full stream of the album today, in advance of its release by Blood Harvest on May 26th. Continue reading »

SEEN AND HEARD ON A SATURDAY: DOEDSVANGR, JOHN FRUM, FANGE, CULT OF EIBON, INFERNAL MAJESTY, SUFFERING HOUR, TELEPATHY

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  5 Responses »
Mar 042017
 

 

It’s been one of those weeks. As usual, I accumulated a big list of new songs and videos I wanted to recommend, but just didn’t have time to post any round-ups. And now I don’t have time to play catch-up either. I’ve made some fairly random choices from my list to include in this post, and will have some others in tomorrow’s weekly SHADES OF BLACK installment (we have a couple of Sunday premieres lined up as well).

I say “fairly random”, because in making these choices I did try to provide a variety of metallic sounds, and I also decided (with one exception) not to write about new songs that I think have already gotten plenty of attention elsewhere around the web this past week. And so, for example, other than the following links, I won’t be writing about the new songs and videos by Solstafir, Wolfheart, Svart Crown, Havok, Valborg, Vanum, or Windswept (among others) — though they’re all worth checking out if you haven’t done that.

DOEDSVANGR

Doedsvangr is yet another group formed and fronted by Norwegian artist Doedsadmiral. His other groups include Nordjevel, Svartelder, and Enepsigos. For Doedsvangr, he is joined by Finnish guitarist Shatraug (Horna, Sargeist, ex-Behexen, Nightbringer) and drummer Anti-Christian (Tsjuder, Beaten To Death). Their debut album Satan Ov Suns will be released by the Belgian label Immortal Frost Productions on March 27. Continue reading »