Nocturnalia – III Winter

Wooden Earth – Fangs

Moonreich – Wormgod

Blackwood – Of Flies

Ghostboy – Disgusting

Nocturnalia – III Winter
dark rock
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Nothing new under those vast Scandinavian skies – yes! Nothing boring in the wide open spaces – yes! Nocturnalia are a good example that a mix of Rainbow, Deep Purple, the 69 Eyes combined with a singer who clearly likes Bruce Dickinson never gets boring. For we have heard those things so often before we can clearly identify the roots – always a great thing for every fan(atic) as he can display his knowledge. However, there is something else to that mix that lies beneath the obvious and that is some good and clever songwriting because we must remember – copying is one thing but taking lessons from idols is another. Nocturnalia definitely follow the second line and we can take singer Linus Ekermo as an example here: He knows his Bruce, he knows his Dio but he never dares to simply copy them, he adds little singular characteristics once in a while, for example in “Winter Hymn” when his (nearly) spoken word is a great atmospheric moment - “Frost be the sign of this lost ending year / Darkness embrace me for winter draws near” words and phrases heard before but combined with a sound reminiscent of the wind of uilleann pipes and a second (at the beginning nearly inaudible) vocal line we are still drawn to it and keep on spinning “III Winter”.
Wooden Earth – Fangs
hard rock / classic rock
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Wooden Earth (look at that band name – you already see the green smoke rising in the desert) are to release their new track “Fangs” on December 13th. The Dallas-based duo consisting of guitarist Devin Moreno and drummer/vocalist Griffin Thomas will release their debut full length next year and are currently touring their ….. off. No new witches’ brew in their mix of two similar genres, but their play with dynamics is definitely worth lending your ear if you like Red Fang’s ferociousness, QOTSA’s pop appeal and some scruffy vocals to accompany all of that. They throw in a riff that is really genre-like but their dynamics draws you in and the small kicks from the side in form of a sharp noisy lick keep you going just as much as the 60s style psychedelic organ in the background which keeps the atmosphere light and tight. Here you go, Stoner fans, you might have another band to follow! What a name anyway!
Moonreich – Wormgod
metalcore
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My media player sometimes plays a trick on me and doesn’t enlist the tracks in the right order but reverses them, so that the last track is played first. It did that when I started listening to Moonreich’s recent EP Wormgod, and thus the first thing I heard was “Broken” and the first vocals I heard were “If you want control without any pain / How long will you suffer? / How long will you reign?” My mind racing, where had I, what did they, whom had they…. and then memory retrieved the wanted information – it’s a cover of a Depeche Mode-song! No, nothing worrisome about that cover but well, the rest is solid work. A lot of grindy-metalcore, blastbeats, solid screaming gutturals, some quick and harsh turns, a few moments reminiscent of Slipknot (supposedly a major influence) and some posty-swirling guitar loops. A solid Metalcore band doing some solid Post-Metal songs but being unable to hide their roots. A good band to start your summer festival day with, but well …if it wasn’t for that Depeche Mode-cover!
Blackwood – Of Flies
dub doom
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Ever wondered what it would sound like if Godflesh emphasized the metal side a bit more and a bit dirtier? Less sterile and less dubby? With a bit less verve and some more doomy gloom? Then you might find yourself drawn to Blackwood, an electro-doom-metal-project headed by Italian artist and composer Eraldo Bernocchi who – via Subsound Records has just released his new EP “Of Flies” with the help of vocalist Emilia Moncayo and a lot of samples, for example the urgent screams “Conductor we have a problem! Press emergency!” taken from a YouTube-video filmed a few years ago, when a man ran around in an American subway screaming these words all the time. The songs are like a descent into the hell of the human psyche, one does not want to listen because of the grittiness of the songs but it it somehow impossible to stop because there might be another even more sensational sound or sample or scream just around the corner of this dirty wall of sound. And just before the finger hits the button he calms it down again and then surrounds the ears with some soothing parts and ethereal moments. But the dirt is always just one step away. A great introduction into a genre some people might never have imagined. Or never wanted to imagine.
Ghostboy – Disgusting
dark ambient / edm / house
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“Always on my mind”. Elvis. His late years. A classic. Always recognizable. Always? No, not as in always always, because as Ghostboy shows with his version, starting out like a desert slo-mo-acoustic guitar version then turning into slow ambient song, even a song we have all heard a trillion times can be hard to recognize even though he sticks to the original lyrics. This song was my reason to listen to the new EP by Ghostboy released on and for Halloween and thus aptly titled “Disgusting”. Four songs revolving around the themes lost love, death, loneliness and ghosts are presented here by the electronica artist, who combines burbling dream-pop with dark electronica parts or classical house elements and sometimes garners them with an interesting detail, like the aforementioned acoustic guitar. The only fault in the EP: The cover doesn’t totally fit in with the others, even though it is quite an original track, but its lyrical mood is so different and furthermore because of said western-intro. Maybe he should choose a real Halloween classic for such a themed release – my suggestion: “The Boy with the Arab Strap”. Otherwise, it becomes clear where Ghostboy comes from and where he’s headed as he stays immensely authentic.
Thorsten
Ogmasun - Into the Void
post rock / post metal
Bunkr - Schluss
noise rock / jazz / experimental
Gloson - Mara
doom / sludge
Geezer - Spiral Fires
psychedelic / doom / stoner rock
Lecu - Scented Sonar
ambient
Aleksei Nikitin - Vesna
house / techno / electronic
Druhá Smrt - Incarnatium
dark ambient
Chelidon Frame - NowHere Nowhere NoWhere
ambient / experimental
Talipes Valgus - Sly
electronic / downtempo
Haunt - If Icarus Could Fly
heavy metal
Suffering Hour - Dwell
black metal / death metal
Russ Young - Pala
ambient
Serge Ashtoreth - Ciuthach
drone / ambient / folk
Zer0 れい - an overview
electronic / ambient/ synthwave
Afterglow 20XX
Midihack
Slipstream 20XX
Xasthur - Aestas Pretium MMXVIII
acoustic / folk
Black Market Heart - Who Put A Knife Through Your Heart?
post punk
The Lautreamonts - Who Are You Wearing
post punk
Ennui - End Of The Circle
funeral doom
A Shoreline Dream - Waitout
shoegaze / dreampop
Rude Audio - Rude Redux
electronic / house / synth
Idle Hands - Don't Waste Your Time
hard rock
Lower Automation - Shoebox Companion
math rock / alternative rock / experimental / noise rock / punk
Serge
electronic / ambient / house
Music is Born in Silence is an album by Lithuanian electronic music artist Evaldas Azbukauskas, better known by the alias of SoulSonic, released by renowned underground label Cold Tear Records on May 22. With nine tracks – Choose Your Path, Gentle Wind, One Direction, Sunny Days, Life, Love You, Heal, Walking and Clouds –, Music is Born in Silence is an amazingly fantastic record, that realizes a deeply surrealist and phenomenal mixture of several subgenres of electronic music, like house, deep house, techno music, chillout, ambient and electronica, amongst others. With pure and tremendously captivating tunes that enchants the listener from the very beginning until the end, throughout the whole record, Music is Born in Silence is a vigorously powerful masterpiece, able to conquer each and every individual that is an avid enthusiast of the current electro house underground scene. With an ability to summarize intense rhythms in a correlated beat with smooth harmonies that dynamically plays along with intrinsically nuanced vibes, with all his talent, SoulSonic probably is a fundamental reference in these subgenres of electronica in the local club scene of his hometown of Mazeikiai, in the Baltic state of Lithuania.
The first half of the record is simply intriguing. With proficient and colorful melodies, that conquers the space in between the solidary solitude of a perfectly structured rhythmic dissonance, the expansive tone of his beats are prominently inclusive, and the constant intonations that revolves around the synchronized precision of his tunes are remarkably soft, exposing a serene exhilaration of sonorous boundaries that reveals a profound rapture perfectly sculptured by shape and form. Like a sonorous atom that conquers the most sizeable part of a delusional rhythmic paradise, this record establishes its own pattern of musical logic, in what concerns the authenticity and the beautifully poetic atmosphere of its peculiar style. Music is Born in Silence is so good that is possible to anticipate this record becoming a fundamental milestone for the house, deep house and techno subgenres of electronic music. With one track better than the other, there are no faults at all to be pointed out in what concerns this formidably majestic, brilliantly conceived and majorly cohesive record. A tremendously great masterpiece, it is highly recommended to all enthusiasts of underground electronica, especially the ones who are fond of the subgenres brilliantly and amazingly executed by the artist, with all the whimsical perfection of his great artistic skills: house and deep house. Be sure, you’ve never listened to something so astonishingly monumental in your life before on this particular type of music. Wagner |
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