The first new release in a while from these Dutch black metal shoegazers, who even at their heaviest, were barely black metal at all, existing on a plane only tangentially related to the typical BM buzz and blast, with a sound more akin to post black metal experimentalists like Alcest, Les Discrets and Amesoeurs, and even in that company, CBR were way on the poppy side of the spectrum, their sound lush and lovely, more 4AD and MBV than anything, and very little has changed on this new single, if anything their sound has grown even more lush and lovely. There's still some buzz, but it's washed out and drowsy, dreamy and ethereal. Crystalline guitars, warm woozy basslines, thick swaths of billowy shoegaze guitar, achingly melancholic melodies, clean, crooned vocals, there's definitely a Nadja feel to the sound, although it's much more blissed out and dreamy.
The B side here is a bit more propulsive and rocking, with some subtle electronic filigree, but even with a bit more crunch and buzz in the guitars, it's still the same gloriously dreamy, washed out sun dappled shoegaze poppiness. Black metal fans who dig the above mentioned bands, and have no aversion to shoegaze pop, might take a chance, but for folks who love My Bloody Valentine, The Swirlies, Teenage Filmstars, and all the rest, these guys definitely belong in your collection too, don't let the black metal classification dissuade you, this is pure fuzzed out shoegaze heavy pop bliss.
Packaged in a nice full color jacket. Sorry, no download.
Although, from their not particularly atypical name and logo, you might expect just another business-as-usual Nordic black metal horde, corpsepainted and kvlt-y, this is NOT just another BM (or, USBM in their case as they hail from New Hampshire) band. Nosirree. We figured that out right away, when the vocals started up on "A Dangerous Wayfaring" and weren't a grim rasp, but rather a faux-British accented chorus. The more usual sort of guttural gruffness also soon appears, but CNV had piqued our interest, and we kept listening with curious anticipation that was quickly rewarded by this album's unexpected and unusual blend of underground black metal, goth rock, and industrial. Actually CNV also had our attention 'cause this comes from the same label, Bindrune, who last brought us Blood Of The Black Owl's A Feral Spirit, another unique and experimental metal offering.
This isn't quite as weird as that record, but this eclectic effort certainly captivates chaotically with majestically catchy riffage, Gobliny soundtrack synths, clean vocal singalongs, and even all-acoustic mellow moodiness ("The Shores Of New England"). Our favorite element though is what might be termed their Satanic industrial sound, with sampling and sequencing, the best example of which is "The By-Paths To Chaos", a rhythmic exercise in sinister, cut-and-paste percussive clockwork. Very cool. Hail Cold Northern Vengeance!!
We've been so focused on the Paysage D'Hiver reissues lately, that we've barely had time to dig into the other releases on Cold Dimensions and Kunsthall, but there are at least two that we definitely need to highlight, the latest Trist, which we'll review soon, and this one right here. Melancholie2, from German one man band Coldworld, quite possibly, one of the best depressive black metal records we've ever heard. Although defining Melancholie2 as a depressive BM record might be a bit reductive. It will make more sense, read on...
A dizzying mix of lilting melancholia, furious blackened blasts, epic morose arrangements, awesome drumming (a definite shortcoming in most bands), kick ass and ridiculously catchy riffing, and most importantly, incredibly evocative atmosphere and ambience, even when a song is buzzing along frantically, beneath the surface there is always some sort of drifting crystalline melody, or whirring drone, or chant like vocal line, it sounds a bit confusing, but the mix is magical.
The sound on Melancholie2 is so dynamic, so majestic and heavy, no lo-fi boom box recording here, the guitars are massive, thick and crunchy and buzzy, the vocals raw and primal, the keyboards and synths lush and shimmery, the drums somehow perfectly audible amidst all the buzz. And as with most black metal records, buzz is a key component, and here that buzz is all encompassing, warm and expansive, coating everything in its warm embrace.
The slower tracks are definitely Burzumic, the lumbering riff, the plodding rhythm, underpinned by a gorgeous keyboard melody, the midtempo tracks are like a less weird Lifelover, the music hooky, and weirdly poppy, but still grim and black, slipping from melodic lilt to intense speaker shredding blowout, rare that a band, or man as the case may be is equally adept and crafting doomy dismal blackness AND intense blasting black metal. The ambient tracks are surprisingly effective, moving and lovely, most black metal bands use cheesy synth sounds, but here, those parts sound like antique music boxes, or the soundtrack to a soft snowfall in some forgotten forest, dark, and haunting, but definitely beautiful and breathtaking, only moreso when they lead directly into another intense burst of blackness.
Some of the tracks are dangerously poppy, but the band manages to pull it off, channelling the sweeping sound of Katatonia, but adds some truly bizarre, almost robotic sounding vocals, which definitely sounds goofy, but in fact, the effect is anything but. It's more some sort of abstract alien doom, that is truly creepy and otherworldly. A few of the tracks are gorgeous sprawls of washed out sorrowful doom, but at least one shifts part way through into a strange pounding bit of minor key midtempo black metal, before slipping back into that depressive plod.
It's really hard to do this music justice. It's at once so familiar, embodying so much of what we already love about this sort of music, at the same time, it manages to sound unlike anything we've heard before, every song manages to be both heavy and wistful, depressive, but weirdly rocking, as a whole it's an incredible, expansive song suite, culminating in the final track, a skittery glitched out ambient landscape, bits of static and hiss drift between simpler percussion, and a shuffling rhythm, moody minimal guitar, slightly twangy, all draped over a swoonsome bit of minor key drone, with a crunchy metallic middle, before slipping back into more skittery melancholic drift. So goddamn good.
Quite possibly one of our new favorite records, black metal or otherwise!
It's tough to resist a black metal record that is, according to the label: "an ambitious and profound concept album about the "spleen", the suffering of everyday life". Hmmm. Do they really mean the spleen? Does the spleen represent the suffering of everyday life? Weird. Guess they must be archaically referencing the melancholy humor, not the internal organ. But what do you expect? These Italian miserablists have crafted a single massive 64 minute epic, divided into eight movements, each flowing smoothly into the next, a sprawling doomic depressive emotional black metal, that spends as much time soaring majestically, or drifting melodically as it does blasting grimly.
The perfect mix of classic old school doom, a la My Dying Bride or Paradise Lost, and the more modern depressive folk infused black metal like Drudkh as well as plenty of darkened suicidal buzz (think Shining, Forgotten Tomb). Bleak and austere, the guitars seem to weep and moan, the melodies mournful and emotional, the vocals an anguished wail, a deep bellowing howl more than a black shriek, the drums relentless, even the midtempo parts underpinned by frenetic double kicks, all very moody and evocative, sweeping long stretches of epic blackened doom, separated by lilting clean guitar folk interludes as well and bursts of furious blackness, even some gnarled bits of mathy Deathspell style weirdness, but through it all runs a weary black sonic stream, a melodic thread that turns these songs into one epic songsuite, a gorgeous sprawling expanse of doom-ed melodic blackness.
Those of you who managed to catch Andee and Allan guest DJing on Brian Turner's show On WFMU a few months back got an earful of all the craziest metal they could muster (if you didn't hear it, go to WFMU.org and you can listen to the whole thing!) in a desperate attempt to stump Brian the musical genius. Of course we cheated and played a bunch of unreleased demos!! One of which was some amazingly damaged keyboard heavy black-drone metal from Circumscriber. No idea when that record will finally see the light of day, but we just discovered that Benighted Leams label mates Contra Ignem Fatuum is in fact a group comprised of members of Circumscriber. Which makes perfect sense as CIF traffic in the same ultra repetitive black drone metal that so blew us away. We weren't sure what to expect as the majority of Detritus is ambient. No drums, no guitars, just dreamy streaks of smeary sound, delicate ghostlike melodies, warm synthesizers, chanting monklike vocals, majestic melodic swells, distant martial percussion, a bit like In The Nursery or Dead Can Dance or a lot like the recently listed Dark Ages disc. The second of the three tracks is the little black secret here, bookended on both sides by ethereal ambience, the 14 minute long title track is a brutal and mega-catchy, completely hypntoic, endlessly repeating KILLER riff, a swarm-of-locusts kind riff, buzzing and twisting, pounding and pulsing repeating over and over, a bit like a black metal Circle or more heavy metal Pharoah Overlord or even a way heavier Gore. The track builds and builds until the drums burst into a blazing fast blast beat and utter chaos is unleashed, the whole track becoming a swirl of demonic vocals, shrieking, swarming guitars, warm washes of keyboard and spastic lighting fast drumming, as everything becomes less and less distinct and more a black flurry of sound. Wow. When the riff kicks in, you'd have to be totally ROCK-less to not leap out of your chait and start banging your head and whipping your hair around like a windmill. It's like that Khold riff, the sort of riff bands kill for. So fucking great. So enjoy this while you can and steel yourself for the eventual arrival of Circumscriber.
We're always on the lookout for new music metal magazines, cuz as much as we love Decibel and Terrorizer, it's the cool DIY mags that really cover the stuff we love, in a way that seems totally genuine, driven purely by a love of the music, whether it's the now defunct Oaken Throne, or Salt (not strictly metal), or Asgard Root, we can't get enough. Which is why we were so thrilled to discover the curiously named Convivial Hermit, while at the same time confused as to how we missed the first 4 issues of this incredible magazine. Based in Warmonster, Pennsylvania (!!!), TCH covers a wide array of dark and heavy underground music, black metal, doom, psychedelic folk, industrial, and pretty much everything in between, as well as artists and filmmakers and whatever the hell else they feel like. This is issue five, and it's a doozy, featuring legendary slowcore doomlords Skepticism, Chinese neo-folk outfit Baishui, USBM horde Nechochwen, Korean metallers Sad Legend, Norwegian metal outfit Wallachia, filmmaker Andrei Tarkovsky, Orson Welles' film Mr. Arkadin, mysterious Russian black metallers Walknut, black metallers Algaion, symphonic neo-folk group Rome, longtime aQ fave Steven R. Smith, Russian doom metal label Solitude Productions, Lovecraftian metal weirdos Fungoid Stream, funeral doom outfit Helllight, an essay on the dying art of compilations and reviews of some of the editor's faves, French Illustrator Chris Moyen, death metallers Affliction Gate, Spanish black metallers Beelzeb, German black metal horde Drengskapur, Italian black metal unknowns Adversam, an essay on hermits (!), acid folk legends and ALL time aQ faves Comus, Czech black metal weirdos Master's Hammer, French black metallers Aorlhac, legendary dark ambient soundscaper Raison D'Etre, Chinese label Pest Productions (whose releases we have featured on the aQ list recently!), an thoughtful essay on record stores and the future of recorded media (for which this 'zine would get our recommendation alone, read this!), and then of course, TONS of reviews, records, magazines, shows.
The magazine is massive, beautifully laid out, fun to read, packed with old faves and new discoveries, just might be out 'new' favorite metal mag!
Latest issue of this massive metal (and more) mag, only number six, in maybe twice as many years, but we look forward to every issue, it's sort of like Ugly Things for metalheads, but as the 'and more' above suggests, CH pushes way beyond just metal, there's industrial, folk, experimental, psych, electronic, drone, in addition to all the various strains of metal, and each issue is packed with tons of reviews, great articles and interviews, and as for the bands covered, tons of old favorites and even more new discoveries. All that and some seriously excellent writing to boot!!
So this time around, long time aQ faves Blut Aus Nord, Kiss The Anus Of A Black Cat, as well as Russian pagan black metallers Vspolokh, Finnish black metal weirdos Funerary Bell, neo-folkers Larrnakh, Icelandic experimental electronic duo Gjoll, Russian neo-folk combo Neutral, folkish black metallers Falls Of Rauros, German black metal horde Bergthron, old school Lusitanian BM outfit Cripta Oculta, Italian trad black metal combo Movimento D'Avanguardia Ermetico, Finnish death metal outfits Purtenance and Rippikoulu as well as a killer retrospective of Finnish death metal.
There's also UK death metallers Cruciamentum, an awesome primer on Japanese experimentalist Aube, a live review of Merzbow and Charles Cohen, post diSEMBOWELMENT outfit Inverloch, ambient neo-folkers Trial Of The Bow, spaced out doomlords Monolithe, Belorussian folk ambient outfit Dalina, ultradoomsters The Sullen Route, Israeli black metallers Dagor Dagorath, German BM horde Infestus, French black metal outfit Christicide, the Temple Of Torturous label, Philly record store Digital Ferret, a killer compendium of the worst metal of 2009-2011 (which had us sort of wishing for a whole mag's worth!), a review of 2011's Killtown Deathfest in Copenhagen and an interview with the festival's organizer, fantasy/horror novelist Joe Abercrombie, several really great essays by Convivial mainman Yury, as well as a visit to St. Peter's Village in rural Pennsylvania, some train hopping action (excerpted from another zine we love, Bogus Rendition), a bunch of zine reviews, record reviews, book reviews and more more more!
Easily one of the best, and more passionately put together music mags out there, metal or otherwise!
We have VERY few of these, as in maybe 5 copies, but we figured there were at least 5 weirdo aQuarius customers out there who would flip their lids for this (sadly, probably WAY more than 5, but at least there's talk of a less limited version down the line), cuz really, even conceptually, this has aQ written all over it. A lavishly handmade package, two tapes in a little gatefold sleeve, with a miniature booklet inside the gatefold, all held together with a Japanese style obi. The artwork itself is sorta curious, there is what appears to be a bike tread, and what is most definitely a cyclist, and yep, Cracked Vessel is in fact something we've never encountered before, BICYCLE BLACK METAL. To be fair, listening to this, you might not immediately pick up on the bicycle connection, but knowing it's there, only makes it that much cooler. And weirder. And by the same token, if you had no idea there was a bicycle theme, the music itself is fucking furious and frenzied, a wild, chaotic, blast of punky blackness, whirling and wild, lurching from impossibly frantic blasts to punky pound, the arrangements intricate and downright proggy, feedback everywhere, the drumming insane, the songs super short, but crazy catchy crammed with parts and time signatures, killer riffs, all blown out heaviness, the sort of buzzing black rawness that would put most non bicycle black metal to shame. Grab one of these before they're gone, and for all but the five of you who actually nab one of these, keep your fingers crossed that they repress it in a much less limited run...
Elsewhere on this list you'll find the repress of the double cassette from this bicycle black metal outfit (yeah, you read that right), now combined onto one tape and at a nicer price, but we also got the new tape, and like the first, you wouldn't necessarily know that Cracked Vessel was all about bikes, but believe us, it is, which for us, only makes it that much cooler/weird, but if bicycles aren't grim and trve enough for you, just pretend their singing about Satan and you'll be just fine, cuz sonically, these guys kick up a seriously ruling black metal din, with blown out fast picked insectoid riffing, furious blast beats, harsh shrieking vokills, and all that good stuff, but they also temper the buzz and blast, with plenty of melody, hints of shoegaze, some post rock, math rock too, with the five songs here cycling (get it?) through multiple permutations, from frenzied ferocity, to loping moodiness, from punked out crush to almost Deafheaven-like tripped out black buzziness, not to mention some weird angular bits that remind us of classic screamo, and some lumbering downer dirges that sounds like classic post punk, all of those seemingly disparate elements all tangled up into a fantastically gnarled collection of fucked up experimental heaviness that manages to be brutal and catchy, pretty buzzy and black, but also strangely poppy, not sure why these guys aren't more well known, we can't imagine that'll be the case much longer. Fans of the various strains of modern black metal, would do well to check these guys out. And hell, as long as you're buying this one, you might as well by the first one too, they both RULE.
The UK's notorious black metal superstars take their Gothic metal fantasies to the major label level with this new release, a quickie album preceding their debut disc for new label Sony! While not as fully-realized as their last full-length (the
Dani & Co.'s Countess Bathory concept album! Again, amazing theatrical black metal from the UK's kings of the genre. Not as good as "Dusk And Her Embrace" production-wise, but bloody good otherwise. Includes (while supplies last) a limited edition bonus disc of remixes and covers, including Venom's "Black Metal" (which sounds kinda stupid with keyboards!) and a great version of the classic Maiden tune "Hallowed Be Thy Name".
It's hard to know what to say about a band whose sound stays pretty consistent throughout its relatively lengthy career. On the one hand, it's sad when a band makes the same record over and over again. But one could argue that if one was great then 5 or 6 would be even greater! I think most of us fall somewhere in between. We want bands to explore and expand, but we don't want their sound to change so dramatically that all the stuff we loved about them in the first place is changed or gone. With Cradle Of Filth, and maybe black metal in general, there's only so far you can go and so many ways you can experiment. This may just be the best Cradle Of Filth record since their career defining Dusk And Her Embrace album. Not because this record is a whole new sound, and not because it's that familiar sound we already love. but because CoF have mastered two elements that in the past have wholly determined the hit/miss ratio of their albums. The first is the production. CoF have been cursed with a thin, and thus entirely unheavy production in the past. And while it is maybe understandable, trying to fit all those guitars, drums, keyboards, double kicks, female background vocals, dreamy atmospheres, and of course vocalist/black metal pinup Danni Filth's dog whistle shrieks and guttural growls, that still didn't keep some old records from sounding like they were recorded on an 8-track and mastered with tin cans and twine. This is definitely the heaviest CoF record in a long time; the guitars are thick and brutal, the drums are pummelling and the vocals are settled just right in the mix. Things are still marred by that wimpy keyboard sound, but I think that's more an aesthetic issue than one of recording/production. The other element that makes Damnation one of Cradle Of Filth's best is the SONGS. THE GODDAMNED RIFFS! In the past, CoF have occasionally lapsed into sound over song, sonics over substance. Where it all sounded great, but...were there any actual songs?! This time around the riffs are wickedly catchy and the songs follow suit. Complicated enough to withstand repeated listens, but hooky enough to leave you humming the riffs days later. Cradle Of Filth are still silly and over the top and dramatic and goofy, that's their schtick. But the fact that the songs are so weird and convoluted and actually pretty fucking heavy, makes the goofy vampire/creatures of the night/goth nightmare side of their band a welcome relief from the glut of TRUE blazing fast, monochromatic, grim, primitive and humorless black metal. Think of it as some sort of black metal opera, Immortal meets Devil Doll, and it all makes some sick sort of sense.
MPEG Download: "Hurt And Virtue" [/audio/cradleoffilthhurt.mp3]
MPEG Stream: "Hurt And Virtue" [/audio/cradleoffilthhurt.m3u]
We love black metal. Longtime readers of the aQ list are no doubt well aware of that fact. And as much as we dig the true and the grim and the kvlt, we have no fantastical notions of our own "Trueness". We love all sorts of black metal, ridiculous over the top orchestral bombastic black metal, avant pop laced BM, totally twisted weirdo BM, all manner of blacknoize, AND we love Cradle Of Filth. We have for nearly two decades. One of our first black metal records was 1994's The Principle Of Evil Made Flesh, which even today, still sounds incredible. And yeah, like Dimmu Borgir, CoF are one of the few bands who managed the shift to mainstream metal act, finding their way into Hot Topics and onto teenage bedroom walls worldwide. But that's not a reason to hate them. Well for some folks it probably is, but for us, we dig their ridiculous bombast, their over the top symphonic arrangements, their vampiric babe imagery, the soaring synths, the faux strings, Dani Filth's bizarre vocalizing, slipping from guttural growl to inhuman screech, and besides all that stuff, there's some seriously shredding black metal happening. Sure, not all their records have been good, the last few have been a bit disappointing, and few have been as good as their classic Dusk... And Her Embrace, which along with their debut we would still rank with our all time favorites.
The problem with the not-so-good CoF record was that they just weren't heavy enough, everything else was firmly in place, but the strings and the dramatic female vocals, and the orchestras and all that stuff, relegated the riffs and the blasts and the buzz to supporting roles. But damn if this new one isn't a return to form, their heaviest in ages. And it's easy to see why this appeals to goths and teens and the like, this is an epic and dramatic tale, it's like a black metal musical version of True Blood, or more accurately some historical tale of witches and warlocks, the whole thing rife with death and life, and love and tragedy and vampires and murder and mayhem, but it's the music that matters, and it sounds pretty bad ass to us, the riffing furious and frantic and so heavy, the drumming blasting and pounding, the vocals distinctively unlike most black metal vokills, then the synths and pianos, that would be enough, but then mix in some haunting dramatic interludes, the cinematic ambience, the haunting female voices, the symphonic stabs, and you've got what is essentially another awesome Cradle Of Filth record. And yeah, the true grim hordes can look down their corpse painted noses at us, but we love this shit. And for anyone who bought the ridiculous new one from Dimmu Borgir that we listed last time, well, this is the perfect companion!
While they last, we have the deluxe version with a bonus cd and four extra tracks!
NOW ON VINYL, AGAIN! "Litanies of damnation, death, and the darkly erotic" from Britain's biggest (and best?) black metal act, the notorious Cradle of Filth. Andee was already a fan of their previous discs, but this is the one that convinced Allan that CoF were pretty darn great. Totally over the top, storming black metal mixed with Hammer Horror theatrics. It's fast, complex, and brutal. Definitely extreme despite their "sell-out" reputation. The CoF disc to get, to start with, we all agree.
We've had this for a while but neglected to list it, a fate that this ferocious little ep does not deserve. Previously available as an import digipak, now in a domestic jewel case version with one track different from the original (swapping the import's techno-remix for a brand new, non-techno song, a good deal really). Featuring possibly CoF's best song title ever ("Of Dark Blood And Fucking"), a ditty that happens to also be their best song since the days of "Dusk & Her Embrace". Despite all the hype and the lineup changes, this ep is proof that Dani Filth and his corpsepainted crew are still quite capable of drawing blood.
The UK's most popular black metal export strikes again. Such songs as "Cthulhu Dawn", "Lord Abortion", and "Creatures That Kissed In Cold Mirrors" maintain CoF's sexy Hammer Horror vibe, and although "Midian" has much better production than their last album "Cruelty & The Beast" (thankfully!), Dani Filth and the lads still haven't sold out for the Marilyn Manson big bucks that they must be tempted by... I mean, "true black metallers" will claim that CoF were sell outs from the beginning, but at least they haven't changed. This record, along with the improved production, only differs from past efforts by the inclusion of even more melodic, Iron Maiden style guitar parts, not a bad thing at all. Otherwise, the Gothic keyboards, female backing vox, Dani's unholy repertoire of low and high screams, and the blasting drums are intact and 100 percent Filthy (i.e. completely over the top).
Here's one of our all-time favorite black metal bands, and even we are guilty of ignoring them a bit now that they're HUGE rather than being a raw, cult, underground one-man-band operation like a lot of the stuff we've been trumpeting lately. But that's not fair. Cradle of Filth, though some purer-than-thou types see 'em as sell-outs, are pretty much just as 'extreme' as they ever were, and in terms of songwriting have really only gotten better. And they're one of the reasons that we're even black metal fans in the first place -- CoF were the first 'modern' black metal band that Andee, for one, ever heard and got into (along with Satyricon)...and then one thing lead to another. Not everyone's cup of absinthe, but you can't deny their brew's potency.
So, we really should have reviewed this new album the week it came out, but better late than never. Of course, we also know that if you're already into CoF, all you need to know is that this latest album is simply another great CoF opus -- gothically bent, vicious and heavy. Its perfumed and perverse atmosphere of baroque excess lacks not for Dani Filth's trademark screech and snarl (more snarl than screech this time), and some sweet female vox too (a Nymphette, of course, and doubtless corseted), ornate Hammer horror keyboards, blasting drums, and a good deal of very 'heavy metal' guitar riffage. More and more the Filthies have been taking after classic metal mentors like Iron Maiden and Metallica, with some very trad sounding melodies and harmonies cropping up amidst their occult-sexual black metal blasphemizing. Fans needn't know much more, you ought to be happy with this. On the other hand, if you haven't yet been, um, rocked by this Cradle, well, this would be a very accessible starting point (although we certainly must also recommend our absolute fave, Dusk And Her Embrace). And for those of you who once were CoF fans but turned your backs on 'em as they got more popular and more tuneful and better produced...well never mind about Nymphetamine then, I guess. But you're missing out on some damn good metal music!
This is the cd you must buy if you are at all interested in Norwegian dark metal (even though they're not Norwegian). Melodic. Heavy. Fast. Beautiful. The current kings of black metal, just amazing.
Writing a guest review here two years ago, Wrest of Leviathan called Craft's previous album Terror Propaganda a "lesson in the grimmest of expession". We just got this new, third (and final? maybe not) Craft disc in stock so we haven't checked with Wrest yet to see what he thinks of it, but subjecting it to our own finely black metal attuned ears, we say, YEAH!
Fuck The Universe is another bog-blast of genius from one of the best bands in the Swedish black metal underground. For the black at heart, grim pleasures abound in Craft's negative metal mixture of misanthropic spittle, dismal drone and headbanging hooks, the band bulldozering through the uncaring cosmos with the feeling being mutual. Or worse. There's something very rock and roll gone wrong about this, slowed down thrash executed with a sneer of competence, nodding to the gods Darkthrone and Mayhem with a "don't worry, we've got it covered" sort of look (and sound). Recommended. Plus, this domestic version is released on the undeniably hip label Southern Lord, whose doom roots have of late seemingly been overtaken by the love of black metal, and they love the good stuff, we're on the same page there!
This bit of black metal wisdom comes courtesy of AQ pal Wrest from the mighty Leviathan:
As things change and weaken in the ranks of older "black metal" bands, a hellish shriek sounds from the Swedish underground. Unlike their fellow countrymen, Mardukee and Dork Fun-eral, Craft have developed a formula for taking the sound of '90s era B.M. and breathing new life into its whithered black lungs. Terror Propaganda, Craft's second effort, is a lesson in the grimmest of expession. "False Orders Begone" rides a riff that matchs the genius of old Celtic Frost while "616" is a thrashy, dark intrumental voyage. These 8 hymns may seem to some like mere Darkthrone worship, but upon closer listening, this hard to find gem shines far brighter than most new Scandanavian B.M. coming out these days. May Craft rot in glory.
Blazing fast primitve Swedish black metal in the style of Darkthrone, old Ulver, or Immortal. Blurry buzzsaw guitars, pounding blasting drums and raspy growling screams. Pure and evil and totally cult.
Finally! The return of Swedish black metal horde Craft, six years after their crushing Fuck The Universe record, purported to be their last at the time, but it was well worth the wait, and we're happy to report very little has changed in whatever negative grim underworld these guys call home, in fact, if anything, Void sound even more misanthropically miserable, the sound seriously cranked, a killer production that doesn't take away from the sound's raw immediacy or caustic filth at all, just makes it that much more powerful. As always, these guys weave dizzying blackened riffs into plodding doomic trudges, creating a strange dichotomous sound that find the guitars riffing furiously, while the rest of the band lumbers ominously, their debt to Mayhem and Darkthrone more than paid, as they take the classic sound of vintage Scandinavian blackness and make it all their own, peppering their dirgey miserablism with cool little melodic trills, processed backwards guitars, weird effects, all employed judiciously, and subtly, letting the core black buzz and demonic pound speak for itself, the vocals even more harsh than before, and so blown out and high in the mix that occasionally you can almost hear the needles in the studio peg, but for all the lumbering midtempo dirgery, it's not just all doomy blackness, and while the band rarely go full bore frenzied blast, they do crank up the tempo here and there, although they do tend to slip right back into some gnarled and churning dirge before too long. There's also plenty of classic metal mixed into their black buzz too, which makes these songs surprisingly catchy, but again, without at all sacrificing the band's grizzled hellish blackness.
What is it about California that spawns such fury and hatred and musical malevolence? Must be the weather! Or its proximity to HELL! There's been a remarkable number of cold and frosty, cult black metal bands coming from the Golden state in the last few years, all of them worthy of inclusion in black metal's elite: SF's legendary Weakling, Ludicra, Leviathan, Xasthur, Draugar (coming soon on tUMULt) and now CREBAIN. Another one man project, Crebain is Ancalagon The Black, who handles "Majestic Hellcommand Of Kataklysmik Deathstrings, Nightmarish Throatshredding and Percussive Programming." This is classic black metal, hateful and misanthropic, buzzy and hypnotic, ala Burzum, Darkthrone, Judas Iscariot, and the like. Named for Sauron's huge black birds in Lord Of The Rings (what would black metal bands do for names without Tolkien??), Crebain exudes a similar malevolence on Night Of Stormcrow, replete with howling, guttural, hyper-distorted wails of anguish, hellish riffs, buzzing insect-swarm guitars and some masterful programming that thankfully turns the drum machine into a hellish instrument of evil. Less atmospheric than Xasthur, and less fucked up than Leviathan, but equally true and black, Crebain follows his own dark path straight to the pits of hell. And as Ancalagon states in the liner notes: "To all those who have dared to cross me, your time is coming. Eventually, I will kill you all." This cd-r is strictly limited to 66 copies and numbered in BLOOD!
MPEG Download: "Night Of The Stormcrow" [/audio/crebainnight.mp3]
MPEG Stream: "Night Of The Stormcrow" [/audio/crebainnight.m3u]
We had a handful of Crebain's ultra limited demo Night Of The Stormcrow a few years back, and they sold out in no time at all. You've now got yourself another chance to pick it up, on VINYL no less, with this here super limited picture disc version of these very first recordings from SF black metal horde Crebain. Nice thick picture disc vinyl with the logo on one side and an amazing photo of Crebain mastermind Ancalagon The Black on the other, weilding the most metal of weaponry, the sledge hammer! So fucking cool. Here's what we had to say about Night Of The Stormcrow first time around:
What is it about California that spawns such fury and hatred and musical malevolence? Must be the weather! Or its proximity to HELL! There's been a remarkable number of cold and frosty, cult black metal bands coming from the Golden state in the last few years, all of them worthy of inclusion in black metal's elite: SF's legendary Weakling, Ludicra, Leviathan, Xasthur, Draugar, and now CREBAIN. Another one man project, Crebain is Ancalagon The Black, who handles "Majestic Hellcommand Of Kataklysmik Deathstrings, Nightmarish Throatshredding and Percussive Programming." This is classic black metal, hateful and misanthropic, buzzy and hypnotic, ala Burzum, Darkthrone, Judas Iscariot, and the like. Named for Sauron's huge black birds in Lord Of The Rings (what would black metal bands do for names without Tolkien??), Crebain exudes a similar malevolence on Night Of The Stormcrow, replete with howling, guttural, hyper-distorted wails of anguish, hellish riffs, buzzing insect-swarm guitars and some masterful programming that thankfully turns the drum machine into a hellish instrument of evil. Less atmospheric than Xasthur, and less fucked up than Leviathan, but equally true and black, Crebain follows his own dark path straight to the pits of hell. And as Ancalagon states in the liner notes: "To all those who have dared to cross me, your time is coming. Eventually, I will kill you all."
LIMITED TO 500 COPIES, WE GOT 60 AND WILL NEVER BE ABLE TO GET MORE, SO IF YOU WANT ONE ACT FAST. ONE PER CUSTOMER!!!
The black cloud over sunny California grows and grows, with each addition to its dark army and each new missive from one of its elite! Black metal has found a strong foothold in this unlikely location. Xasthur, Leviathan, Draugar, Crebain and a small dark likeminded legion lurk in the shadows, far away from the fun and the sun, unleashing some of the most raw and uncompromisng black metal we've ever heard.
AQ pal Wrest and his genius one man avant black metal outfit Leviathan return with what may quite possibly be his best, most intensely weird material to date. We just can't get enough of his dark and violent, totally skewed take on grim frosty black metal. And for this release he teams up with relative newcomer Ancalagon The Black and his outfit Crebain. Not quite as weird as Leviathan, Crebain channels his darkness through a more thrashing Darkthrone/Mutiilation style.
On this split, Wrest takes his ultra distorted inhuman vocals, pummelling hyperspeed blasts, and violent riffery to a whole 'nother dimension, and moves even further away from his contemporaries, both in terms of sound and concept. There are certain sonic similarities for sure, but Leviathan has such a personal and undiluted take on the black sounds that so obviously flow through is veins. For every blast beat and every buzzing riff, there's some stuttery, fucked up breakdown, or extended blissed out ambient soundscape, or rhythmic mathrock workout, or strummy clean guitar jangle, or weird production with all sorts of glitches and strange sounds. The ambient parts here are definitely some of the most beautifully creepy we've ever heard, from a metal band or otherwise. And the metal, well, by now you should know few can touch Leviathan when it comes to black metal brilliance. And the thing is, Wrest doesn't think any of this is weird. He just makes the sounds he hears in his head, and they sound right to him. And they are right, but in such a beautifully weird way. Can't wait for the upcoming full length Tentacles Of Whorror. His half of the split ends with a straight ahead and super necro cover of cult early '90s San Francisco metallers Von's "Blood Angel." Nice.
The other half of this is Crebain's first offical cd release, having previously only released a super limited cd-r demo last year, and it's just as good as that demo led us to hope. This is as raw and buzzing and blazing as it gets. Where Wrest is a master of arranging, creating moods and ambience, Ancalagon is a master of the riff. An unbelievably good guitarist, these riffs are lightning fast and swarm into your ears like a plague of locusts. Thrashing and chaotic, Crebain is a furious no-nonsense metallic onslaught. Programmed drums allow the rhythms to keep up with the madness inducing riffery. Occasionally things slow down to midtempo, and then it becomes quite obvious that Crebain is actually writing catchy songs, not just an insane series of parts. Melodies and almost-groovy riffs propel loping hypnotic dirges towards their eventual obliteration via hyperspeed blasts and that blurry Crebain riffery. Fucking great.
This split is another nail in the coffin containing the corpses of the Nordic metal elite, as black metal's Calfiornia contigent threatens to thaw their frosty corpses with the soul shearing rays of its black sun! Aieeee! Limited to only 666 copies!
Long overdue release of Canadian death metal murk from legendary horde Cremation, the brainchild of J. Reed, who would later go on to play in Axis Of Advance, Conqueror, Arkhon Infaustus and of course the mighty Revenge!
Black Death Cult is a collection of various tracks from early nineties demos, and is a glorious, raw, lo-fi, muddy and murky blackened death metal blow out. The guitars are tuned way down, the vocals are gurgles and grunts, the drums are chaotic and splattery, the arrangements seriously off kilter, no long stretches of droning blasts, or doomy plods, instead, the band lurch and lumber, from brief flurries of high speed thrash, to woozy warped chugging stumble, to freaked out grinding blast, to meandering metallic drift, these songs are bizarre and twisted and convoluted and brilliant. Reminds us a lot of the recent Impetuous Ritual, the same sort of Morbid-Angel-slow-parts-all-strung-together vibe, and the same sort of dipped in tar sound, but with a slightly more trad death metal feel, but only very VERY slightly. This stuff is so fractured and fucked up, that it will more likely appeal to folks into weirder, outsider metal, Wold, Portal, that sort of thing, at some points it almost sounds like Gorguts' Obscura playing at 16rpm, super technical, but grinding and pounding through a druggy syrupy haze. Awesome. One of the coolest, weirdest metal reissues in recent memory.
How could we resist a band called The Crevices Below, whose album is titled Below The Crevices? Hell, just check out album opener "Below The Crevices" (yes!!!), a creeping atmospheric synth heavy subterranean exploration, that does sound precisely like a field recording of what lurks just below the crevices, all blackened swirls, strange machine like rhythms, ominous melodies, anguished wails off in the distance, eventually spidery doomy guitars drift into the picture, and then suddenly, the song explodes in a frenzy of furious synth soaked black blasting, everything cavernous and echoey, the vocals a rasped bellow, the drums pounding, the guitars buzzing, but those thick droning synths transforming the sound into something weirdly alien and majestic. And then out of nowhere, in comes an impossibly melodic clean guitar part, again transforming the sound into something almost poppy, the sound slipping back and forth between that grim synthy buzz, and that soaring melodic poppiness, dense and heavy and droney and totally epic.
Not really sure how we discovered this Australian one man band, pretty sure it was based entirely on the band name, but our obsession spread, first Andee, then Allan, then fellow black metal weirdo Botanist, then aQ pal Monte. Soon after Andee played it on his radio show, and everyone wanted to know what the heck it was. And where they could get it.
So yeah, The Crevices Below, who besides being masters of synth heavy black metal majesty, also create a dark gloomy downer pop the likes of which we haven't heard since the amazing debut from Nuit Noire offshoot Soror Dolorosa, which is how most of Below The Crevices plays out: gothy, gloomy, Joy Divisiony dirges, long expanses of melancholic synthswirl doom pop, washed out and dreamily woozy,�over which a deep ominous croon, that sits right on the verge of hysteria,�wails and howls, occasionally blossoming into something much more black and buzzy, in fact most of the tracks here are a perfectly twisted fusion of goth pop and black buzz, heavy and darkly psychedelic, the synths really the driving force, swooping in to transform what ever buzzing blackness or dour broodery is taking place and turning it into something heavy and epic and mighty, and mighty twisted.
When you break it down, very little of Below The Crevices is truly black metal, several of the tracks strip away the buzz completely, leaving instead a sort of creeping poppy gloom, or some sort of softly hazy, almost shoegazey ambience. "Whispers Of Sorrow" is all spidery guitar melodies wreathed in thick swaths of synthdrone, all underpinned by skeletal drum skitter, while "Trapped In Suicidal Depths" is all gloomy and gothy, heavily effected downtuned guitars, low slung bass, croaked sinister vox, more Christian Death or Specimen than black metal, super spare, the guitars less buzzy and more warm and twangy, the vocals growing more and more anguished, and while there's a brief bit of buzzing guitars and pounding drums midway through, those quickly fade, leaving the rest of the track to unfold like some smeared eyeliner, gothic cabaret.
But bookending this goth-gloom two-fer, is one one side, "A Grand Cavernous Awakening", which might be the most black metal of the bunch, at least initially, the synths adding plenty of pomp to on otherwise grim sprawl of black buzz, while the second half of the song, slips back into moody melodic gothic doom pop, and on the other side, the record closer, the nearly eleven minute "Carrying The Cries Of The Lost", which starts off all hushed and folky, deep vox over acoustic guitar, and simple spare drumming, but then this track too explodes into some soaring buzzing blackness, those synths epic and triumphant, peeling away at one point, offering up the record's grimmest moments, pure metallic crush, only to then shift gears again, and slip into a more melodic half tempo groove, seconds later launching back into a blasting gallop, but instead of grim buzz, super dramatic crooned vox once again transform the sound into something much more gloomy and poppy, before a twisted squall of an ending, flitting from mathy angular crunch, to distorted buzz / synth swirl psychedelia.
So incredible, incredibly weird, and utterly recommended. Another black metal record of the year contender and it's only January (and yeah, we know this came out last year, but it only made it on the aQ list in 2012...)!!
Second release on Handmade Birds from this post (sort of) black metal outfit, formerly called Frail, when they were black metal only in as much as they had shrieked vokills, musically, their sound was much more in line with the Cure or Depeche Mode, dark depressive almost new wave, and wait a second� that's basically true of Crooked Necks as well, after a whole record of Joy Division covers (the recently reviewed Something Must Break 12"), this brand new full length doesn't sound all that far removed, dark shimmery bass lines, lots of chiming melodies and gloom pop guitar jangle, crooned vocals, a little reverby shimmer, softly propulsive rhythms, Crooked Necks are one of those rare bands that all metalheads seem to like, even though they're not even remotely metal. It's that weird heavy metal rule that states all metalheads must like the Cure and Depeche Mode, but just applied to a more modern band, which does make sense cuz again, take those shrieked vocals away, and this record could have come out on Sacred Bones or Captured Tracks or Wierd. But hey, that's fine with us, we're merely questioning why these guys are classified as metal, black or otherwise, maybe they're not so much anymore, regardless, we love this stuff, dreamy blissed out gloom pop, the weird thing is we'd almost even like it more sans the harsh vox, then it would just be pure crystalline jangle pop, a little gloomy, a little gothy, but pretty much total pop. The vocals definitely give it an edge, and there is some cool, slightly weirder stuff going on as well, some strange production, backwards swoops an swirls, but for the most part this is just a great new wave downer pop record, that yeah, if you're an adventurous metalhead, you just might dig, and if you're a popkid, and don't mind a bit of black screech, this could definitely be a new fave.
We first heard from Crooked Necks on their split with Finnish (sort of) black metal weirdos Circle Of Ouroborus. And as CoO made their way to the new Handmade Birds label, it makes sense that Crooked Necks would too. Born of the band Frail, who we raved about a while back on the list, who essentially sounded like a black metal Cure, or more accurately, they sounded exactly like the Cure, or a similarly dour new wave band, just with black metal shrieks instead of the typical deep gothic croon. That band transformed into Crooked Necks, and while the sound didn't change all that much, the vox were dialed back a bit, and the band began to sound more and more like an actual cold/new wave band, with the occasional BM tendencies, instead of the other way around.
This brand new 12", launching Handmade Birds' new White Label series, was apparently recorded a long time ago, and was born of some unnamed tragedy, and because of that was shelved for years, only now finally seeing the light of day. The most interesting part is that it's a collection of Joy Division covers, presented pretty true to the originals, but reimagined enough to make them interesting and a bit weirder. The A side is a bit more upbeat, so much so that we had trouble realizing that it was in fact meant to play at 45rpm, but the band definitely make these their own, which really is no great feat since they sort of sounded like Joy Division to begin with, but the drum programing is creative, the strange effects add a twisted vibe, it's mostly instrumental, but then the vocals do appear, they're buried in the mix, and heavily reverbed, ominous and mysterious and dramatic. The B-side is where it gets great, the band take on "New Dawn Fades" and "The Eternal", gloomy and dirgey and darkly haunting, emotional and melancholy, "The Eternal" especially, all spaced out and abstract, there are some shrieks on the B side, but just a few, and at first it was hard to tell they were voices, it could have been some sheet of high end guitar, but instead of distracting, it simply adds more emotion and passion.
The weird thing is that these guys are beloved by metallers, and that it ended up on Handmade Birds, when it almost sounds like it could have been some unearthed rarity reissued on Dark Entries. Gorgeous, haunting stuff. Fans of gloom rock and doom pop and the various waves (cold, synth, new, etc.) will definitely dig.
LIMITED TO 250 COPIES, in plain black sleeves, with no labels, simple black and white stickers on the front and back.
Released a little while ago on the ever eclectic and elite Profound Lore label, the debut by blackened thrashers n' bashers Crucifist is something we don't want to overlook. It's not just another band featuring Brutal Truth bassist Dan Lilker (also ex-Anthrax, Nuclear Assault, S.O.D., Venomous Concept, Hemlock, Exit-13, etc.) but also features two members of true doomlords Orodruin. So, while Crucifist ostensibly play (very) old-school black metal, they also incorporate an unhealthy helping of doom and death-grind musicks, anything really to make this disc all the more filthy and crusty sounding. Lilker's rubbery bass is simply sick, a heavy anchor for the wicked riffs, widdly guitar bits, and the wretched vokills (by a guy named Ron, who is thus nicknamed "The Rondertaker", haha). The Rondertaker reminds us a bit of King Fowley from Deceased, singing in a raspy guttural gargle with the occasional Tom G. Warrior death grunt. Throw in some horror movie atmospherics (such as "Neon Corpse", an interlude of chant and FX) and copious amounts of chaotic energy (surging to the fore on such cuts as "Witchgrip"), and you're in for a nice and nasty dose of old schoolish underground extreme metal mania. They've basically written their own review of this album with the song title "Skull-Smashing Face-Ripping Death"... if you like that, you'll like this! Another one that might do for a review, meant in the best possible way: "Putrid Mother Lode"!
This should appeal to fans of the ancient likes of Venom, early Voivod, Autopsy, and Hellhammer, especially the latter when they slow it down, which they do to crushing effect often enough... it should also be noted that Crucifist dare to blaspheme against NWOBHMer's Angel Witch with a cover of their "Angel Of Death"!
By the way, guitarist John Gallo, one of the Orodruin guys, also has a solo project called Blizaro, doing synth-based, Italian horror soundtrack influenced, eccentric doom metal, that RULES, and will have a new full-length out on Razorback sometime this spring that we expect will be amazing, look out for it!
Most recent full length from these raw cult black metallers from Chicago. We never had the cd version, but the lp is such a gorgeous piece of work, we figured we oughta list it. Sonically, this is super intense, midtempo blackness, with touches of thrash here and there. A huge Darkthrone influence is obvious, and there ain't nothing wrong with that. Each song a buzzing thrashing blur, some super catchy, killer riffing, distorted processed vocals, and drums WAY up in the mix, but doing some cool stuff, and subtly making the songs a little bit weirder than they might be otherwise. In fact, the more we listen to this, the more it's kicking our ass.�
But as much as we love us a black and brutal slab of raw cvlt black metal, it's all about the packaging. Nuclear War Now! always pulls out all the stops, the recent Root box is a perfect example, but this record is just mind blowing. The cover is a gatefold, and is so thick, it's like opening some old unearthed leather bound book. It creaks and groans and you actually have to put some muscle into it. The inner sleeves are thick to, and printed, so even minus the records, the thing must way 3 pounds! Then the vinyl, ultra thick of course. 180 or 200 gram for sure. But the icing on the cake, is the killer original painting used for the cover art, the gatefold and the poster inside, painted by none other than WREST from LEVIATHAN! Immediately recognizable and so striking (even though the� label somehow put someone else's signature on the cover, ugh). Bits of the painting are also reproduced on the record labels, and the gatefold is just thick swirls of paint, the whole thing is just completely stunning.�
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
Third in this series, where two Season of Mist bands (in this case Cultus Sanguine from Italy and French black metallers Seth) contribute a couple new sonsgs, cover a song by the other band, and both do a cover version of some other band's song. In this case, a Depeche Mode track!
BACK IN STOCK!!!
First release from the oddly named Cvbe Ov Falsehood, the new project from one of the guys in aQ faves Servile Sect, and like that group, whose connection to black metal is tenuous at best, CoF deliver some seriously avant blackness, to sidelong 15 minute tracks that combine drifting drones, with symphonic fragments, layered strings, pizzicato melodies, churning blurred riffage, swirling psychedelic FX, what sounds like field recordings, the first track/side begins with what sounds like an orchestra tuning up, while in the background, the earth begins to rumble and the crust of the earth collapses into subterranean caverns. But that tectonic/Teutonic rumble, is soon smoothed out into a glorious bit of black drone drift, laced with all manner of subtle sonic fluctuations, buried industrial rhythms, the whole thing coalescing into a sort of murky kraut-psych, wreathed in dense black ambience. Soon the sound is wreathed in hiss and static, a cloud of swirling sibilant shimmer, that gradually becomes more and more caustic, before transforming into a strange staticky rhythm, churning machinelike to the end of the side.
The flipside begins with the sounds of a gamelan (we think), lush, lustrous, resonant tones, ringing out, the sky filled with the ripples of subtle overtones, mysterious samples surface from the murk, the low end becomes more active, a strangely muted melody, pulsing, super distorted, over another barely there industrial rhythm, the result a pulsing sprawl of blackened kosmische, that gradually becomes more and more abstract and tranquil, before beginning another slow build, beginning with a burbling thrum, laced with cricket like chitter, and distant keening melodies, all draped in a black sonic gauze, suddenly erupting into some serious caustic crunch, grinding and corrosive, but somehow also weirdly melodic and psychedelic, the burst brief, soon settling back into a final stretch of deep tones, and hushed ambient dronemusic.
Gorgeous packaging too. A clear tape in a black and white J-card adorned with black and white space diagrams, the whole tape then housed in a black on black embossed, textured cardstock slipcover. LIMITED TO 100 COPIES. Some of which include a Tarot card!
First we've heard from this one man kraut-drone combo from Torronto, but we figured we'd probably dig it based on the list of influences (Taj Mahal Travellers, Fripp & Eno, Ash Ra Tempel, Cluster, Manuel Gottsching) and the fact that the music was self-described as "fuzz worship, drones, hails to Big Muff and Dirge Electronics" and it definitely lived up to the promise of all that. From the first few moments of the first track, Cyclopean Wall unfurl a black, caustic, viscous sprawl of rumbling, crumbling distortion, blurred and buzzy, undulating and softly churning beneath spidery guitar melodies, drifting weightless over the roiling neat-metallic churn. And while those above mentioned influences definitely apply, we also hear plenty of SUNO))), Expo '70, even another obscure aQ fave, the Hills Have Amps. But Cyclopean Wall is not all downtuned dirgery, the sound opens way up on the second track, into something much more pastoral, all lush, lustrous chordal swells, and soft focus melodies, with a brief build mid song into something again nearly metallic, before settling right back into that dreamy drift. The flipside offers up variations on the same sonic theme, with one track that buries the melodies beneath a thick layer of gristly static and blackened haze, sounding a bit like some lo-fi Skaters / Tim Hecker hybrid, while the other is the most darkly delicate of the bunch, a hazy slow burn that unfurls languorously, all somnambulant shimmer and gauzy twilit ambience. Super limited, just 50 copies, dubbed onto different colored tapes, each one labeled by hand.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
The return of our favorite Medieval, Middle Ages, and plague obsessed ambient atmospheric dronescapers Dark Ages, who just so happens to be a member of Ukrainian black metal Hordes Drudkh and Hate Forest. No buzzing blackness here, instead Dark Ages is a sonic trip through, well, through the Dark Ages. Another Bosch / Breughel style painting on the cover, this time skeletons on horses, pulling a wagon full of skulls, driving through a town square littered with corpses and robed skeletons. The song titles are also appropriately grim: "Ships Full Of Blackened Corpses", "Rats", "Dead Desolate Villages", "The Doors With Scarlet Crosses" and of course "Black Death".
The sound this time around is even darker and scarier. This is ambient music, sure, but it's also a sonic travelogue, a weary wander through the plague ravaged villages of Middle Europe. The sky is choked with black smoke and the stench of burning flesh. Corpses lay stacked like firewood. Dead children litter the ground like leaves fallen from trees. The few survivors, walk zombie like, an endless death march with no destination other than the grave.
The music is sounds JUST LIKE THAT. It's totally evocative and ultra creepy. Thick washes of keyboard drones, chiming minor key melodies repeated mantra like, a deep churning dark ambience underpinning the melancholy ambience, stabs of atonal harpsichord add jagged shards of horror here and there. Long stretches of super dramatic cinematic shimmer definitely recall Goblin and Zombi, some tracks are super murky minimal rumbles, with the melodies muted and buried under a thick crumbling wash of mumbled whirs and swirling low end, others are majestic and grand, fanfares for the dead and dying. They're all quite grim, a bit black, super intense, and surprisingly emotional.
Sonically, Dark Ages almost sounds like a super dismal, way blacker Dead Can Dance, or like Tangerine Dream or Popol Vuh covering Skepticism. Or even like some long lost Jacula album.
So gorgeously dark and creepy. Recommended!
Behold the final chapter (after Twilight Of Europe, A Chronicle Of The Plague and The Tractatus De Hereticis Et Sortilegiis) in this long running series of releases from the appropriately monikered Dark Ages, a Ukrainian duo made up of members past and present of Drudkh, Blood Of Kingu, Hate Forest and Old Silver Key, who specialize in a virulent strain of medieval dark ambience, each record brilliantly captivating in its sonic representation of the middle ages, of crumbling cities, and a plague ridden populace, each record rife with brooding, haunting atmospheres and melancholic melodies, slow shifting synthscapes, swoonsome strings, all layered and textured, cinematic and darkly mysterious. This latest might be the prettiest of them all. Although you might not have thought so, considering that once again, the cover is adorned with some horrific Bosch / Breughel style art, and the record is called Rabble, Whores, Usurers, and the song titles include: "Leprosy", "Deformity", "Malice", "Depravity" and "Sin".
And while the sound of Rabble is in fact lovely, it remains sinister, and ominous, moody and brooding. The opener "Leprosy" is all lush layered shimmer, chanted vocals, a haunting chorale, laced with tinkling chimes, of dramatic strings, what sounds like muted horns, a miserablist fanfare of sorts, you can almost imagine an imaginary camera panning across a wideshot of a post plague village, burned houses, piles or rubble, charred corpses, beggars in the street, emaciated beasts wandering throughout, the sky choked with ash, the sound evoking a sort of melancholy, a feeling of loss, and of hopelessness, those dramatic strings growing more and more feverish, the song growing more and more tense. Every time we play this in the store, someone comes up to see what it is, and always seems to find it hard to believe that it's a concept record about the dark ages.
The rest of the record is equally stunning. "Chastity" is a lush landscape of crystalline shimmer, weirdly processed into something strangely rhythmic, with ethereal female vocals, and even a pulsing beat, "Avarice" is a grim sprawl of dense rumbles, and music box like melodies, "Deformity" is super dramatic, all swirling organs, total seventies horror score, while "Malice" might be the most overly medieval of the bunch, martial snares, deep vocal chants, moody strings, clouds of cymbal shimmer. "Depravity" is a hushed, subterranean sounding creep, long droned out tones, strange percussive scrapes and mysterious synth melodies, a murky blackened psychedelia, which leads into the closer, "Sin", which is the most minimal of the bunch, a slow, softly smoldering synthscape, a little bit kosmische, a little bit black ambient, drifting vocal like tones, transform the second half into something almost liturgical, darkly lovely and hauntingly austere.
SPECIAL SALE PRICE! Even though this split release is from a few years back, it really couldn't be more timely. Two groups, two songs from each, both dedicated to the loss of their countrymen. Up first is Dark Ages, the medieval dark ambient project of Roman Saenko (Hate Forest, Drudkh, Blood Of Kingu, etc.), who hails from the Ukraine, which is, as we write, in political and social turmoil, so these two haunting elegies are even more moving. Unlike past Dark Ages recordings, that conjured up visions of ruined villages, and crumbled cathedrals, the first track here is achingly melancholic, brooding and moody, and truly haunting, soft swirls of string like synths, drift beneath delicate piano, the sound laced with delicate percussion, the sound cinematic and darkly sweeping, the sort of heartbreaking instrumental you would expect in the denouement of some bittersweet drama. The second track though slips back into the Dark Ages of old, unfurling a gristled expanse of crackle and deep chordal thrum, strange industrial percussion, and tranced out synth drones, but over the top, more aching melodies, strings this time, like some gypsy folk troubadours, playing for their fallen, the static almost like the sound of rain. So so lovely.
Dark ages share the split with a duo from Ireland, with the mouthful moniker From The Bogs Of Aughiska, and whose sound, while ambient, is a much different beast, murky and muffled, thick, rib cage rattling tones, smeared into tectonic rumbles, rife with buried shadows of melodies, a rich, churning thrum, peppered sporadically with scraping, groaning tones, and what sounds like mutated slowbuzz guitars, transformed into grinding hums, the whole thing is closer to SUNNO))) or Phurpa or Mohammad. The second From The Bogs track cranks everything up, building a wall of sound, that seems to be constructed from white noise, but that white noise has been blackened and curdled, a suffocating grey wash of sound, laced with subtle slivers of melancholy melody, softly swirling and darkly psychedelic, there's a brief bit of sampled voices, and then the sound seems to blackly blossom into more sinister noisiness, still murky, but with some grim black heft, that at the very last minute, seems to peel back, and reveal a little bit of choral dreaminess beneath the roiling black surface.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
Another back room discovery, a record from a couple years back, released on unblack label E.E.E., a 2006 ep from these Indiana based (un?) black metallers, who mix dark, raw and grim riffage, with strange twisted black ambience, grinding processed glitchscapes and haunting sinister drones.
Five tracks, 25 minutes, after a sprawling graveyard fog intro, all moonlit creep and gnarled bleak rumble, the band explode into "Mists Of Darkness", some super raw heaviness, blasting and chaotic and blown out, primitive and frosty for sure, but imbued with plenty of ominous mystery and warped ambience. A long stretch of acoustic guitar post rock, all spidery jangle and skeletal drift, gives way to another burst of pounding, grunted blackcrush.
"Burn The Twilight" begins with some ethereal looped guitar that grows more and more tangled and squiggly, before finally splintering into another squall of jagged black shards, and stumbling primitive blackness. "Nox Noctis" starts out Slinty, before getting all folky and softly psychedelic, the drums giving it a sort of spacey post rock vibe, the track slips subtly back and forth between the two until some dark minimal piano enters the picture, only to get swallowed up by some swirling turbulent black drones, that final track sprawling and slowly decaying, fragmented melodies and bits of piano, surfacing and the then drifting off into the ether.
Fans of all things E.E.E. and mysterious dark metal and experimental ambient blackness will DIG DIG DIG. And this is out of print, these are the last 7 or 8 copies, so snag one while you can!
Usually, you pretty much know what you're in for when a band proclaims boldly right there on the sleeve, that they perform "Pagan Black Metal Art Exclusively!" And then when you take into account the fact that Darkestrah just so happens to include the drummer from Nargaroth, well then you know for sure you're in for some glorious buzzing, stumbling, midtempo blackness. And indeed, Embrace Of Memory is rife with fuzzy tranced out riffs, super repetitive drone-y arrangements, pounding drums, subtle layers of synth, and howled vocals. Definitely plenty of nods to Nargaroth, but you can also hear hints of avant black metallers Forgotten Woods and early Enslaved. Incredibly catcy melodies are somehow snuck into super buzzy black riffs, the tempos shift from sea sick waltzes, to not quite blasting blastbeats, to pouding dirges, but always mesmerizing and hypnotic, droned out and almost blissy, while managing to still be heavy and brutal.
Two other interesting things that make Darkestrah stand out: one, the vocalist is a woman, although she looks just like one of the guys in the heavily coprsepainted photo, and her harsh demonic howl does not sound all that feminine, but for an almost exclusively male genre, it's pretty dang exciting, and she does have one serious set of glass gargling, bile spewing pipes. And two, Darkestrah just might be the only band we've ever heard who hail from Kyrgyzstan!
HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!
Being one of only three black metal bands hailing from�Kyrgyzstan according to the online authority Encyclopaedia Metallum, and featuring a female vocalist, must make Darkestrah one of the most unique BM outfits going, but on first listen, neither of those attributes are all that readily apparent. Certainly, the harsh strangled demonic howling vocals did not immediately strike us as particularly feminine, and the glorious hypnotic buzz didn't seem all that region specific, but the more, and closer you listen, the more those elements do seem important, keeping Darkestrah from sounding like just another bunch of boring buzzing blackness...
One half hour plus epic, separated into movements, beginning with�the gentle sound of a burbling brook, the fuzzy white noise like ebb and flow of waves crashing on the sea shore, until those tranquil sounds are�joined by distant keening guitars, a long drawn out buzz, that eventually solidifies into a gorgeous melancholic riff, draped over simple midtempo drumming, intense and epic and blown out, eventually exploding into a black burst of raw grimness, but never losing that melancholic vibe. Repetitive and hypnotic, with killer drumming and furious guitar buzz, until all of a sudden in come cellos, and then the song is transformed into a sweeping Godspeed like expanse of beautiful blackness...
About halfway through, the sound of the surf returns, soon overtaken by tribal drumming, Viking like riffing, a bit of chanting, eventually bursting into some seriously Burzumic pound, with more soaring riffage and really intense unlikely mathy arrangements, eventually stretching out into a long form static buzz, while over the top strings soar and flutes flutter, again transforming the song into a swoonsome black lament, eventually fading out into just the sound of wind and sea....
Latest release from one of the strangest and most unique black metal bands around. How many groups, black metal or otherwise can you think of that hail from the tiny country of Kyrgyzstan? We actually couldn't think of any, although apparently there are at least three black metal bands. How many grim buzzing BM outfits can you think of fronted by a female? Not many we'd bet. Or how many black metal bands incorporate traditional Middle Eastern instruments into their sound? Again, the answer is not a whole lot.
So thus we have Darkestrah, a female fronted black metal trio from Kyrgyzstan who we've raved about in the past, but who seem to only get better and better with each record.
The production this time around is amazing, so thick and heavy and polished, but without losing any of the ferocity. The songs are multi part epics, slipping from woozy midtempo dirge to blackened blast, frontwoman Kriegtalith's vokills a harsh demonik shriek, the songs rife with melodies and hooks, managing to be both blasting and brutal, but catchy and epic. The coolest part though is how the band mix in traditional folk instruments and vocal techniques from Kyrgyzstan into the songs. While much of that is used as intros, gorgeous stretches of plaintive mournful throat singing and deep shimmery rage like strum, those instruments and sounds also surface within tracks, fluttering woodwinds hovering over churning black buzz, strange lilting folky melodies wound into otherwise straight ahead blasts. It turns the record into something much more haunting and mysterious and so unique. So easy to get lost in the buzzing drones and Middle Eastern melodies... The Great Silk Road is quickly becoming one of our most listened to new BM records...
Yet another warehouse find, discovered a tiny handful of this, the last full length from one from Bulgarian blackened doom metallers Darkflight, whose sound is a killer mix of dirgey doom, soaring symphonic majesty, and haunting melodic ambience, the songs super dense and extremely heavy, but even at their heaviest, they ooze melancholy, the guitars unfurling melancholic melodies, and tangling up in minor key harmonies, while the riffs churn and the drums pound, all wreathed in soaring strings and swirling shimmer, with occasional acoustic guitar and brief stretches of hushed thrum. But for the most part, these tracks, trudge and lumber, super emotional and darkly moving doom-ed heaviness, that reminds us of Shape Of Despair or Skepticism, but often ends up sounding more like a doom metal Alcest or a more metal Nadja. Only have 3 or 4 copies of this left, not sure if we can get more once they're gone...
