After announcing changes in their lineup, Spanish death metal band Bizarre has now launched a single track in form of a lyric video which shows their development featuring a new vocalist and bassist, and which also serves as an appetizer for their upcoming debut album for Xtreem Music in 2018.
The new song is entitled “Psyche,” and you can watch the video directly HERE.
“Psyche” is also available for free download at Xtreem Music’s Bandcamp HERE.
Release date and more details to be announced shortly. In the meantime, visit Bizarre’s official Facebook page below.
Today, Dutch death metallers Neocaesar – a band formed by all ex-Sinister members like Mike van Mastrigt (vocals), Bart van Wallenberg (guitars), Michel Alderliefsten (bass), and Eric de Windt (drums) – premiere the new track “Valhalla Rising”.
The track hails from the band’s highly anticipated debut album, 11:11, which was self-released a few months ago but is now seeing official release & distribution through Xtreem Music on December 5th.
Formed back in fall 2014 by these four ’90s ex-Sinister former members, Neocaesar wrote their debut album during 2015 and recorded it during 2016 while playing shows through Holland, Germany, Denmark, and Czech Republic. 11:11 was released in early 2017 as a limited self-financed pressing just to get the band out and playing around, but it’s now when this album will get the promotion and distribution it deserves with the help of Xtreem Music.
Every good fan of the true Sinister sound of the early ’90s, will for sure love Neocaesar’s debut since this is probably one of the best European death metal albums of the year! The previously revealed “From Hell” can be heard at Xtreem’s official YouTube channel HERE as well as the label’s Soundcloud HERE.
Cover and tracklisting are as follows:
Tracklisting for Neocaesar’s 11:11
1. Initial Novum (Intro)
2. From Hell
3. Victims of Deception
4. Invocation of the Watcher
5. Sworn to Hate
6. Valhalla Rising
7. Prelude to Darkness
8. Angelic Carnage
9. Sigillorum Satanas
10. Blood of the Nephilim
SHINING are streaming the second song taken from their forthcoming album, ‘X – Varg Utan Flock’, which is scheduled for release on January 5th.
The song “Gyllene Portarnas Bro” (which translates as “Golden Gate Bridge”)
SHINING mastermind Niklas Kvarforth comments: “Our new track, ‘Gyllene Portarnas Bro’ has been in the works since 1999 and is one of the calmer moments on this record. Built around three different parts, it was originally intended for the album, ‘Livets Ändhållplats’. It was later reworked for ‘Redefining Darkness’, but it wasn’t until now that this song finally started to make sense. Lyrically, it speaks of the seduction of the human mind and spirit, the ultimate destruction of the life cycle of the one being seduced. Indeed, this track sets the mood for the violent darkness that follows.”
SHINING are furthermore releasing the artwork of ‘X – Varg Utan Flock’, which has been created by Kevin Rolly and can be viewed below.
Track-list
1. Svart Ostoppbar Eld (7:11)
2. Gyllene Portarnas Bro (6:39)
3. Jag Är Din Fiende (7:05)
4. Han Som Lurar Inom (8:03)
5. Tolvtusenfyrtioett (2:53)
6. Mot Aokigahara (9:33)
Total playing time: 41:24
Niklas Kvarforth is not the first artist struggling with mental illness and related issues. The erratic Swede is also not the first musician whose inner demons are part of the creative genius. Yet in the world of metal, his band SHINING remains as a unique and outstanding act in terms of talent and musical excellence.
Never shy about his personal afflictions, Niklas Kvarforth is once again baring his tortured soul with ‘X – Varg Utan Flock’. His anger, his confusion, his pain, and his torment are all becoming tangible on the tenth album in the band’s long history. For a point of reference, the legendary ‘V – Halmstad’ release probably offers the most appropriate comparison. Yet all the influences SHINING fused into their previous masterpiece, ‘IX – Everyone, Everything, Everywhere, Ends’ (2015) are also still present. Eclectic influences from progressive rock, jazz, classical music, and even faint traces of pop have left their mark.
In addition to the broad musical spectrum on display, Niklas Kvarforth’s deeply emotional laments emerging from the dark depths of his twisted mind go beyond the usual scale of metal bands in their great vocal scope and variety.
Founded in 1996 by Kvarforth, SHINING self-released ‘Submit to Self-Destruction’ in 1998 and spawned the term “suicidal black metal” with this debut 7″. A couple years after first full-length, ‘I – Within Deep Dark Chambers’ (2000) and sophomore album, ‘II – Livets Ändhållplats’ (2001) had cut deep marks into the underground scene, Niklas replaced his whole crew, which started a continuous cycle of line-up changes. With MAYHEM drummer Hellhammer on board, ‘III – Angst’ (2003) and ‘IV – The Eerie Cold’ (2005) began to gather major press attention. At the same time, SHINING focused on bringing their vision and often controversially received live performances to Europe. Yet Kvarforth’s mental health led to cancellations, physical and psychological fights within the band, and finally a break-up. Not content to let things rest after his breakdown, the restless singer returned with new members and the acclaimed masterpiece, ‘V – Halmstad’ in 2007. By then SHINING had reached headliner status and toured with other great acts such as SATYRICON and MAYHEM. Several line-up changes later, the Swede recorded two albums in one session: ‘VI – Klagopsalmer’ was released in 2009, to be followed by ‘VII – Född Förlorare’ two years later. The band also received their first gold disc for the single ‘Förtvivlan, Min Arvedel’ in Sweden. After rotating more musicians in and out, SHINING returned with ‘Redefining Darkness’ (2012) and a less aggressive, yet more sinister sound. Before signing to Season of Mist, the band released the project ‘8 ½ – Feberdrömmar I Vaket Tillstånd’, which featured six of Kvarforth’s favourite vocalists. In August 2014, SHINING entered Andy LaRocque’s Sonic Train Studios to record their ninth album, ‘IX – Everyone, Everything, Everywhere, Ends’ as the sum of Niklas Kvarforth’s musical evolution and experience. More line-up changes and breakdowns followed.
Yet Niklas Kvarforth clawed his way up from the depths once more and returned to Andy LaRocque and Sonic Train Studios to record another album. The result, ‘X – Varg Utan Flock’ is a musical masterpiece far beyond simple genre limitations and a shining tribute to the achievement that a troubled mind is capable of when driven by a passionate will to excel and overcome. Listen with respect.
Today, horror metal cultists Vaultwraith stream the entirety of their highly anticipated debut album, Death is Proof of Satan’s Power, Set for international release today, on Halloween, via Hells Headbangers, stream the entirety of Vaultwraith’s Death is Proof of Satan’s Power HERE
Deep within the tenebrous bowels of a dark and decrepit castle was it that the black ritual was undertaken. Assembled there were four of the worst sinners this world has ever known, utterly profane and perverse: The Warlock, He of the Blasphemies… Alucarda Bellows, She of the Devil… Esteban Walpurgis, He of the Evil Rites… and Baron Blood, He of the Flesh & Blood. A blood-red full-moon hanging in the benighted sky, they began the unspeakable ceremony. Mercyful Fate and Bathory albums were offered unto a flaming pyre, as were the celluloid artifacts of Jess Franco and Paul Naschy. Once some esoteric incantations in Latin and Sumerian were uttered alongside the spilling of hot sacrificial blood did that loathsome quartet play the notes known but to the most impious and obscene. And it was then, at the foreboding stroke of midnight, that the shuddersome fiendish spectre did arise from out of the stygian void: the Vaultwraith!
While its ominous conception dates back to 2012, it was not actually until the untimely death of that legendary underground warlock, Jim Sadist of the infamous Nunslaughter, that Vaultwraith truly arose from the netherworld. Before his death, Sadist had been in talks of joining the Devilcraft Cult, and it was indeed those dangerous meetings that conjured the very soul of the thing, bringing infernal life to what had been, before, but a formless nightmare. Now sworn to an unwholesome and unholy pact with devils, witches, and all that is supernatural, Vaultwraith was begotten upon the summer solstice of 2016. Inspired by those masters of classic ‘80s metal such as King Diamond, Iron Maiden, and early Metallica as well as the heavier occultism of Celtic Frost and Nocturnus, it evinced an otherworldly marriage of furious heavy metal guitars, dueling monstrous extreme metal vocals, and keyboards straight out of a Hammer Horror film. The result of all this utter devilry was black hymns that not simply dripped with a palpable atmosphere of unadulterated evil but that were hauntingly melodic, as well.
The very first manifestation of Vaultwraith’s malevolence came in the form of the Wrath of the Wraith demo in late 2016, and it was this tape that seduced obscure label Turanian Honour Productions to arrange a split 7” with, so very apropos, Nunslaughter, this to be freed from Hell sometime in 2017. But it was those maniacal overlords of underground death and black metal underworld, the one and only Hells Headbangers, who did behold the true potential of that Devilcraft Cult and offered to unleash their full-length masterpiece of aural horror, Death Is Proof of Satan’s Power. Eleven dreadfully metaled tributes to all that is morbid and macabre, it is due to lurk forth from the shadows in 2017.
And so, as you descend down, down, down unto the accursed black heart of that very same abandoned castle, you must ask yourself: are you prepared to bear witness to the Vaultwraith?
Ordering info can be found at Hells Headbangers’ Bandcamp HERE.
Cover and tracklisting are as follows:
Tracklisting for Vaultwraith’s Death Is Proof of Satan’s Power
1. The Vaultwraith
2. Ravaged In the Crimson Mist
3. Infernal Realms Unfold
4. Dark Desires Unleash the Legions of Lucifer
5. Night Ride Through the Black Woods
6. Manifest at Midnight
7. Devilcraft
8. Open Grave Rape
9. High Priestess of the Wolf Coven
10. Damsel In Disgust
11. Skeletonized Malediction
Today, Italian technical thrashers Centripetal Force reveal the first track as well as cover art and tracklisting for their forthcoming debut EP, Eidetic, which will be released on December 20th via Xtreem Music. Entitled “Eidetic Memory,” hear the first taste of Centripetal Force’s Eidetic HERE.
Formed back in 2010 by Stefano Saroglia (guitars) and Andrea Carratta (drums), Centripetal Force completed the lineup with John Knight, who is lead singer of UK progressive metal band Synaptik. The musical style of the band is twisted, technical, and progressive thrash metal in the vein of bands like Watchtower, old Cynic, Mekong Delta, Control Denied, Coroner, later Death, and Toxik.
In 2017, Centripetal Force recorded three songs destined to be their debut EP, entitled Eidetic, and with this, they got a deal with Xtreem Music for its release in December of the same year. The band is now working on more songs for a second EP to be released sometime in fall 2018, but that’s another story…
In the meantime, hear “Eidetic Memory” from Eidetic both HERE
Cover and tracklisting are as follows:
Tracklisting for Centripetal Force’s Eidetic
1. Centripetal Force
2. Eidetic Memory
3. Death of a Marionette
Before we start I just want to say that I LOVE Midnight , I own all their records on vinyl, I always go see them every time they hit the Tri-State Area and I think their Debut “Satanic Royalty” is one of the strongest albums to come out in the last 10 years and that speaks volumes since there has a been a lot of great music in recent years.
So Sweet Death and Ecstasy – where to start? Hell’s Headbangers released a teaser track in advance of the album release about 6 weeks back, “Penetratal Ecstasy” and I have to say I was not all that impressed. I hated the guitar tone and didn’t think it was the strongest thing Athenar had written either hook wise.
So the album was set for a December 5th release date I believe but I guess HHR got their stock in early as I pre-ordered in in September expecting a long wait and mine arrived Friday afternoon, seems like most people I know who ordered it got theirs Friday or Saturday depending on where about you live in the country.
You can’t write an opener as strong as “Satanic Royalty” on
every album
I have to say I put the album on with some trepidation, like I said I was not wholly impressed by the first “single” (side note: do people still call them singles these days? or is it more “album teaser” or what?) and..its a slow start. Sure you can’t write an opener as strong as “Satanic Royalty” on every album but the general school of thought when mapping out a running order for an album say versus a CD is you start with your strongest song on Side 1, followed by your second strongest as the intro to side 2, Lust Filth and Sleaze for example. (With cd running orders most bands just put all their strongest songs first with the album getting progressively weaker as it goes along , but that’s another story)
So yeah the first song “Crushed By Demons” is a slow chugging song. Initial knee jerk reaction is its a strange song to start your album with.Its a long song too taking up the majority of side 1 of the vinyl version.
Following up is Penetratal Esctasy, ok it all makes sense now the slow start and build up and now this song! That guitar tone I hated when I heard first heard this track? Forget it – I am loving it now.
Here comes Sweet Death is next, a classic fist pumping metal anthem followed by Melting Brain an instant Blackened Thrash Classic, short and sweet and that’s it Side 1 is over! Like I said the majority of Side 1 of the vinyl is taken up with Crushed by Demons, the opener.
So far so good – now let’s see what Side 2 has to offer us
Kicking off with Rabid! followed straight up with Bitch Mongrel , side 2 comes out swinging super upbeat catchy blackened thrash we all know and love. Poison Trash is awesome, frantic thrash almost with a Germanic feel to it – so good!
Final track on Side 2 Before My time in Hell – wow its that time already the end of the album, slower than the last couple of tracks – its super catchy and chuggy, easily the longest song on Side 2. Its a great way to round out the album.
Well what can I say – I went into this album with a closed mind, almost a negative attitude towards it but goddam it’s so fucking good. I need to jump up and flip it back to Side 1 again.
Make no mistake this is Midnight at their best
This album may take a while to grow on you (like it did me) but make no mistake this is Midnight at their best, a true metal masterpiece for 2017. Buy it now!
You can order the album directly from Hell’s Headbangers Here
On December 1st internationally, Svart Records will release Kaukolampi’s I. It is the debut solo album of K-X-P frontman Timo Kaukolampi. And today, a new video for the album track “Three Legged Giant Centipede” has been revealed HERE.
“I wanted to break all structure, to see if all form can be destroyed,” says Kaukolampi of his debut solo album. A desire to deconstruct convention is not a new thing for Kaukolampi, given that K-X-P have been blurring the lines between techno, krautrock, space rock, and experimental electronica for the last decade and forging an idiosyncratic and unique sound truly of their own.
Whilst playing some pummelling and PA-testing solo electronic shows over the last year, Kaukolampi has picked up fans such as Erol Alkan, James Holden, and Optimo; they were invited to the latter’s 20th anniversary party in Glasgow this year to perform – they’re the group Optimo have booked the most over the two decades. Whilst K-X-P still remains a strong and evolving force, Kaukolampi has created an outlet for something new in his solo endeavors. “I wanted to make music that has more space in it than I usually do. That captures this lonely sense of emptiness, of euphoria and beauty – a deep sadness,” he says. “It’s a conversation between good and evil, beauty and brutality, and it’s most definitely my inner journey.”
The resulting album is one long track broken up into five titles. Across that runs an eerie dystopian presence driven by pulsating synths and distant beats, whilst stylistically traversing across cosmic disco, techno, and dense cinematic ambience, with the starting point being Kaukolampi’s own radio show. “Initially, this album had a lot more beats on it, but every Sunday evening, I’d play music with no beats: drone, ambient, experimental, and noise. This made me change the concept, and I discarded the beats for half of the record.” It leaves space for contrast, for discordance and harmony, for gentle and loud, for the tender and the rough. This, explains Kaukolampi, is because he feels one can’t exist without the other: “This album also has that hard, violent noise that is more typical for me, but I don’t think noise can ever work if it does not have beauty.”
The album was recorded primarily in Helsinki with some parts in Berlin and was distilled down from between 50-70 “jams” that Kaukolampi had been working on over the years. The solitary working process allowed Kaukolampi to rewire his working ways, to rethink his approach, technique, and what he wanted to get out of the creative process. “I wanted to break all structure, to see if all form can be destroyed, and to see if I can get away from the programming in my brain. I’ve always worked in some song-based form: verse, bridge, chorus. I wanted to see if I could make this form disappear.” It also allowed Kaukolampi to think more carefully about his own definitions of techno and whether what he was creating fitted into the typical conventions of that genre. The answer, unsurprisingly, was no. “I love techno, but I guess the techno I make does not really suit any genre at the moment. Techno for me means sci-fi, cosmic realms, a sense of the inner journey. Like the dark side of new age music.”
Whilst this record may struggle to land neatly into a preexisting genre, it does pay tribute to one of electronic music’s pioneers. ‘Epiphyte (Requiem for Mika)’ is a segment of the record that pays tribute to the late, and truly great, Mika Vainio. Musically, it gently hums, evoking a mournful and emotive tone in its vast richness and depth. It is named after a strange plant he found in a friend’s garden in Portugal, but Kaukolampi felt its tone felt familiar. “I realized that it had that Mika Vainio-type song title vibe, so I dedicated it to him. He was an amazing talent and good friend. I miss him a lot. We all do.”
In the leadup to the release of Kaukolampi’s I, see & hear the video for “Three Legged Giant Centipede” HERE.
On December 22nd, Signal Rex is proud to present a special collection from Thy Sepulchral Moon entitled Indignant Force of Malevolence on vinyl LP format. Already a cult name in the underground, this Canadian/South Korean entity has so far released two EPs in as many years – 2016’s Incantations Inciting Demise and 2017’s Contemptuous Retaliation Storm – and hereby collect on one format both those EPs as well as three unreleased demo tracks and two cover songs, Beherit’s “Sadomatic Rites” and NON’s “Total War.”
As suggested by their spectrum-spanning choice of covers, Thy Sepulchral Moon are not your trendy, identikit “bestial” black metal band. While certainly grounded in the earliest nuclear vomits of the idiom, there’s an especially tweaked and torturedly experimental sensibility at work across their canon. The pulse is primitive and unabashedly mechanistic – cold, lifeless, DEAD – and a swarm of gasmasked voices speak ill tidings from nearly every direction; the layering of sewer-drenched sound is similarly indebted to the foulest depths of the gabber-gore underground. Altogether, it makes for a uniquely ritualistic sound that portends total and utter oblivion. Meet that oblivion head on with Indignant Force of Malevolence!
Take the first step into that oblivion with the track “Insides Disrupt”
Cover and tracklisting are as follows:
Tracklisting for Thy Sepulchral Moon’s Indignant Force of Great Malevolence
1. Intro + Spell 1
2. Spell 2
3. Spell 3
4. Spell 4
5. Spell 5
6. Send a plume of Choking
7. Dislocated from advance
8. Insides Disrupt
9. Sadomatic Rites (Beherit cover)
10. Total War (NON cover)
11. Murk Demo Version (Bonus Track)
12. Spell I – Rain as Funerary Attendants Reh Demo
13. Spell II – Translocate Misstep Reh Demo
Tracks 1-5 from Incantations Inciting Demise
Tracks 6-10 from Contemptuous Retaliation Storm
Tracks 11-13 are exclusive to this compilation
Today, Svart Records sets November 24th as the international release date for Anguis Dei’s highly anticipated debut EP, Ad Portas Serpentium.
Anguis Dei represents True Satanik Black Metal. It represents the extremity of hellish orchestral black metal: harsh, majestic, and spectral soundscape based on Satanism, demonology, and the true primordial black metal tradition.
The formation of this sect occurred back in MMXIV anno bastardi. Since then, its devotees have been the following four entities: Adeptus Juno – hæretical strings & darkestrations (Juno Bloodlust); Adeptus Summum Algor – blasting rituals (Adversam, Juno Bloodlust, Natassievila, etc); Adeptus Hakuja – serpentine strings (Hakuja, Cataplexy, etc); and Adeptus U.:È.:Œ.: – séance & magitation (Arkha Sva, Avsolutized…, Ahpdegma, etc). Now, in early Novembre MMXIV, Anguis Dei’s first EP Ad Portas Serpentium shall proudly be unleashed by Svart Records. It shall feature the following three sonic ceremonies on the circular laminas. I. “Maythorns Over Uroboros,” II. “Angela Krudeliis Ambitiosa Nokturniis,” III. “Origin ~ The Lionel.” And, in addition, Ad Portas Serpentium shall shortly be followed by the first full-length entitled Angeist.
Anguis Dei is an audible form of black magick for Satan and Satanists rather than other flooding commercialised music products. It shall provide something invisible affecting your invisible world. Prepare for entering the gates and taking a dark journey into the malign realms of Satanik Magick.
The first realm can be entered with the new track “Maythorns Over Uroboros”
Cover and tracklisting are as follows:
Anguis Dei’s Ad Portas Serpentium album cover artwork
Tracklisting for Anguis Dei’s Ad Portas Serpentium
1. Maythorns Over Uroboros
2. Angela Krudeliis Ambitiosa Nokturniis
3. Origin
4. The Lionel
Today, American black metal cult Worm stream the entirety of their highly anticipated debut album, Evocation of the Black Marsh. Now set for international release on November 3rd via Iron Bonehead Productions, hear Worm’s Evocation of the Black Marsh in its entirety HERE.
Hailing from the swampy recesses of Florida, Worm is the work of one mysterious Fantomslaughter. To date, he’s done two rare demos, The Deep Dark Earth Underlines All (2014) and Nights in Hell (2016), but now as a duo alongside one Equimanthorn, Worm present the fullest distillation of their foul ‘n’ fetid aesthetic in Evocation of the Black Marsh.
Ever aptly titled, Evocation of the Black Marsh comprises eight hymns to the spiritual swamp lurking in every listener. With titles like “Evil in the Mire,” “Altar of Black Sludge,” and especially “The Slime Weeps” and “Swamp Ghoul,” it would be fair to assume that Worm would worship at the altar of Varathron’s classic His Majesty at the Swamp. However, while faint traces of those Greek gods can be detected, across the 42-minute LP is a clanging, blown-out appropriation of early Goatlord and Mortuary Drape, but strewn with a screws-loose personality that hails unorthodoxy endlessly. It’s a harsh and unsettling listener, but done with the authenticity and purity of black metal’s earliest, pre-tabloid days – and where else would something harsh and unsettling end but at the swamp?
Submerge into the slime and prepare for a true Evocation of the Black Marsh.
Cover and tracklisting are as follows:
Tracklisting for Worm (USA)’s Evocation of the Black Marsh
1. Altar Of Black Sludge
2. Winged Beast Of The Phantom Crypt
3. Gravemouth
4. Evil In The Mire
5. Evocation Of The Black Marsh
6. Swamp Ghoul
7. Rotting Semblance
8. The Slime Weeps
