Ygolonac - Strange Aeons

Apologies for the unexplained absence for the preceding fortnight, gentle ones, but rest assured that posting will resume with gusto upon the arrival of the new year.  In the meantime, share with me this horrid lump of coal that I found in my inbox.  Another mad one man metal band in the mode of Brown Jenkins or Aarni, this Ygolonac seems fixated on the fictional grimoires of the Mythos, from what can be deciphered from the song titles and the band name.  Ygolonac is the lord of the perverse and sadistic, the only Old One outside of insidious Nyarlathotep capable of taking human form, and notorious for the ravenous mouths screaming for blood from his palms and groin, traditionally cast in the role of curating the library of suppressed tomes which tend to drive mundane minds into madness.  Ramsey Campbell's brutal and bitterly funny "Cold Print" is perhaps the finest Lovecraftian story produced in the seventies, and while the retro vibe of this nasty debut is probably meant to transcend time and space, I can sense a little disco cokestache under all the noise, maybe just slowed down 800x.

Down at the Bookstore

Individual Thought Patterns

Chuck Schuldiner (May 13, 1967 – December 13, 2001)

RIP

Ennio Morricone - Red Sonja

Yet another long-out-of-print soundtrack that has been repackaged several times in packages of dubious quality and legality, Ennio Morricone's Red Sonja is a haunting piece of majestic oddness.  Combining the epic bombast required for the material with his usual penchant for strange sounds, nonsense vocals, and unusual instrumentation, Morricone deftly mixes with hordes of wind instruments with 80's synth pads, spooky choirs with thunderous junkyard timpani.  I'm not positive which version we have here, and we are bereft of song titles, but it hardly matters;  let the music entrance you, and pay no heed to the blade at your throat. 

I know my future. You have none.

Deicide - Legion

Another crucial piece of your narrator's youth - Deicide's Legion is a classic or crazy, evil death metal merging cartoon Satanism, Lovecraftian cosmic horror, and a level of heaviness heretofore unheard.  The track "Dead but Dreaming" is an important piece on the map of Lovecraftian metal, one of the best known and earliest.   Legion clocks in at just under thirty minutes, but packs more brutality and nihilism into that short time than a dozen albums by lesser bands.  It's easy to forget in light of later shenanigans, but at one time Deicide was the evilest, hardest band in the world. 

Revocate the Agitator

Necromass - Abyss Calls Life

From deep within the swirling mad vortex that calls itself Italian Black Metal, Necromass mixes in some primitive death and doom sounds with their typically melodramatic hate opera.  The over-the-top foppery of most Italian metal is subdued here, replaced with a cool restraint that makes the wilder moments that much more potent.  Much of the album grooves along at a nice mid-tempo gallop, punctuated by twin leads and unpredictable mood swings.  Vocalist Charles Blasphemy (what a name) growls with gusto as well, more in the style of the Swedish death scene than the typical second-wave tortured wail.  Another forgotten treasure from the underworld, brought to you with nothing but contempt and malice.

A Serpent Is Screaming In The Abyss

Scumdogs

RIP Flattus Maximus

Immortal - At the Heart of Winter

Just stopping into the Swamp for a brief moment, long enough to leave you my favorite album by the unkillable tyrant kings of the frozen fjords, Immortal.  The songs on this one are a bit longer and more varied than on their earlier material, and yet this is one of the records where Immortal's roots in thrashy first-wave black metal really shine through as well.  Plus, there's the all-time ESL classic "Tragedies Blows at Horizon."  I will attempt to remain among you until Halloween, but duty beckons...

Darkness with darkness you darkened me

H.C. Minds - The Beginning of the End

Like many of you, I have been basking in the dark radiation of the new Yob album repeatedly for the last several days. I'm not going to post it, but I will unleash this monstrosity from H.C. Minds, for which Mike Scheidt and Travis Foster of Yob once played. While HCM trades in a crusty doom style not dissimilar to Yob, it is nonetheless more filthy, nasty, and preoccupied with apocalyptic matters, making it right at home here in the Swamp. Elements of the nastiest Amebix-worship hardcore creep in around the edges too, lending a particular stink to the proceedings. Lots of ugliness, nihilism, and pessimism here, oh joy.
Land of the Wargoat

Oranssi Pazuzu - Muukalainen Puhuu

Alas, a combination of weird occurrences and technical setbacks has once again stifled communication with the outside world. Have no fear, though, I shall take advantage of this brief window in time to leave you with this terrifying and trippy album of psychedelic black metal from Oranssi Pazuzu. I mentioned this album the other day without realizing that I had neglected to post it, despite the heavy rotation they receive here in Swampland.
Grafting the tenets of second-wave black metal - blastbeats, tremolo picking, and spooky keyboards - and grafting onto them elements of surf, kraut-rock, and dub, Muukalainen Puhuu (roughly "The Stranger Speaks") is a terrifying black hole sure to darken up any end-of-the-world soiree or maddening drift through the cosmos.
Myöhempien Aikojen Pyhien Teatterin Rukoilijasirkka

Fear No Pain

Lord Vicar is the group founded by former Reverend Bizarre guitarist Peter Inverted and vocalist Christian Lindersson, most notorious for replacing Wino in Saint Vitus on the under-appreciated "C.O.D." album. It's about what you would expect - molasses paced swaying doom riffs, eldritch lyrics, and crushing despair and hopelessness. Strangely it also sounds wonderful while I am sitting on a porch, sipping on a fruity girly drink, whiling away my first day of downtime in weeks. Ponder the futility of human existence and pass the pomegranite juice, you wanker!
Pillars Under Water

Devil - Magister Mundi Xum

It's a bit difficult to properly convey the sense of foreboding and gloom on this doom demo from last year while this kitten writhes around on my lap and sheds upon my keyboard, but let's say it's a fair shot between Ghost's Blue Öyster Cult/Mercyful Fate hybrid and the swaggering bell-bottom blues-metal of your Pentagrams and your Witchcrafts. There's an album from this year you'll want to look into if this whets your appetite, but be sure to spit out all the cat hair first.
I Made A Pact

Throng of Shoggoths - Nauseated and Terrified for the Future

Well, this is certainly destined to end up here sooner or later, so let's just go ahead and get it on! Throng of Shoggoths is a sludgy doom monster from Alabama, dedicated to the Lovecraftian and the foul. Leaning heavily towards the obscenely slow but occasionally erupting into fierce and nasty hardcore, this unpredictable beast of a demo splits the difference between Buzzov*en-styled drug sludge, Swedish death/doom, and crusty crossover metal. Truly impressive; I have high hopes for these gentlemen in the future.
Buy here.
Ftagn here.

Rapture

Disappointed?

Don't Be!

Runemagick - On Funeral Wings

I was going to post something entirely different, something quirky and breezy, but as night descends and temperatures drop to an unseasonable chill, it resonates hollowly and I find myself returning to the realms of doom and death. Runemagick is a long-running player in the death/doom game, predating the current boom by two decades, yet they haven't quite received their due in my opinion. Nevertheless, they grimly soldier on, producing album after album of dense, occult misery reeking of Armageddon. This particular example, their eighth LP from 2004, is a sprawling and ambitious epic incorporating many diverse influences without straying too far from its plodding, elephantine gait. Preceded by the more straightforward Darkness Death Doom, and followed by the more funereal Envenom, this full length reflects a murky high-water mark from a band who has yet to produce anything of less than excellent quality.
Black Star Abyss

Necronauts

Another forgotten tome of hideous beauty, Necronauts is the story of noted paranormal pioneer Charles Fort teaming up with Harry Houdini, H.P. Lovecraft, and Arthur Conan Doyle to battle dark forces from outside the universe. The story is a real ripper and the Frazier Irving art is just stunning.
Here

Ythogtha - False Faith

Named for Lin Carter's son of Cthulhu, as presented in "The Dweller in the Tomb," Arizona's black metal monster Ythogtha serves up ten tracks of awful scraping madness (including the most fucked up Black Flag cover of all time) in thirteen minutes. Fans of Bone Awl and the like will enjoy this but frankly their horrid sound is entirely their own. Further pushing the boundaries of taste and listenability, False Faith is a sure-fire way to end Thanksgiving early!
Opener of the Way

Trike

Woof, Swamplings! Holy Shit! Just freshly back from the bar, humoring a geographically proximate birthday boy, who wanted to go see a "party rock and roll" band. I lasted perhaps thirty minutes and three double shots into an indescribably awful "rap"/screamo hybrid abortion before slithering out the back door and into the comfort of my little happy place. I'm aware that this style of music exists, though my experience is limited to brief horrified fragments from Metal Inquisition videos. However, I was not aware the phenomena had encroached this far into Swamp territory, let alone performed by grown-ass men visibly older than myself. Horror!

As a psychic enema, let us peruse this nasty and inscrutable album by one-man band Bob Log III, late of the mighty Doo Rag. A sloppy cocktail of blues, garage-rock, titty obsession, noise, jumpsuits, vaccuum tubes, and cheap whiskey, Mr. Log III's second album comes on like the runt of a pack of giant squid left alone to figure out Hasil Adkins tunes on King Buzzo's down-tuned-to-oblivion guitar with only a stack of Barely Legals and yesterday's bacon and eggs as sustenance for all eternity, captured by Richard Nixon's Oval Office tape recorder and shot into space. Much more sensible than what the kids listen to these days, yes?
Clap Your Tits

Yyrkoon - Occult Medicine

There's always a little something special about French metal, especially of the black and death varieties. Yyrkoon is no exception: they weild a hybrid style somewhat akin to, say, Anaal Nathrakh, but with an added twist of 90's-style death-n-roll à la Entombed and some nutso ESL lyrics. Lazy comparisons and genre-milking aside, my main attraction is of course to their Lovecraftian mindset and commitment to madness. Occult Medicine is a set of songs based around Herbert West, Re-Animator - both the short novel and the series of films. My only minor gripes with this album are the too-clean production and lack of dynamics, but this is more than made up for by the ferocity of the playing and the whirling chaos of the songwriting. Their next album, Unhealthy Opera, is a full descent into Lovecraftian cosmic horror, but tonight the splattery spray of fluids and concrete-muffled night terrors of this one just felt right.
Their heavy steps
And their twisted steps
Awakening a vision of terror
Freezing each human’s brains

Ahulabrum - Magonia

Strange weather outside tonight. Pressure drop, red skies, hot winds. Ominous.

West Virginia's mysterious black noise experiment Ahulabrum consists more of ghostly signals from the stars than it does of traditional earth notions of "music." Ham radio transmissions, humming telephone wires, and phantom vibrations play as much of a part as the guitar or vocals or muffled, subliminal drums. Each song is based on a real-life close encounter, and will reward the diligent researcher with shocking revelations. This is genuinely unnerving art, helping put in perspective the tiny speck of light we circle around, surrounded by oceans of unending blackness and unfathomable horror.
Psyop

Secret of San Saba

Legendary underground cartoonist Jack Jackson wrote and drew this excellent Lovecraftian tale of cosmic horror amid the arid deserts of Texas during the first clashes between the natives and the Spanish missionaries. A dense, beautiful, horrific work - just ripe for the plucking.
Xotl