Winding down, winding up

From the Year of the Dumpster fire into a New Day Rising?

Sometime in this new year I’ll drop my favorite albums of 2023. I’m prone to waiting a day or two (though this will be a week or two or three) because there is always something late to gum up the works. Prava Kollektive unleashed a five warhead godbomb early December - and you’ll notice none of those titles made vaunted end of year lists? You know all of those journalists “who hear everything before joe schmo and we know better” and put out end of the year lists in November. C’mon, you can go fuck yourself. I know better. As the Jim Jones and the Kool Ade Kids title reads, trust me… Do better, stop shilling for advertisers.

While I’m pretty certain of my top three titles, I haven’t been compiling things as thoroughly as previous years since midway through 2023 I migrated all the music off my computer (about 5 years worth) to an external hard drive and I’ve really only been listening to things from July forward. Though, funny enough, when I do mental gymnastics for favorite albums of 2023 I do recall a number of quality releases from the first quarter: Thy Darkened Shade, Djunah, Sodality, Anatomy of Habit, BIG|BRAVE, Molekh, Verminious Serpent, so on and so forth. So mote it be.

There will be glaring omissions and for those there are valid explanations. A few bands I have ties to whether working behind the scene as an advocate and/or I’m personal friends with. I’ll name some when the list drops. Some I won’t because they don’t meet the 33 minute criteria for full length, so I don’t have to reveal information. And, finally, there are specific titles everyone is falling head over heels over that I do not care for at all in any shape or form. No accounting for discerning taste. Whether questionable or outright incorrect. Theirs being most definitely incorrect.

Looking into the new year ahead there is a new Pyra album announced. “Becoming” is the first track to stream. Italian black death misanthropy await Those Who Dwell in the Fire.

With 7 brand new releases and one remaster in 2023 Reykjavík, Iceland’s one man slow motion funeral doom industry Dauðaró marches ever forward. Different angles on display with these end of the year offerings from elongated Thergothon, disembowelment, Winter cavernous guttural threnodies to ambient drift reminiscent of Cyclic Law and Cold Meat Industry artists. Funereal plodding paces between dreams and nightmares or soundscapes drifting to distant stars the deepest reaches of the Mariana Trench. Would Vivaldi approve of the collaboration on Fl​æ​ð​i is up for conjecture, but, one thing is certain, it works.

ANGR return with 3 more songs in 2023 following their 2 tracks off the Ex Mundi Ad Nihil - Gnosis of the Unbeing comp in April with Temple of Nihil and Disillumination. Furious black metal assault after the obligatory intro. Strains of Kriegsmaschine, Mgla, Odraza crafted grim majesty. I suspect if this were a few minutes longer this would land on my favorite albums of the year.

Oh, and speaking of Polish Darkside back-beat miscreants, Hauntologist is a powerhouse duo of The Fall and Darkside. If Darkside is drumming you can expect a clinic and that’s what you get. Not the refined, masterclass of Kriegsmaschine, but, a bit more variation than what you hear on Mgla. Some of this more in the pocket, driving traditional metal drumming but given those killer Darkside cymbal accents and tumbling rolls. No Solace will be releasing something this year. When? Only they know for certain. Until then, “Ozymandian” is there to whet the appetite.

estha with two releases in 2023. this one self described as “dark and jarring doom featuring manic saxophone, Gregorian type chanting and loud crushing drums.” Very elegiac, would pair nicely with Nevoa Towards Belief. I imagine this would even sit well with Sleepytime Gorilla Museum and Swans. Since I can’t remember if I did something on estha with regard to In Mirrors, I’ll add that gem here, too. This was a case where the artwork for the album led me to the discovery of the band. Credit to bad museum for the artwork.

While on the train of thought of artists… I didn’t realize until afterward that Challenger Deep have Artem Grigoryev on board for this offering. Belarusan band by way of Lithuania with a crushing style that recalls the metallic hardcore gone black. Almost a mash up of Erdve, Knut, Geneva, Hollow Corp, The Fifth Alliance and Plebeian Grandstand’s DsO, Nihill looping riffs and hanging noise.

A 43 minute EP? Thank you Árstíðir lífsins. I dub thee a two song album of epic narrative glory told in black metal riffology spanning the ages. From Viking period Bathory to modern Icelandic fury.

Doomstress Suvi Savikko with a new shedfromthebody full length in the form of Amare. All the dream pop shoegaze smears of sound and Kelli Ali/Alison Shaw babygirl crooning crossed with deftones Godflesh heft and drive. A couple Amare tracks, “Air” and “Messiah,” have Smashing Pumpkins vibes to them, normally, that would be a hard pass, but, Savikko’s voice(s) smooth over that aversion as she pulls out clever vocals twists and turns of phrases that are different from the singers I’ve compared her to.

Jared Moran, the beast who never sleeps, an underground scene unto himself has, under the Plaguehammer alter ego, fashioned a new Vertebrae Fetish Totem release titled Alchemy. A slight bit brighter than the Cult debut, this offering is 11 spasms under 32 minutes. Mining osdm territory given an injection of future tech in terms of chords and strategic layers of guitar noise, Vertebrae Fetish Totem have the brevity kills aesthetic of Master and Repulsion gone full barbarian and may be viewed in similar league as Cultum Interitum, Caveman Cult, Chasmdweller and Fumes in terms of brute attitude and savagery.

This post has taken me far too long to bring to light. No Clean Singing beat me to the punch with maudissez. Uncertain if I had this queued up before Islander and company, but, chances are you heard and read about it there first. “Anti-catholic death doom noise.” Doom crawl, vomit vocals, layers of noise. In a sense it makes me think of Sweden’s Black Wound with less of a Buzzov-en gone Primitive Man lean and something like Buzzov-en shifted toward disembowelment and Hellish Form. Whatever the case, it rules pretty hard and this is definitely a late spoiler for me. How typically French.

Netherland’s Zaqqoem return with …and Winter’s Dregs Made Desolate. Black metal deathly noise with gibbering guitar textures, mechanized percussion that would sit at the right hand of Portal, Impetuous Ritual, Orbyssmal, Pestilength.

Oh, and speaking of Pestilength… February 16 is the date for Solar Clorex. “Neerv” strikes like the bastard son of Altarage. You ever see this duo and Altarage together? I imagine the two together would cause an immense rift in the space/time continuum to wreak havoc upon all. Which considering how mankind is already pushing armageddon it may not be a terrible choice to end it on an Altarage/Pestilength collision of black matter. Until then…

Old school death metal that is wretched putrid filth, living up to the name of Atavistic Decay. Billowing from a hellmouth out of Indianapolis, Indiana, this could be the more primitive cousin to Venomous Echoes and Black Curse. Tar pit trudges, feedback, gated drums, neanderthal roars during the slowest of the death doom sections that whip up to uptempo races into fiery oblivion.

End this piece (of shit) on what is probably the title of the 2023: Songs to Fuck and Kill Yourself To. Award to Youth Pastor, collect your no prize at the door. Thank you for the grime and fuck all attitude in no wave noise rock punked up damage.

Before 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, Thrown to the Abyss Podcast, Freedom Has No Bounds, Machine Music, Dreams of Consciousness, Doktor Dismemberment’s Midnight Murderplex and Crucial Blast’s Warhead…. most of these sites update daily and weekly, most likely more frequently than what I provide.