apanthropy

Updates for the following bands: October Falls (FIN), Cryptic Shift (GBR), Witches Hammer (CAN), Black Funeral (USA), Ancient Burial (PRT), Curse Upon a Prayer (FIN), Hegemony (USA), Death Racer (AUT), and the Extreme Nation documentary.

October Falls Announces New Album, First Track Available:

Via press release:

Today, Purity ThroughFire sets May 30th as the international release date for October Falls‘ highly anticipated fifth album, A Fall of an Epoch, on digipack CD and vinyl LP formats. A special diehard LP version with an engraved wooden slipcase will be available only through preorder.

By now, October Falls should require little introduction. Formed in 2001 by Mikko Lehto and expanding to a full band lineup later on, October Falls have built up a considerable canon of unparalleled power and passion, their epic, folk-inflected black metal both reverential of tradition whilst blazing new trails into the beyond. Amidst their all-enveloping album works, the trio have also concurrently released somber fully-folk releases, displaying the depth of their character and the boundlessness of their vision. In short, October Falls have come to represent the enduring face of Finnish nature-oriented black metal.

It has now been an interminable seven years since their last full-length, The Plague of a Coming Age, and now October Falls dive back into the underground which birthed them by aligning with Purity ThroughFire for the release of their long-awaited A Fall of an Epoch. Thus, the album’s title takes on even greater significance, but linger under no assumption that “underground” means “underproduced” or similar. Far from it, of course, when dealing with October Falls: nothing but the most strident, splendorous reaches of the spirit, painted with poignancy and vibrancy, racing across myriad shades and sensations, evoking an engrossing narrative which spans windswept speed and achingly beautiful acoustics, all done with the fire & fury for which the trio have made their name so canonical. If anything, A Fall of an Epoch is a tri-dimensional experience that distills past, present, and future into one breathtaking whole, the album’s five-song/48-minute runtime the perfect configuration for their magick to take deepest hold – and never let go.

Time moves forward, every second committed to the past, memories fading into irrelevancy. Through these ever-shifting mists stands the firmament of October Falls, ageless and eternal, heralding A Fall of an Epoch!

Begin heralding October Falls‘ long-awaited return with the brand-new track “Hammering the Tide” HERE at Purity ThroughFire‘s YouTube channel.

Cryptic Shift Premiers New Track Ahead of Debut Release:

Via press release:

Today, UK tech-thrash cosmonauts Cryptic Shift premiere the new track “(Petrified in the) Hypogean Gaol” at Decibel magazine’s website. The track hails from the band’s highly anticipated debut album, Visitations From Enceladus, set for international release on May 4th via Blood Harvest Records. Hear Cryptic Shift‘s “(Petrified in the) Hypogean Gaol” in its entirety exclusively HERE.

One of the metal underground’s best-kept secrets, Cryptic Shift hail from Leeds, England and formed in 2014. Over a steady stream of EPs, splits, and digital singles, the band patiently perfected their craft, evolving from more modestly stated thrash metal to cosmic, tech-minded deathrash by 2016’s Beyond the Celestial Realms. Not for nothing was that EP named as such: here, Cryptic Shift began plotting their trip to space…or at the least the hinterlands of the death metal imagination.

And at long last, Cryptic Shift have truly blasted off into the outer stratosphere with their long-awaited debut album, Visitations From Enceladus. Also fortuitously titled, the band’s full-length debut is indeed some strange visitation from unexpected (and unexplored) locales, a veritable transmission of alien origin. Dauntingly, the album begins with the 26-minute “Moonbelt Immolator,” itself colorfully titled, challenging the listener’s perceptions right from the start. But those ready to explore the furthest, most (moon)bent reaches of death metal will soon be rewarded with a journey like no other; Cryptic Shift subsequently slice and sluice their a whole host of harrowing, horrific shapes, yet always with an uncanny knack for hooks. Similarly – and as vividly displayed by that opening, side-long epic – this quartet of cosmonauts deftly downshift into eerily placid moments of repose, their shimmering vapor trails of melody twisting with serpentine delight, all before building again into torrents of thrashing-like-a-maniac DEATH METAL gone completely off the rails. But Cryptic Shift‘s execution is tight beyond belief: truly, this is a band of master musicians and craftsmen, and thankfully, they’ve put those chops in the service of the song – and four equally astounding ones that amount to an amazingly kaleidoscopic work.

References to the legendary likes of Athiest, Gorguts, Cynic, and especially later Death and Pestilence are understandable, of course, but Cryptic Shift have a gnarled ‘n’ gnarling aspect that puts them closer to such cults as DBC, The Chasm, Timeghoul, Sadus, Canada’s Martyr, and especially Nocturnus. All we can do is strongly suggesting booking an excursion aboard their mothership NOW, and begin experiencing fully this Visitations From Enceladus!

Continue blasting off with the brand-new track “(Petrified in the) Hypogean Gaol” exclusively HERE, courtesy of Decibel, North America’s only monthly metal magazine. Begin blasting off with the previously revealed “The Arctic Chasm” HERE at Blood Harvest‘s Bandcamp. Preorder info can be found HERE.

Witches Hammer Debuts New Track Ahead of Comeback Release:

Via Press Release:


Today, reanimated Canadian metal cult Witches Hammer premiere the new track “Across Azeroth” at Deaf Forever magazine’s website. The track hails from the band’s long-awaited comeback album, Damnation Is My Throne, set for international release on April 25th via Nuclear War Now! Productions. Hear Witches Hammer‘s “Across Azeroth” in its entirety exclusively HERE.

Although they only released a few demos and a 12” EP during the band’s original active period (1984-1990), Witches Hammer occupies a prominent place among the pantheon of Canadian speed metal masters. The original lineup featured guitarist Marco Banco, who was just 15 years old when the band recorded its first demo; vocalist Rayy Crude; bassist Steve “Naïve” Withrow; and on drums, Rayy’s brother, the late John Prizmic. Witches Hammer’s name may not have been widely known during the band’s existence, but they were a crucial piece of the Vancouver extreme metal scene, most notably through their influence on the members of Blasphemy. (Banco would, of course, later play guitar for Blasphemy on the legendary Fallen Angel of Doom album.)

In the early 2000s, Nuclear War Now! worked with Banco to re-release Witches Hammer’s demos and self-titled EP, as well as the previously unreleased MLP the band recorded in 1988. Indeed, NWN!’s relationship with Witches Hammer is one of the longest-running associations the label has established through the years. In 2018, Banco and Crude decided it was time to revive the band and assembled a new lineup capable of delivering the blistering, sinister speed metal for which Witches Hammer is known. Their appearance that same year at the first installment of the Never Surrender fest in Berlin exceeded all expectations, proving that their reemergence was consistent with the band’s legacy without being a sterile imitation of their prior catalog.

The response to the recent Witches Hammer live performances has been uniformly positive, further reinforcing Banco’s and Crude’s resolve to press forward. The result of this effort is the astonishing Damnation Is My Salvation album. The current band’s sound is a perfect extrapolation of the earlier recordings. Witches Hammer delivers the same primitive, evil thrash but slightly blackened and more technical, tastefully reflecting the unavoidable influence of the musical developments during the intervening years, achieving a sound reminiscent of bands like Ares Kingdom and Destroyer 666.

Three songs on “Damnation Is My Salvation” are re-recorded versions of classic tracks from earlier releases; “Frozen God,” “Deadly Mantis,” and the eponymous, “Witches Hammer” all originally appeared on the band’s demos, but are now revived and repurposed for this new lineup. The other tracks, all newly written and recorded, are masterful. Directed by Banco’s virtuosic guitar work, Witches Hammer deliver a searing frenzy of wretched riffs, frenetic bass, and relentless percussion, perfectly complemented by the barbed rasps of Crude’s menacing vocals.

Few bands, if any, have reformed after decades of inactivity to produce such a powerful addition to an already tremendous catalog. With this album, Witches Hammer both reinforces and builds upon its significant legacy.

Hear for yourself with the brand-new track “Across Azeroth” exclusively HERE, courtesy of Deaf Forever, Germany’s defenders of the true. Also hear the previously revealed “Solar Winds” HERE at Nuclear War Now!‘s Bandcamp.

Black Funeral Releases Track in Advance of 10th Album:

Via Press Release:


Today, Iron Bonehead Productions sets July 3rd as the international release date for Black Funeral‘s highly anticipated tenth album, Scourge of Lamashtu, on CD and vinyl LP formats.

By now, Black Funeral require no introduction. One of the very first American black metal bands, Black Funeral have been long led by the magickal hand of Michael Ford AKA Akhtya Nachttoter, who has concurrently garnered international respect as a leading author on Luciferianism and occultism. Although many lineups have come and gone since the band’s pioneering days of the mid ’90s, Black Funeral found its strongest formation yet with Ankou and the Death Fire – released in 2016 by longtime fans Iron Bonehead – which includes Drowning the Light mastermind Azgorh Drakenhof handling guitar, bass, and keyboards. Two years later followed the mini-album The Dust and the Darkness, also courtesy of Iron Bonehead, showing that this partnership truly brimmed with the fires of creation…and destruction.

Now arrives Scourge of Lamashtu, a Black Magickial sonic invocation of the Seven Udug-hul, Vampyric Deities and Lil-demons of ancient Babylonia. May our kišpe (witchcraft) call forth acasual and abyss-dreaming powers and the pandemonium of Lamashtu, Pazuzu, Nergal, lilû, lilitu, kiskilili and vampyric demonic dead, the emmu. Black Funeral aligns in a underworldly wave of cacophonic disharmony uniting cold black metal with dark ambient soundscapes composed from sounds of desert winds, sands, wilderness, mountains, storms, owls, wolves, and ravens to authentically represent the demons, deities, and ghostly dead within this album.

Black Funeral opens ancient, sand-worn tombs and reconstructs the rituals of kaššaputu (sorcery, black magic), demonology, and vampyrism of the Neo-Assyrian, Neo-Babylonian, and the Ur III (Sumerian) periods of Mesopotamia. The entirety of this recording is centered around malefic demons, rebel-deities, and the vampyric ghosts which still haunt this world. Incantations and spells translated from 8th Century B.C.E. Akkadian compose the core of lyrics. The Seven Udug-hul (utukku) Demons and rebel gods are structured in incantations of seven names, interconnected with Lamashtu, Lilith, and the malicious types of Udug-hul (translating “evil,” “hul” is also formerly spelled as “xul”) demons whose number is legion and drinks the blood (and souls) of human prey.

Boundless, eternal, defiant as ever: Black Funeral call forth the Scourge of Lamashtu!

Hear the first summoning with the brand-new track “Kassaptu Lemuttu” HERE at Iron Bonehead‘s Soundcloud.

Ancient Burial Release Track Ahead of Debut:

Via Press Release:


Today, mysterious Portuguese black metal cult Ancient Burial premiere the new track “Into the Land of Death” at heavily trafficked web-portal NoCleanSinging.com. The track hails from the band’s striking debut album, Beyond the Watchtowers, set for international release on May 1st via Signal Rex on vinyl LP and cassette tape formats. Hear Ancient Burial‘s “Into the Land of Death” in its entirety exclusively HERE.

Ancient Burial hail from the darkest underbelly of Portugal’s forever-thriving raw black metal scene. Although a new entity, with no prior public recordings existing, the band mysteriously may or may not include members of other high-profile hordes. Nevertheless, what they’ve created with their debut album stands for serious reckoning.

Ominously titled Beyond the Watchtowers, Ancient Burial‘s first full-length indeed goes BEYOND: a hysteric, hellacious black (w)hole of horrific frequencies, each smothering the senses with hypnotic magick and almost avant-garde crudity. In one sense, the album slots complementarily alongside so much paradigmatic Portuguese black metal, particularly from the Black Circle, instilling a similar sense of possession and otherworldly intent; but in another, more accurate sense, Ancient Burial bury themselves more deeply into trance states that delicately walk the line between improvisational meltdown and motorik catatonia, carrying over that beyond-obsidian embrace right into the very heart of the listener. Or, more accurately, those who would go Beyond the Watchtowers…

Mystery or none, Ancient Burial will be performing at this year’s Invicta Reqviem Mass VI, curated by Signal Rex and set to take place on December 4th and 5th in Porto, Portugal.

In the meantime, hear the brand-new track “Into the Land of Death” exclusively HERE, courtesy of NoCleanSinging.com. Also hear the previously revealed opening track “Intro + Nighthunt” HERE at Signal Rex‘s Bandcamp.

Curse Upon a Prayer Streaming Entire New Album:

Via Press Release:


Today, Finnish black metal firebrands Curse Upon a Prayer stream the entirety of their highly anticipated third album, Infidel, at heavily trafficked web-portal Black Metal Daily. Set for international release on April 10th via Saturnal Records, hear Curse Upon a Prayer‘s Infidel in its entirety exclusively HERE.

Despite the censoring acts and overall spinelessness of this day and age, Curse Upon a Prayer returns from northern Finland to conquer, kill, and turn the castles of this modern world into sand. Since forming in Tornio in 2010, the band have released two albums – From The Lands of Demise in 2014, and Rotten Tongues in 2015 – and the especially well-received The Three Woes EP in 2018. That EP hastened Curse Upon a Prayer‘s feverish momentum on the live front, where the band gained no small amount of recognition for manifesting their strongly anti-Islamic themes in multiple Quran desecrations.

But at long last, Curse Upon a Prayer deliver their masterwork: the aptly titled Infidel. With no hesitation nor self-doubt, these Finnish infidels have taken another giant step towards the gaping abyss here, a ruthless yet incredibly dynamic assault on the senses and spirituality. No page of the Quran is left unburnt on Infidel: from quintessentially nasty Finnish-style black metal to somber acoustic sections, Curse Upon a Prayer‘s third album ranges a vast spectrum of searing sonics. While flagrant blasphemy is at the core of the band’s being, the artistry across Infidel is undeniable; Curse Upon a Prayer are working within a rarefied field for black metal, and their truly unique character has come to the fore on this seamless song-cycle. Indeed is Infidel threaded together like one massive work, throttling the listener with filthy physicality one minute and haunting their dreams the next, and each of these nine songs reveal deeper, darker truths across the album’s compact yet incredibly satisfying 36 minutes. Allah-raping has never sounded better…

Hasten to prayer, all ye whose lungs breathe fire! Hasten to damnation, all ye true Infidels! Behold the instigating torch hereby known as Curse Upon a Prayer‘s Infidel!

Behold that torch’s fullness in its entirety exclusively HERE, courtesy of Black Metal Daily. Updated preorder info can be found HERE.

Hegemony Premier Music Ahead of Debut Release:

Via Press Release:


Today, Hells Headbangers sets April 24th as the international release date for the striking debut album of America’s Hegemony, Enthroned by Persecution, on CD and vinyl LP formats.

Hailing from Alabama, the four members of Hegemony – drummer Ruination Wielder, bassist Primordial Dominator, guitarist Barbaric Progenitor, and vocalist Fanatical Deathtitan – formed in 2015 and released their first demo a year later. Although a then-brand-new entity, the members of Hegemony possess a wealth of experience in other southern US bands, and that experience for sure showed on Demo MMXVI: a foul explosion of filth, bestial metal savagery executed with exacting cruelty. Not surprising that its three component songs are titled “No Throne Left to Topple,” “Driven by Hedonistic Vice,” and “Fist of Heretical Triumph.”

With those latter two songs reprised for their debut album, Enthroned by Persecution, Hegemony nevertheless strike upon newer, uglier territory here. Still unrepentantly and punishingly physical, here Hegemony move away from the more familiar bestial metal tropes as proffered by such bands as Bestial Raids and earlier Demonomancy and instead drive deeply into the idiom’s most viscous underbelly, bringing to the fore their latent death metal muscle and dragging everything down into caverns most doomed, dire, and disgusting. Arguably more world-eating than before, Hegemony‘s ripped ‘n’ roiling attack is now more reminiscent of such overlooked bestial touchstones as Finland’s Belial and Mythos, Incantation’s earliest work, and especially ’90s Demoncy. As such, alongside labelmates Abysmal Lord‘s recent Exaltation of the Infernal Cabal, with Enthroned by Persecution are Hegemony standing at the forefront of the American South’s rising bestial metal vanguard.

South of Heaven, below Hell, become Enthroned by Persecution with Hegemony! In the meantime, hear the previously revealed “Rise in Turmoil” HERE at Hells Headbangers‘ Bandcamp, where the album can also be preordered.

Death Racer Debut Demo To Be Released Soon:


Austrian upstarts Death Racer will release their debut demo on April 24th through Dying Victims Productions on cassette. The tape will come with a sticker and button. Death Racer includes musicians from Kringa, Hagzissa, Eisenhand, and Chainbreaker.

South Asian Extreme Metal Documentary Ready for Viewing:


Make an effort to check this out. Directed by Roy Dipankar, this documentary takes a very close look at the grime and rage of the South Asia extreme music scene. Featuring: Nafarmaan, Konflict, Multinational Corporations, Primitiv, Plaguethroat, Genocide Shrines, and Impiety (among many others). Look it up on Vimeo. Do it.

Look for Apanthropy to be around as long as the Holocough.