SHADES OF BLACK: DOEDSVANGR, ALBURNUM, TANTUM, CARRION BLOOM, THRALL, BERATOR, VØLUS, PHENOM, VINTERDRACUL

 SHADES OF BLACK  No Responses »
May 082022
 

Happy Mother’s Day to all of you who are mothers, and as a reminder to those of you who were born of mothers (versus those who were the result of asexual reproduction). I intended to compile a roundup of new music yesterday, but was feeling under the weather. I’m feeling less incapacitated today, as you can tell from the volume of music in this week’s Shades of Black.

There’s a method to the way I organized the following songs. Words like “grim”, “depressive”, or “poisonous” may come to mind over the course of the first three tracks, and then things begin to turn more chaotic and violently unhinged, leading to a closing twist that’s more difficult to sum up.

DOEDSVANGR (Norway/Finland)

I’m beginning with a video for the song “As the Rivers Bleed Their Blessings” from Doedsvangr‘s newest album, Serpents ov Old, which was released by Debemur Morti last fall. The video was recorded at the band’s release gig for the album, which took place at Røverstaden (Oslo) on March 26th, 2022 (credit to Carl Eek of Necrolust Productions for filming and editing it). Continue reading »

OVERFLOWING STREAMS: NIHIL KAOS, NON SERVIAM, FERNWAH, BANK MYNA, GREY MOTH, LAANG, NIGHT HAG, BLOOD COUNTESS, VINTERDRACUL, HELLFIRE DEATHCULT, VENATOR, OCEANHOARSE, MACKLEMORE

 Exceptions to the Rule, Metal News, RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  No Responses »
Dec 292021
 

 

A baker’s dozen of new songs and videos is a lot to take in, but that’s what I’ve compiled here, and since we’re in the middle of Dead Week it seems entirely fitting for me to throw it your way now.

This 13-band round-up is the result of me going deep down a music-listening rabbit hole last night, a topsy-turvy underground descent in which I didn’t encounter any metal bands other than relatively obscure ones. My head was spinning by the end, and I hope yours will be too.

I did attempt to arrange the following items into “blocks”, but I make no promise that the arrangements will always make sense to you. Sometimes they barely made sense to me. I do promise you a real musical roller-coaster ride, and hope you’ll not jump out before you get to the end. And of course I had to pitch a curveball at the end.

P.S. I picked up the name “Dead Week” from this recent essay in The Atlantic, which perfectly sums up the oddities and attractions of this blank space that stretches between Christmas and New Year’s Eve.

NIHIL KAOS (International)

While I think the entire journey through today’s round-up will prove to be head-spinning, I’ve chosen to lead with a trio of songs that are within themselves head-spinning. And I’ve begun with the track that for me had the most jaw-dropping, eye-popping impact of them all. Continue reading »