Month: January 2019

Windswept premiere second new track “Gustav Meyrink’s Prague”

WINDSWEPT, the Ukrainian black metal formation founded by DRUDKH mastermind Roman Sayenko, are premiering the second track from their upcoming album ‘The Onlooker’. The song “Gustav Meyrink’s Prague” is streaming here:
The artwork and tracklist of ‘The Onlooker’ have previously been revealed and can be viewed below.
Track-list
1. I’m Oldness and Oblivion (Intro)
2. Stargazer
3. A Gift to Feel Nostalgia
4. Disgusting Breed of Hagglers 
5. Gustav Meyrink’s Prague 
6. Insomnia of the Old Men     
7. Times of No Dreams & No Poets 
8. Bookworm, Loser, Pauper     
Conceived by DRUDKH mastermind Roman Sayenko in cooperation with two fellow band members, black metal force WINDSWEPT have returned with their second full length. ‘The Onlooker’ is to be released via Season of Mist Underground Activists on February 8, 2019.

Sayenko’s latest brainchild, WINDSWEPT, came into being in 2017. As this project stays within the classic expression of Ukrainian black metal, the band shares some similarities with legendary DRUDKH. However, the main goal for the three musicians is to express their creative ideas by improvising and capturing these sounds with the raw and authentic feeling of a live performance.
 
WINDSWEPT released their full length debut ‘The Great Cold Steppe‘, last year (March 2017). A musical piece that was inspired by the cold and harsh realities of the hostile and fierce Eastern steppes. Reflecting upon notions of traditions and the past, the musicians released the EP ‘Visionaire’ on Van Records, early in 2018.
 
Built on the same foundations, the new record ‘The Onlooker’ once more employs a raw, fierce black metal sound reminiscent of earlier days, harvested from spending only a few of days in the studio. ‘The Onlooker’ is bound to appeal to those who’ve enjoyed other works of these veterans of Ukrainian (black) metal scene. 

Line-up
V. – drums
K. – bass
R. – guitars, vocals

Sentient Ruin announce vinyl release of Consumed by Oblivion the debut MLP by Death/Doom four piece Void Rot.

Hailing from Minneapolis MN, Void Rot are devoted to constructing massive and soul-consuming dirges of monstrous death-doom that is influenced by the glorious progenitors of majestic, atmospheric, and slow moving death metal like Winter, Rippikoulu, Disembowelment, early Paradise Lost, Incantation, etc.

With their debut MLP Consumed by Oblivion Void Rot unravel 15+ minis of earth-shaking and telluric death-doom that erupts from the depths of hades and pulverizes into the cosmos, weaving ancestral death metal and atmospheric doom into a dismal and soul-crushing deluge of riffs to construct a sonic colossus of unseen enormity, which will be sure to please all fans of bands like Spectral Voice, Anhedonist, Inverloch, Indesinence, Krypts.

Within their imposing compositions Void Rot weave light and darkness seamlessly and with unseen mastery, evoking atmospheres of unparalleled vastness that alternate majestically between sidereal and contemplative psychedelia, and visceral and bludgeoning heaviness. Consumed by Oblivion is an iconic and proud example of true american death-doom as seen at its finest hour as it masterfully distills the void of space and the loneliness of the cosmos and bends them to impact the crushing misery of our earthly reality. The end result is a seismic monolith of spine-breaking riffs and warped atmospheres that while glorifying death-doom’s most distinctive traits also elevates the genre to an entire new level.

Officially released on January 9 2019, the LP will come as an etched, single sided black record housed in a custom black heavy cardstock cover + insert silkscreened with Pantone metallic bronze ink, and can now be pre-ordered at our store or Bandcamp. An EU version will be released with copper metallic ink through Italy’s Everlasting Spew Records.

Consumed by Oblivion has been acclaimed by critics with many outlets like CVLT Nation, Last Rites, No Clean Singing, Toilet ov Hell, Nine Hertz and many more hailing it as one of the best death doom moments of 2018, and CVLT Nation listing it ints top 10 best death doom records of 2018.

More info here

France’s Cénotaphe stream new track

Over the last several years, France’s Cénotaphe have unassumingly become one of the most promising new voices in black metal. Operating as a duo—each member with a long and distinguished résumé trailing behind him—multi-instrumentalist Fog performs all of the music, while Khaosgott handles the vocals. The band’s auspicious prior releases (a demo from 2015 and the 2018 Horizons MLP, both on the Finnish label Kuunpalvelus) established a foundation for the band to build upon, and the result is the magnificent Empyrée MLP. In both content and spirit, Cénotaphe draws inspiration from a constellation of 19th century French literary and artistic figures, such as Aloysius Bertrand, Théophile Gautier, Charles Beaudelaire, and the painter Odilon Redon. It is, however, the poet Stéphane Mallarmé who casts the longest shadow over the band. Mallarmé’s work is dense with inscrutable and tangled syntax, every poem an arcane cipher; however, despite his modern and unconventional style, Mallarmé tended to rely on stalwart and traditional poetic forms, like the sonnet. Within the framework of these rigid poetic structures, Mallarmé’s language was itself unconstrained, abstract, exquisitely lawless, but also excruciatingly methodical and intentional. 

There is a similar sensibility to Cénotaphe’s work. Regarded from a distance, one might not notice the idiosyncratic details that permeate it because the band remains so true to the form and spirit of black metal. But ensconced within the traditional structure of Cénotaphe’s songs are fractured melodies, disharmonies, sowing atonal discord under the surface of the song, like a violent undertow beneath a seemingly serene sea. The songs on this MLP all have an epic quality to them, and yet, none clocks in at more than seven minutes. The grandiosity of the tracks derives from their strength of composition, not overindulgence. The riffs are expansive, stretching out across the roiling pulse of the drums. The vocals, delivered entirely in French, hang in suspended animation, puncturing the surface of the song at precise points. Occasionally, the band modifies its approach, fleshing out the sound with keyboard flourishes or other instrumentation, but noticeably eschewing the use of guitar solos, despite being clearly in possession of the necessary skill. 

Nothing feels unintentional about Empyrée; it is a highly sculpted aesthetic creation. The album closes with a curious climax, a track that perhaps offers additional clues about the band’s musical interests: a near-instrumental cover of “End of the World” by the 1960s Greek prog pioneers Aphrodite’s Child, known for being Vangelis’ first band. Beginning slow, much the same as the original, the song evolves and accelerates, deftly bringing the album to a frantic crescendo, punctuated with piano notes and wordless vocals. Tying the album together is the cover art, a piece from 1893 entitled “In the Dust Cloud” by the Polish symbolist painter Jacek Malczewski.
MORE INFO:
www.nwnprod.com
www.facebook.com/pages/Nuclear-War-Now-Productions/114864651994141   

Black Metal Legends ENTHRONED sign to Season of Mist

Season of Mist are proud to announce the first signing of the new year; ENTHRONED! The legendary Belgian black metal formation will release their new album later this year.

The band comments: “ENTHRONED hordes worldwide, the time has come to break the silence. So it is with great pleasure that we can finally announce the new label with whom The Blackened Horde of ENTHRONED will work as from now on. We will be working with the Season of Mist clan for our next releases and further cooperations. We are looking forward to this new partnership, to work with a label that will be able to give us the support, freedom and the right tools to bring our dark art in it’s right place.
ENTHRONED – Confirmed live shows 2019
16 Feb 19 Arnhem (NL) Doc’s Blackfest, Willemeen
02 Jun 19 Kharkiv (UA) Art Plant Mechanica
20 Jul 19 Volyne (CZ) ETEF
ENTHRONED, a name Black Metal fans are no strangers to. Over the course of the last 25 years, they have pushed the boundaries of black metal and the deepness of the Left Hand Path philosophy further within. The quintet has channeled that dedication into their newest record; a dark and crushing black metal album where cold riffing, blood chilling atmospheres and ritualistic drumming are keys to forging their most mature and accomplished opus to date.

The band, who crawled out of the black lands of Belgium in 1993, inked their first contract less than a year after its formation, and recorded their revered debut album ‘Prophecies of Pagan Fire’, an album which became an all-time classic within the genre.

By then known as The Blackened Horde to fans and the scene at large, ENTHRONED recruited guitarist Nornagest and within 2 years entered Hautregard Studios to give birth to their second album. After the recording, tragedy struck and founding member and drummer Cernunnos (1997) took his own life.

The band went on to record the album using Cernunnos’s drum tracks from rehearsal recordings which were recorded by long time friend Da Cardoen, from the Belgian band ASPHYXIA. ‘Towards the Skullthrone of Satan’ was thus born.

ENTHRONED went on touring the world and releasing albums such as ‘Regie Sathanas’, ‘The Apocalypse Manifesto’ and ‘Armoured Bestial Hell’, the first album to feature core member Neraath on guitars. Then followed ‘Carnage in Worlds Beyond’, a brutal piece of black metal recorded by Harris Johns.

Ten years after their very first release, ENTHRONED recorded ‘XES Haereticum’, their last studio album with original vocalist and founding member Sabathan. The band then recruited Phorgath from the Belgian veterans EMPTINESS on bass and backing vocals, with Nornagest assuming the main vocal duties.

ENTHRONED recorded their seventh album ‘Tetra Karcist’ (first with this line-up) in 2007, which was hailed at the time as one of the best releases of the band. ‘Tetra Karcist’ also was the first opus out of a conceptual quadrilogy including ‘Pentagrammaton’, ‘Obsidium’ and last but not least ‘Sovereigns’.

The 2014 record ‘Sovereigns’ saw the debut of Menthor on drums, as well as extensive touring over the next four years. In 2016, Phorgath and guitarist ZarZax departed the band on amicable terms, and were replaced by Norgaath and Shagal (from cult Argentinian act VIBRION) respectively.

The band have started to work on their 11th and most anticipated album so far, which will be released in 2019 by Season of Mist.
 Line-up:
Nornagest: Vocals
Neraath: Guitars, noise and effects
Shāgāl: Guitars
Norgaath: Bass
Menthor: Drums

Links:
https://www.facebook.com/Frater.Silurian
https://www.instagram.com/enthronedofficial
https://enthroned.bandcamp.com/

KATECHON: Norwegian black/death quartet announces the details of the third album 

KATECHON has already found a notable place in the underground upon churning out two albums. Trondheim, Norway based black/death metallers are now ready to take the wraps of their forthcoming third opus, Sanger Fra Auschwitz. The album is anti-totalitarian in form and a view into the events of the second world war and how it affected the people on both sides. 

This third album also marks a new era for the band as they are now signed to Finnish label SATURNAL RECORDS. This album is slated for worldwide release on CD and digitally on March 01, 2019. 

KATECHON started up in 2011 in Trondheim, Norway, with 5 members from different local metal and punk bands who were fed up by doing music by the numbers. They recorded an eponymous demo in 2012 which gained a strong amount of positive feedback from the underground and this demo paved their way to get signed to Nuclear War Now! Productions. During their tenure in Nuclear War Now!, KATECHON spawned two acclaimed albums — the debut “Man God Giant” in 2013 and  the sophomore album “Coronation” in 2015.

After the second album, the band decided to go on without their guitarist PGS and the drummer MD for personal reasons. Shortly thereafter Kråbøl (from Thorns and Sarke) took over on drums and CB became the sole guitar architect of the band. With this line-up they spent almost one and a half year in the studio recording the third opus “Sanger Fra Auschwitz”. During the studio sessions, Nuclear War Now! and KATECHON decided to part ways, and soon they found a new label, SATURNAL RECORDS, with whom they feel they can pursue their musical goals even further.

With the album “Sanger Fra Auschwitz”, KATECHON takes a deep dive into the darkest places of the collective human psyche. Here Auschwitz is not just the physical, but also the meta-physical manifestation of evil on earth. The record is a view into the events of the second world war and how it affected the people on both sides. It is anti-totalitarian in form, drawing textually from Paul Celan, T.S. Eliot and beat poetry. The music is cold and bleak, which is ironic considering they spent over one year recording it, utilizing a lot of guitar effects, synthesizers and mellotrons to achieve the full and rich sound it conjures. With this album KATECHON kills off the esoteric child diseases they had in their early years and head straightforward into the entropy of collective madness. The band has also weakened the magnitude of death metal attachment in this record and brought forth a more harrowing black metal commanded approach. “Sanger Fra Auschwitz” is 37 minutes of pure darkness!

Recorded: NORDSTERN studios in 2017-2018 
Music and Lyrics: KATECHON
Mastered, Mixed and Engineered: Christian Broholt
Cover Artwork: Martin SchreinerTRACK-LIST: 
1. Fotspor
2. Eloi
3. Renselsen
4. Ankomst
5. Mørkets Hjerte
6. Tre Hoder
7. Davids Skjold
8. Unheimlich
 MORE INFO:
https://www.facebook.com/Katechonband
https://katechon.bandcamp.com 
https://open.spotify.com/artist/3CGYWVrKWCgmrpTaJ2vQ3f
www.saturnalrecords.com
www.facebook.com/saturnalrecords