Gone rogue...

mutant bodies.

Trying to keep head above sewage. Too much music and falling beneath the inundation of digital files.

Sophomore release from Minneapolis death mongers Nothingness dropped January 20 has left many slack jawed in wonder. Great production that is brighter and more in your face than the debut. Killer cover artwork, too. Supraliminal isn’t bowling me over the way the debut, The Hollow Gaze of Death, does. Not saying Supraliminal is a terrible record, it isn’t capturing my attention the way The Hollow Gaze of Death does in spite of having stronger production value and proper death metal chops. Tones nailed here are righteously massive and captured to perfection. The problem I have is nothing within these nine songs is favorably sticking in my craw in terms of riffs or specific moments. In fact there are more moments I dislike and my overall take is Supraliminal suffers disjointed song writing. Be interesting to return to this in a couple months and see if my opinion changes.

NoEvDia / Norma Evangelium Diaboli up to their usual tricks and making a sudden drop of a new album from UK/Poland unit Sodality (aka Sodalicja) in the form of Benediction part 1. The two credited members are involved with the likes of Death Like Mass, Lvcifyre and Cultes des Ghoules. Sodality hewing closer to the Cultes des Ghoules style bestowed the heft of Death Like Mass and Lvcifyre. Lunatic screams, howls and narratives over long form black metal that careens from hell pit sludge work to free form abstraction to runaway train speed that can go from tight as a sealed drum to ramshackle fraying at the seams and burning into dust.

For the love of gods unholy… Venomous Echoes. The vocal torture on display here rivals what’s heard on Sodality and that is saying something. Musically full on discordant death metal lining up with Portal, Impetuous Ritual, Altarage, Kraanerg, Demilich and with swirling textural noises matching the vertiginous atmospheres of Strapping Young Lad City and The Axis of Perdition. A veritable avalanche of sound designed for discomfort. In sci-fi cosmic horror terms: think of it as a skyscraper sized hive toppling mid-town during rush hour and whatever escaped alien beings wage mind numbing terror upon the populace.

New Anatomy of Habit in the belfry. The dread masters of minimalism and atmosphere have returned. Crushing highs, crushing lows. Open spaces that envelop a listener in rising dread and tightening tension. Sound craft and design on par with Caspar Brotzmann, Swans and Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds. This sounds and feels enormous in its spaciousness and is rich with exacting detail. “Breathing Through Bones” weaves a creeping disquiet riding a malevolent undercurrent threading with the narrative and assuredly moving toward disintegration.

This will be one of a few today that are returners to this page. Now, presented in its full glory, Thaumaturgy Tenebrous Oblations. With Incantation etched into its dna the stacks of downtuned tremelo riffs and reverb drenched guttural prayers this is laden with menacing atmosphere and laced with momentary jack-hammer assaults from the jump. I definitely feel this best works its grim magic at mid to slower paces as the drum programing is more forgiving and less obtrusive.

Avantgarde Music presents the first full length of Poland’s Cursebinder. Cursebinder is a quartet composed with a couple members of Dormant Ordeal. So, if Cursebinder’s vocalist sounds familiar to you, well, there you go. Musically this track isn’t dealing death metal like Dormant Ordeal it’s more of an atmospheric black metal affair with an uptempo, ever so slight sci-fi thrash touch than what they do on the debut ep. Maybe hints of Odraza - Rzeczom? It will be interesting to hear how Drifting plays out in its entirety, whether “Shred by Shred” is an outlier or true indication of the (left hand) path Cursebinder has taken.

Speaking of sci-fi Polish metal, and I may have mentioned this previously and at this moment my addled brain fails me, Entropia. Agonia Records will be handling Total. “Retox” is Voivodian by way of Am Rep and Mgla. This sonic reinvention is definitely more my tempo than before.

Second time’s the charm for Songs For a Tarnished World. Choir previously released this on its own in 2021. Total Dissonance Worship has swooped in to provide physical editions of this gem from Singapore. Upon initial impact (October 2021) I felt it was a late entry dark horse contender for that year’s top ten. Songs For a Tarnished World builds upon the first two Choir releases in big ways… Enormous tones, heightened focus in terms of song writing, tighter production. This, like Venomous Echoes above, plies its trade in the murk of Portal and Altarage. Focus here is trained on the guitars as other instrumentation bows beneath its weight.

Spitting curses from Columbia rides Irae Satanail. I believe the second time is the charm for this release of black metal pomp and grandeur. Epic and melodic. With more than a few tricks up its wizard’s sleeve.

My first encounter with Vitrail is 2021’s Les Pages Oubli​é​es. Moments there recall Husker Du gone black metal. So what does this new EP bring? Brittle icy riffs on a rampage, melodic detours returning to Saint Paul, Minnesota - even moments where backup singing shine alongside croaking vocals, a whip sharp backline to navigate and roam the snowy ranges throughout the wilds of Quebec. I don’t think it’s out line to say there is a slight drift toward the style of Wayfarer or even Ryan Clackner’s blackened Americana oriented acts.

From Toronto comes the unholy terror that is Golod. Sole member Holod is also a cog in the Hussar death metal war machine. Here the order of the day is atmospheric black metal. If I have any issue with Golod it is the fact the ambient component of this project is brighter in the mix than the conventional music. It may not be a distraction to other listeners but it always sticks out to me like a sore thumb particularly when the black metal side of the table is deliberately mixed raw and submerged under a lo-fi veil. The black metal here is hard charging with a combination of familiar evil styles. Two ambient tracks and three black hammer strikes.

When a name says it all: Primitive Rage. 7 songs of a feral grind nature, though far from primitive in execution. Track 8 is all 7 bound together the way this assault is meant to be: full throttle, in your face, breakneck and pulverizing. The Blinko meets Robin Harris art by Wampus Cat is terrific, too.

Raum Kingdom with a second video track courtesy of Chariot of Black Moth. And full album premiere via Decibel Magazine.

Second video track from Endless, Nameless of Living Without.

Jeanne Artemis of Coma Cluster Void offers up a new piece of music she has composed and this is performed by Hashtag Ensemble. At turns haunting and abrasive.

From Ukraine with HM2 damage, Obrij. Of course, this sounds bigger and better over on their bandcamp page, but, you don’t get the visual sorcery you have on youtube. Pick your poison.

In closing, please support: Everything Went Black, The Metal Dad and his fiendish five podcast, No Clean Singing, Stereogum: The Black Market, The Devil’s Mouth, Aversionline, Invisible Oranges, Horror Wolf 666, Into the Necrosphere, Sol Nox Podcast, The Book of Very Very Bad Things, Plague Rages and Doktor Dismemberment’s Midnight Murderplex…. these sites update daily and weekly.