“Dawn of Ouroboros is a project started by Botanist and Cailleach Calling guitarist Tony Thomas and Cailleach Calling vocalist Chelsea Murphy. They play a wild, proggy mix of blackgaze, death and atmo-metal with sprinkles of new age and post-hardcore along the way.” Soup for you.
“So, there I was. Curled up in an armchair, dark outside, shark pups snoring, decaf breakfast tea almost finished, review for the week just turned in, when what should I spy? Lamp of Murmuur sitting, alone in the gloaming of the promo sump, unloved, unattended and already released.” Rub it and see.
“When one thinks of New Orleans and music, there are many touchstones, but black metal ain’t one of them. Dixieland jazz pours from every crevice of the city, from bars to funeral processions, while zydeco and Delta blues echo through the French Quarter. When it comes to metal, NOLA is renowned for the sludge that slithered from the swamps surrounding Lake Pontchartrain. But black metal? In this heat and humidity? Mehenet, a five-piece active since 2014, is happy to be the black fly in the jazzy New Orleans ointment.” Godless gumbo.
“Wolves in the Throne Room is an important band for me. When I was just getting into black metal, I found my way to the early albums in the band’s discography, which demonstrated to me the intrinsic and glorious bond black metal has with nature. I was absolutely captivated and I still consider the trilogy of Diadem of 12 Stars, Two Hunters and Black Cascade to be one of the strongest in black metal’s catalog. While I may be less enamored with the later albums (Thrice Woven, apart from its thunderous opener, left me cold), I feel a very close affinity with the band, and any new release is a very big deal to this reviewer.” Wolves or sheep?
![Old Nick – The Night of the Ambush and the Pillage by the Queen Ann Styl’d Furniture, Animated by One of the Dozen or So Spells That Thee Eastern Vampyre Has Studied [Things You Might Have Missed 2020]](https://www.angrymetalguy.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/OldNick-NightoftheAmbush01-768x768.jpeg)
“I’m not sure why I spent so much of 2020 deep diving into the raw black metal recesses of Bandcamp. Might be because ice cold nihilism was especially in fashion this season, or maybe all the social isolating helped me connect more with the weirdo basement dweller one man band crowd. Whatever the reason, I wound up having a great time listening to some truly terrible music. A lot of it is borderline unlistenable, and a lot of that’s on purpose, because badly recording and producing one’s bad playing is pretty kvlt. Of course, this doesn’t preclude truly talented musicians drawn to the genre’s gritty mystique from making some rock solid metal albums.”Hey, Doctor Old Nick!
“Vanum caught my attention with this gorgeous image of a violent geological process–a particular interest of mine–that is both legibly pictorial and pulling at the edges of abstraction. Tasteful typography and minimal framing compliments rather than competes with the painting. Interest piqued, I dug further and discovered this to be a project of K. Morgan and M. Rekevics of American black metal bands Ash Borer and Yellow Eyes, respectively, both of which I enjoy. Now firmly on the hook, my main question is: does the musical carpet match the visual drapes?” For lavas of fine art.
“These Kentuckians resemble something closer to the bastard offspring of Satanic Warmaster and Dead is Dead, taking traditional black metal stylings (as opposed to “weeny atmospheric emo-black”) and dragging them through deep, dark sludge.” Don’t let that sludge get on your good jeans!
“A few short years ago, Von appeared to be one of those seminal back metal bands who were only recognized for their genius and influence post-mortem. Hailing from San Francisco, CA, Von were arguably the first American black metal band, and inarguably were hugely influential in establishing black metal’s second wave aesthetic. Formed in 1987, the band disbanded in 1992 after a releasing a pair of demos and recording, but not releasing, a third. Over the years, copies of their demos and live bootlegs were hunted by collectors, especially before the internet made sharing and copying as simple as it is now. For over twenty years, aside from the 2003 release of the Satanic Blood Angel demo compilation and live record, Von were silent and inactive, though their influence has touched bands from Dark Funeral and Enthroned to Taake and Watain.” Natalie Zed is here to tell you how that’s workin’ out for ’em in 2013.
