NINE (ish) SONGS I LIKED THIS WEEK IN LIST FORM SEP 24 – OCT 1
HEYO! Music.
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1. Ch'Ahom – "Chavín de Huántar," from Knots of Abhorrence (Avant-Garde Black Metal – Sentient Ruin Laboratories). I wrote about the EP German project Ch'Ahom released a few months back with no small amount of enthusiasm. And I remember that track (which, btw, also appears as a bonus closing track here) being presented by the label at the time in a kind of "you have no idea" kind of promo tag. Well, lemme tell ya, I had very little idea. Easily one of the best albums of the year. Versatile, creative, at times spiritual and crushing black/death metal that creates atmosphere from sheer heaviness. Which is my way of saying: You have no idea. FFO: Tchornobog, HAR, Esoctrilihum.
2. Valdrin – "Seven Swords (In the Arsenal of Steel)," from Throne of the Lunar Soul (Symphonic Black Metal – Blood Harvest Records). Valdrin's Effigy of Nightmares was a wonderful, sick black metal album, this despite the fact that band needlessly capitalizes the "o" in "of." But whatever was sick about that album was polished like a the blade of a make-belief-metal-dude's sword and emerged with one of the best (and longest, DAMN) symphonic black metal albums this side of Grand Celestial Nightmare (see below) and GARSDGHASTR. An explosion of songs, writing, execution and just feeling damn grand. FFO: Emperor, Grand Celestial Nightmare, Starer.
3. Sort Sind – "Tomhed," from I Skyggen af Livet (Black/Death Metal – Nuclear Winter Records). Speaking of black metal that sounds like it was airlifted from 1997, the debut full length from Sort Sind made want to hastily paste posters on my wall and paint my toenails black. Spewing from the infinitely talented and creative mind of one Mathias Friborg (Sulphurous, Tahpos, HAD, and more), it feels like the best black metal a death metal band can make and simultaneously the best death metal a black metal band could make. Ruthless and beautiful. FFO: Ascended Dead, Hyperdontia, Teitanblood.
4. Grand Celestial Nightmare – "Death Made Holy," from The Great Apocalyptic Desolation (Symphonic Black Metal – Independent). Thus begins the Mories appreciation part of this post. I have written many a time about the wonder that is whatever Maurice de Jong has for a brain, so I won't get into that again. But I did have something of an epiphany with this new and predictably absolutely brilliant GCN album: Like all of us, Maurice misses the kind of black metal, death metal, noise or whatever of his youth. Like most of us his work is predicated also on trying to replicate that feeling of terror, horror, awe you had when you were listening to that stuff. However, what sets him apart from humanity are two things: 1) He's as talented a musician and writer as the greats of the 80s and 90s; and 2) He cracked the code. He isn't mimicking or copy-pasting, he's channeling. Go listen to this shit. Now. FFO: Good music and liking Cradle of Filth won't hurt either.
5. Gnaw Their Tongues – "II," from All Natures, All Formed Things, All Creatures Exist in and with One Another and Will Again Be Resolved into Their Own Roots, Because the Nature of Matter is Dissolved into the Roots of Its Nature Alone (Noise/Experimental – Independent). You might as well copy what I wrote above and paste it here, but with a difference. That difference being that GTT is de Jong's ultimate musical legacy, the black pot into which he pours himself and all his music and horizonless imagination. And as such it is the epitome of all he does. He rarely misses with GTT releases, but when he gets it absolutely amazingly right as he does with his side of this recently released split with Sator, then it's basically just music being perfect, lift-affirming, and horrifying. FFO: Being horrified I guess.
6. Trest – "Borda," from Sorginak (Black Metal – Black Gangrene Productions). I had never heard of Trest until a somber-looking album cover for their EP compilation grabbed at attention last year. From that point onwards I found it very hard to stop listening to it. There was something magical, scary about how both raw and fully formed it all felt. I wrote about it here, and was content. Now they're back with a whole album of pulverizing, atmospheric-by-force-of-riff black metal, and I could not be happier. If you like your black metal like you like your being-crushed-by-overwhlelming-sadness then look no further. FFO: A bunch of bands I probably shouldn't mention.
7. Inculter – ״Death Reigns," from Morbid Origin (Thrash/Black – Edged Circle Productions). It seemed like forever since we got a new Inculter album, and then I checked and it was actually kind of forever. The excellent if, perhaps, underrated Fatal Visions came out four freakin' years ago, and I didn't realize how much I missed it until I clicked on the new single and felt the unmistakable breeze of actually good, vital thrash metal. A more than a note from some Justice-like harmonies in this one, too. FFO: Wraithe, Nekrofilth, Midnight.
8. Urine Hell – "Pitiable," from Urine Hell / NÜDE Split (Noise Rock – Already Dead). Whatever it is that people try to get into or out of that thing we call "noise rock" it can't be surface level. No one goes into playing that kind of music or listening to it for someone to be blasé or aloof about the world – emotional world, actual world, whatever. It's guts on the floor, or nothing. Which is why I will forever love Intercourse, and its EXACTLY why Urine Hell are as amazing as they are. This new split included. Guts on the floor. Oh, and the music is amazing. That too. FFO: Intercourse, Nerver, Couch Slut.
9. Iskandr – "Hof der Valken," from Spiritus Sylvestris (Gothic, Dark Wave – Eisenwald). Iskandr's Omar Kleiss is a man of many talents, bands, and tastes. And his flagship one-man project, Iskandr, has been beckoning an upcoming shift in sounds for some time now. Well, it's safe to say that shift has come, with the once black metal entity shifting quite majestically toward the gothic, new-wave-ish sombre sound found on their new album. Lush, melancholy and pretty. Makes one (me) very curious where it till al go next. FFO: Rope Sect, Maggot Heart, Beastmilk.
FIVE MORE THINGS YOU NEED TO KNOW
ONE: If you might be into the kind of pleasant experimental music that sounds like objects falling on the floor, then this BauHut album was a very pleasant experience for me.
TWO: Unless residing under a rock, you might have heard about the Tzadik catalogue making it to the streaming world, finally. Sounds like small, esoteric news, but a real life changer.
THREE: Fancy ambient music that is as scaring as black metal? This Nebuläh EP is cool.
FOUR: Will I manage to write a year's end list this year!? LET'S SEE!
FIVE: Underdark released a new single that sounds absolutely amazing.
ONE LAST THING, PROMISE: Hey disso folk, check this out (Dwelling Below).
