Today, Finnish black metal mavericks Totalselfhatred premiere the new track “Cold Numbness” . The track hails from the band’s long-awaited third album, Solitude, set for international release on April 27th via Osmose Productions. Hear Totalselfhatred’s “Cold Numbness” in its entirety HERE.
Perseverance through adversity, creation through destruction, strength through pain. After years of waiting, skulking, and lying near-dormant, Totalselfhatred has returned to the fray. They are here to present you five songs of our their particular brand of melancholic desolation in an audial form. Turn off the lights, wallow in the sweetness of reclusive negativity, and let yourself float freely in the soothing stream of emotion that their epitome of Solitude will provide.
Totalselfhatred was founded to create truly melancholic and desperate soundscapes and to unravel the blackened thoughts, the blessing and the curse of the inability to think either black or white nor in between. To narrate about the ability to find clarity in madness, positivity in the negativity, shelter in the dark…
To point it out clearly: Totalselfhatred is dedicated to the searching, not to the self-pity. Totalselfhatred is a symbol for resurrection through pain. A pool for the frustrated, for the desperate in life, for those living and bleeding towards a higher truth, to crush the circles of self-inflicted suffering! For I am my worst enemy…
The first cold taste can be found HERE with the previously revealed track “Solitude MMXIII.
Cover and tracklisting are as follows:
Tracklisting for Totalselfhatred’s Solitude
1. Solitude MMXIII
2. Cold Numbness
3. Hallow
4. Black Infinity
5. Nyktophilia
Today, Nuclear War Now! Productions sets May 13th as the international release date for Oksennus’ highly anticipated third album, Kolme Toista, on vinyl LP format. The CD version shall be released earlier on April 15th.
Active since 2010, Finland’s Oksennus have already produced a staggering body of work. Through a series of demos and full-length cassette releases, the band painstakingly carved out a place in the underground landscape that has been largely untouched and uncorrupted. Stylistically eccentric, Oksennus’ music is a controlled departure from the constraints of genre, and, yet, the band nevertheless remains properly steeped in tradition.
With this new album, Oksennus’ ambitious tendencies are on prominent display. Kolme Toista is as bold an artistic proclamation as one could expect in metal without stretching the fabric of the genre so thin as to leave it threadbare. With nearly a decade of work behind them, the members of Oksennus are proficient and meticulous about the presentation of their ideas, and this album showcases the merit in their approach.
As with all of Oksennus’ work, the album cover features the austere and abstract style of illustration that is an aesthetic hallmark of the band’s vision. The album’s title means “Three Others,” but, in Finnish, it is also a play on words, simultaneously evoking the number “thirteen” (“kolmetoista”). Intentionality and purpose characterize every aspect of this release, and the wordplay of the title is no exception. The album consists of a single 39-minute composition, broken into three 13-minute movements, seamlessly woven together, guiding the listener through a sprawling array of mercurial states of consciousness, calling to mind the complex compositions by fellow NWN! act Chaos Echoes.
The album begins joltingly—a frenzy of ecstatic guitars, cycling and clashing, order and chaos held in restrained and tenuous equipoise. The drums and bass, active and aggressive, accentuate the commotion while providing musculature for the composition, as the vocals call out above the fray, invocations of of dark intent. It is disorienting—a warped, whirling, death dervish hymn. As the first movement ends, the compositional filaments become increasingly unraveled, the elements broken down, splayed, ripe for examination. The second movement is more unified; almost hypnotic, but melodically complex. Notes contrast and collide, and although the passage is rhythmically consistent, the sequences of melody never quite repeat. The track slows to near stasis, like atoms as liquid freezes to solid. At the 26-minute mark, the track erupts into unbounded territory. Vocals spill over the mix, summoning and directing the music, which is increasingly freeform as the final movement gets under way. The vocals die out, and the drums dominate the track, with the guitars receding, forming a roiling undercurrent of distortion. Extraneous sounds produced by an array of sources, including a number of unusual instruments (piano, trumpet, accordion, harmonica, kantele) emerge to fill the space and lull the listener into a nearly transcendental state as the third movement winds down. Before the album ends, however, the blissful cacophony of the third movement is interrupted by the same frenetic force with which the album began. Indeed, the same drum pattern that opens Kolme Toista recurs to provide the foundation for the confounding mania of the final minute of the track before suddenly disintegrating into the welcome serenity of silence.
In the meantime, hear the first glimpse of Oksennus’ intentionality with the opening 13-minute track “Toinen” HERE
Cover and tracklisting are as follows:
Tracklisting for Okennus’ Kolme Toista
1. Toinen
2. Toinen
3. Toinen
Belarusian atmospheric black metal unit RAVEN THRONE is returning with their sixth album “I Miortvym Snicca Zolak” on May 02, 2018 via Dutch Label Non Serviam Records.
Check the premiere of the second track “Pole cicha šaptała kałossiem…” from the upcoming album, which is based on poems from the beginning of the 20th century. Listen to it RIGHT HERE.
The Band informs: “The song “Pole cicha šaptała kałossiem” is taken from the poem (having the same title) of Michas Charot — the Belarusian poet, playwright and writer who was shot in the framework of the repression, committed by the Soviet leaders in October, 1937. Michas dedicated this to Tishke Gartnoy (real name Dmitry Fyodorovich Zhilunovich), another prominent poet from Belarus. The poem fits perfectly into the music of Raven Throne, thus forming one of the most powerful and piercing tracks from this album.”
Emerged from the ancient city Polotsk in 2004, Belarusian band RAVEN THRONE is having a couple of LPs and an EP in its amassment. The short lived first line-up collapsed after a few shows, the guitarist Chernotur (aka Dzianis Lukianovich, Thy Wings) kept the flame alive with War Head, who joined the band as a bass player in 2005. Encountering several lineup changes, the main core of the band had been formed in the person of Chernotur and War Head since then. During 2005 and 2006 RAVEN THRONE was a studio project, until Ingwar Winterheart (aka Galdor) joined the band. The first records were made at that time.
RAVEN THRONE had no drummer until 2011 and played under drum machine, but they released 03 magnificent albums till then. The band has become more active since 2014, started playing small and big festivals/gigs on regular basis. The current drummer Green Skin joined the band in 2015. The band shared stages with some prestigious local and international bands, including legendary Polish death metal troop VADER.
05th album «By the Path of the Forgotten» was released in 2016 via Possession Productions. The record was made by Chernotur and War Head as usual. In April 2016, the new line-up was renewed. Zergved Hellersatan (ex-KAIRA) became new vocalist. RAVEN THRONE supported ROTTING CHRIST on their Minsk gig during the world tour in December 2017.
Upcoming album “I Miortvym Snicca Zolak” will be out May 02nd via Non Serviam Records on digipak. RAVEN THRONE invites you to an odyssey in the splendor of the Slavic nature, which is based on poems from the beginning of the 20th century. The bands from the east Slavic countries can invent the supreme atmosphere that darkens the music with deep melancholy and Raven Throne is the perfect example to illustrate this tendency. The 06 splendid tracks of the album are occupied with deep melodies, but powerful rhythms, exploring the darkest side of human emotions. Without sacrificing melodic and dynamic proficiency, their musical technicality comes out on top through the composition.
Magnificent visual artistry in the form of cover art was executed by the band’s vocalist War Head. RAVEN THRONE will be embarking on an European tour this year to promote this album.
Today, Dunkelheit Produktionen sets May 1st for Subduer’s striking debut EP, Death Monolith. Much like they did with Kapala’s debut EP last year, Dunkelheit unleashes pure sonic cruelty with Death Monolith: simply put, Subduer are against everything and all, and suitably detonate lo-fi terrorist death-noise.
Subduer’s origins and membership are a mystery, but we do know they hail from Germany and comprise a duo of Shemhamforash on drums and Az-Zabaniyya on guitars and bass. Do both handle vocals? Possibly, but even one cursory listen to their Death Monolith debut EP and it becomes clear that they’re coming at you from every angle. Nothing but total audial decimation is on their minds; their tools are crude composites of “instruments,” and they wrangle forth every last, licentious noise they can from them. “Riffs,” then, are not so much written as doled out like artillery and duly mangled from there. Howling ‘n’ haunting noise blankets nearly every decibel spewed forth like festering radioactive disease: Death Monolith is thus more like nuclear fallout than proper “music.”
Define them how you want (or not), Subduer could care less; only absolute blackout-unto-whiteout matters. Crush, kill, destroy…and then scatter the ashes to the wind. There lies the Death Monolith. Diehards of Nyogthaeblisz and Tetragrammacide, prepare to meet your new gods!
Hear for yourself with the opening title track HERE
Cover and tracklisting are as follows:
Tracklisting for Subduer’s Death Monolith
1. Death Monolith
2. Zulifiqar
3. Execution Ritual
4. Domination Transmission
Today, Portuguese death metal cult Summon premiere the new track “Cvlt of Abomination”. The track hails from the band’s highly anticipated debut album, Parazv Il Zilittv, set for international release on April 20th via Iron Bonehead Productions. Hear Summon’s “Cvlt of Abomination” in its entirety HERE.
Summon emerged in late 2016 as a gathering between N. and R. in which they decided to follow a sonority that transcends their soul and where they could give it a more cavernous feel, with an intensity of deep agony. Shortly thereafter, N. decides to move forward with composite themes, and then they decide to call J. to seal the covenant of a deadly entity. The lyrics are handled by N. in which he invokes all the blackness and splendor of death, the burden of enduring and wandering in a world of human flesh, and the infinite thirst for mass slaughter converting mankind into a cloak of bones.
What thusly emerged was Summon’s debut EP, Aesthetics of Demise, which was released by Iron Bonehead during the summer of 2017 to widespread critical acclaim. A swirling, sulfurous mass of molten death-doom, Aesthetics of Demise was aptly titled, but on the fuller and more fleshed-out Parazv Il Zilittv, the trio both dive deeper into the murk and emerge into clearer dimensions. By no means do Summon here abandon their expertly crafted monolith of death-doom, but they largely (and wisely) leave behind the obfuscating murk which has become so de rigueur (read: TRENDY) in the millennial metal underground. Instead, each passage patiently unfolds and establishes its intended texture, terrorizing the mind and body with oppressive physical/spiritual weight – even (and especially) when stripped back to foggy, tension-inducing mist. The consequently linear songwriting soon works its sepulchral magick, as lurching ‘n’ lumbering riffs are stretched into hammering trances, sending undulating waves of absolute ritualism deep into the listener’s core. Which is all to say nothing of the production on Parazv Il Zilittv, which somehow manages to make Summon sound creepier despite the clearer and more cutting recording style.
With Aesthetics of Demise, Summon proved that their smashed-psyche sorcery transcended the usual “sepulchral death metal” tropes. Now, with Parazv Il Zilittv, they prove that that sorcery is potent enough to simultaneously open and close the crypt of time eternal. How far will you step in/out?
Cover and tracklisting are as follows:
Tracklisting for Summon (Portugal)’s Parazv Il Zilittv
1. Whisper of the Black Moon
2. Howling Graves
3. Cvlt of Abomination
4. Shapes of Darkness Transcending
5. Below Death Splenddovr
6. Parazv Il Zilittv
7. Impetvovs Sacrifice of thy Womb
8. In Odorem Mortis
9. …from Beyond
Today, Italian black/death cult Demonomancy premiere the new video “The Day of the Lord”. The track hails from the band’s highly anticipated second album, Poisoned Atonement, recently released to international acclaim via via Invictus Productions. In lieu of a full-scale European tour beginning next week (dates below), see & hear Demonomancy’s “The Day of the Lord” below
For a decade now, Demonomancy have been steadfast pillars of the bestial metal idiom, perfecting it over the course of two EPs and 2013’s definitive debut album, Throne of Demonic Proselytism. However, whilst working with the same strident fundaments – ancient South American black/death, the rigorous Blasphemy/Beherit axiom, early proponents of metal primitivism like Profanatica and VON – hereby with Poisoned Atonement do the power-trio leave behind all pretenders and stake out a new, defiant claim of sulfurous metal magick.
Portended by the ominous new track on the 2016 split with Finnish comrades Witchcraft, Poisoned Atonement portrays a Demonomancy no longer bounded by subgenre dictates. Here, they explore all the craggiest corners of their songwriting acumen, finessing forth an endlessly burly yet richly dynamic soundfield that verily approximates the most mysterious echoes of the grand abyss. Smothering, mind-melting violence collides head on with vortextural ritualism, wild-child heavy metal abandon with austere, locked-in grind: Demonomancy not so much leave no stone unturned as they do simply CRUSH it into feeble dust under their massive, ever-masterful boots. To begin understanding the multi-layered miasma of Poisoned Atonement is to gaze deeply into its cover art…
As such, Demonomancy is the sublimation of primitive human impulses morphed into aural spears that suffocate consciousness in a perennial leprous embrace. Corrosive verses burn superficial organic tissues, revealing the pulsating flesh exposed in its primordial obscenity. In this atoning pilgrimage, the unbearable guilt gives birth to inner demons that lacerate the mendacious drape covering our hidden and irrational world. “We praise the morbid and forbidden Bestiality to be rejoined with our primeval dimension,” state the band. “We praise the diseased and torbid Spirit bounded by the mortal coil’s festering chains. The body is merely a monumental epitaph. Metal of Death – Methodical Chaos.”
Bow in fealty and begin your Poisoned Atonement with Demonomancy… Visual atonement can be found HERE,
Cover and tracklisting are as follows:
Tracklisting for Demonomancy’s Poisoned Atonement
1. Intro – Revelation 21.8
2. Fiery Herald Unbound (The Victorious Predator)
3. Archaic Remnants of the Numinous
4. The Day of the Lord
5. Poisoned Atonement (Purged in Molten Gold)
6. The Last Hymn to Eschaton
7. Fathomless Region of Total Eclipse
8. Nefarious Spawn of Methodical Chaos
DEMONOMANCY European tour dates
22.03 – NANTES, FR – Ferrailleur
23.03 – PARIS, FR – Backstage
24.03 – LONDON, UK – Boston Arms
25.03 – AMSTERDAM, NL – P60
26.03 – GENT, BE – Asgaard
27.03 – COPENHAGUE, DK – KB18
29.03 – POZNAN, POL – U Bazyla
30.03 – LODZ, POL – Magnetofon
31.03 – KRAKOW, POL – Ze Pe Te
01.04 – VIENNA, AU – Viper Room
02.04 – SALZBURG, AU – Rockhouse
03.04 – FIRENZE, IT – Circus
04.04 – PESCARA, IT – Tikitaka Village
05.04 – MILANO, IT – Circolo Svolta
06.04 – BAAL, CH – Sommer Casino
Today, Iron Bonehead Productions sets June 22nd as the international release date for Secretum Secretorum, a split album between Ancient Moon and Prosternatur, on CD and vinyl LP formats. Two pan-international entities, both Ancient Moon and Prosternatur have but one recording each to their respective names – an album, with the former’s arriving in 2015 and the latter’s in 2016 – but Secretum Secretorum should prove to shine more blacklight on two infinitely promising, shadowy entities.
Prosternatur
For their half, Ancient Moon deliver an 18-minute epic that builds slowly and ominously before exploding into a tensely buzzing hive of nightmarish black metal. Hypnotic yet free-flowing, somehow making time stand still and move in reverse, “Hekas Hekas Este Bebeloi!” imparts an absolutely spellbinding mysticism that could be a whole record unto itself, its movements and fluctuations subtle yet profound; this track simply demands repeat spins, and eternal thralldom. For their half, Prosternatur render three tracks that are impossibly vast for their six-minute average length. And indeed, Prosternatur are a complementary fit for Ancient Moon, in that this shadow-cloaked trio conjures their own brand of black metal mysticism. Viscously thick yet somehow emitting a near-cosmic sense of space, Prosternatur burl forth with a constantly churning density that’s expertly laced with all manner of beneath-the-surface color and shade. Their attack is doubtlessly muscular, yet similarly evokes a bewitching sensation on the right side of medieval.
Together, both Ancient Moon and Prosternatur beckon the listener to let loose the bounds of reality and step into their Secretum Secretorum…
In the meantime, an audio teaser for Ancient Moon’s half can be heard HERE
while an audio teaser for Prosternatur’s half can be heard HERE,
Cover and tracklisting are as follows:
Tracklisting for Ancient Moon & Prosternatur’s Secretum Secretorum
1. Ancient Moon – Hekas Hekas Este Bebeloi!
2. Prosternatur – Ana Harrani Sa Alaktasa La Tarat
3. Prosternatur – Zi Dingir Isatum Kanpa!
4. Prosternatur – Usella Mituti
Today, Blood Harvest Records sets April 20th as the international release date for Ossuarium’s Calcified Trophies of Violence on digipack CD format. Originally reissued in February on cassette tape format by Blood Harvest but then quickly selling out, Calcified Trophies of Violence is Ossuarium’s debut demo.
Ossuarium seep out of the depths of Portland, Oregon’s underground. Originally created as an outlet for Ryan Koger (drums) and Daniel Kelley (guitar/vocals) to express their mutual interest in late ’80s and early ’90s American death metal, Ossuarium fiendishly manifested into its current form with the addition of Nate McCleary (lead guitar) and Jeff Roman (bass) to their lineup in early 2017, after which they began writing the songs that would eventually become Calcified Trophies of Violence. Indeed, their opening salvo seethes with the same eldritch darkness of their aesthetic forebears, pulsing with a similarly linear heft that marked so much classic death metal during the turn of the ’90s. Even the production itself on the tape is era-accurate, so authentic is the band’s understanding of the form: Ossuarium have arrived with Calcified Trophies of Violence.
Currently, the entirety of Calcified Trophies of Violence is streaming HERE
Preorder info for the digipack CD version can be found HERE.
Cover and tracklisting are as follows:
Tracklisting for Ossuarium’s Calcified Trophies of Violence
1. Chapel Of Bone
2. Deleterious Mutation
3. Abhorrent Travesty Of The Human Shape
Today, Hells Headbangers announces the signing of Greek black metallers Funeral Storm. The first fruit of this union shall be the band’s highly anticipated debut album, Arcane Mysteries, which will see release through the label later this year. Now featuring members from Hellenic scene legends Necromantia and Varathron, Funeral Storm deliver truly ancient – and truly authentic – Greek black metal in the most classic early ’90s style, full of mysticism and might.
Funeral Storm was formed in 2001 by Wampyrion Markhor Necrowolf under the name Raven Throne as a one-man-project. The name was later changed for legal reasons, and after several changes, the moniker Funeral Storm was chosen. Lyrical themes were set early on, and are heavily inspired by occultism, legends, myths, evil, mysteries, horror, and the Cthulhu mythos.
After several lineup changes and one live show, Wampyrion decided to stop any activities concerning the band until 2012, where he released a digital split with Mortuus Sum and a six-way split on tape format with Human Serpent, Thaer Os Valael, Opus Magorum, Silent Dominion, and Varg Order a year later under his label Abyssic Black Cult Records.
Funeral Storm were active again with the addition of members of Serpent Path. In 2016, Mercyful Hell Productions released a compilation with songs that cover most of the years of Funeral Storm that were never actually released. In the meantime, Wampyrion decided to change the sound of the band, now fully inspired by ’90s Greek black metal.
Nick Christogiannis of Deviser and Necroabyssious of Varathron/Katavasia/Zaratus then joined as fulltime members. With this lineup, Funeral Storm released a split in early 2017 with Celestial Rite entitled Funeral Rite with Eskarth of Agatus performing acoustic guitars and a solo on the song “Martyr Of The Lake.” Reaping international acclaim, Funeral Rite was released on 12″ vinyl and CD formats by Iron Bonehead, while Mercyful Hell released the tape format.
Funeral Storm now join Hells Headbangers with the addition of Arcania (Aherusia) on guitars to deliver their first full-length album, Arcane Mysteries. An album of approximately 40 minutes of atmospheric tartaric black metal in the vein of old Hellenic black metal inspired by sorcery, magic, and myths, Arcane Mysteries will also feature two special guests: Eskarth of fellow Hells Headbangers labelmates Agatus and M.W Daoloth of Necromantia/Prinicipality Of Hell. The music is being recorded at Raven Studios, while the vocals were recorded at Crown Audio Conspiracies, with mixing & mastering to be done at Studio 222. The front cover design, titled “King Necromancer,” has been created by Markus Vesper (Denial Of God, Manilla Road, Attic).
More info to be revealed shortly. In the meantime, check out the links below.
Today, doom-death upstarts Shrine of the Serpent premiere the new track “Hailing the Enshrined” . The track hails from the band’s highly anticipated debut album, Entropic Disillusion, set for international release on April 23rd via Memento Mori. Hear Shrine of the Serpent’s “Hailing the Enshrined” in its entirety exclusively HERE.
Formed back in 2008 as Tenspeed Warlock, Shrine of the Serpent have going under their current moniker since 2014. Comprised of past and current members of Aldebaran, Graves At Sea, Sod Hauler, and Roanoke among others, this three-headed leviathan from Portland, Oregon conjure up visions of utmost ominousness and malodorous dreariness as a celebration of the inevitable, when life ceases to be and there’s nothing but a palpable somberness shrouding your passing to the other, unfathomable side. The chosen guide for such a cryptic journey is über-heavy, gloomy, and miserable doom-death metal. When faced with such a fate, one can only help to prepare to be crushed under the weight of utterly monolithic riffs enhanced by tortured growls, ritualistically pounding drumming, and eerie-as-fuck harmonies. Ultimately, this is but the sound of Entropic Disillusion.
Although more fertile now than any time in the past, true DOOM-DEATH is still a field that’s tricky to plow: lumber too long and you arrive at boredom; spice up the formula and lose the necessary desolation. Shrine of the Serpent exhibit mastery of the form on Entropic Disillusion. Truly and unapologetically doom-death metal to the bitter end, their slowly swirling sound patiently takes its time to entrance and then suffocate the listener, but it sure is fatal – not to mention absurdly HEAVY, in the most smothering way possible. Dismiss any hope for sentimental melodies, gothic overtones or operatic female voices, for the sole endeavor here is to oppress the listener. Fans of the bleakest approach to the subgenre who hail such bands as early Paradise Lost, Winter, Dusk, Hooded Menace, diSEMBOWELMENT, Loss Druid Lord, and early Cathedral will definitely find plenty of morbid joy from experiencing this concoction of impending death and doom.
Completed by Mariusz Lewandowski’s ethereal cover art and a crushing mastering job courtesy of Dan Randall at Mammoth Sound Mastering, Entropic Disillusion announces the arrival of doom-death’s newest titans: Shrine of the Serpent!
The previously revealed “Hope’s Aspersion” can be heard HERE at Memento Mori’s official YouTube channel.
Cover and tracklisting are as follows:
Tracklisting for Shrine of the Serpent’s Entropic Disillusion
1. Descend into Dusk
2. Hailing the Enshrined
3. Hope’s Aspersion
4. Desecrated Tomb
5. Returning
6. Epoch of Annihilation
7. Rending the Psychic Void
