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

Briton Rites - For Mircala

 

Greetings, dearies!  I have once again returned to the Swamp, and am back among you.  Today I have for you one of the great unheard doom albums of the last year, the debut album from Georgia's hirsute Briton Rites. Effortlessly evoking the dark history of doom metal without sounding artificially retro or atavistic, For Mircala is a loose concept album centered around vampirism and Lovecraftian dimensional bleedthrough.  I have a particular weakness for metal bands with literate and diverse sources, and these chaps certainly deliver on that front: the title cut is based on a pre-Dracula vampire novel; "The Right Hand of Doom" is grounded in a Robert E. Howard short story starring his demon-hunting Puritan, Solomon Kane; several other are grounded in Hammer Horror flicks and pulpy supernatural melodrama.  Musically, it owes a heavy debt to the doomier side of NWOBHM, like Witchfinder General of Pagan Altar, with killer vocals from Phil Swanson (of such Swamp favorites as Hour of 13, Seamount, and Atlantean Kodex) and guitars by Howie Bentley of legendary Georgia metal band Cauldron Born.  More importantly, every song is memorable, catchy, and tough - no pretty stuff here, just doom and blood and haze.

The doom evoked by the words he spoke, as the hand began to crawl

Ancient Rites - Dim Carcosa

I present to you a fine slab of Lovecraftian cheese courtesy of Belgian black metallers Ancient Rites. Cheese, you say? Oh yes, my friends, this is black metal at its Bal-Sagothy nerdiest, neither scary nor kvlt. However, despite the innate goofiness of the "symphonic black metal" approach and the muddled viking/satanic/Lovecraftian potpourri of lyrical themes, we still have a solid album of catchy and strange music that doesn't sound like anybody else. Of note beyond the title track are the fish metal-leaning "North Sea" and the operatic apocalypse hymn "Götterdämmerung." Mercifully they also have the good sense to keep songs short and to trim the album to a fat-free 45 minutes, so as not to break the spell. Behold!
...And the Horns Called for War

Moss & Torture Wheel - The Bridge ov Madness

Well, wee ones, I must once again take a brief sabbatical from the Swamp, but as is tradition I leave you with a favorite to tide you over. Moss has appeared here before, and this split with similar-minded funeral doom purveyors Torture Wheel is among the best of their catalog. Here's what you're in for: crushing slowness, echoed wailing from the next dimension over, deeply occult and deliberately opaque themes, and a primordial moaning that seems to suggest continental drift more than the rhythm section of a band. Listen to this on repeat until I rejoin you upon Sunday and we shall discuss what you have learned.
Aldebaran

Aldebaran - Voz De Aldebaran

Aside from the fact that they share a name with one of our favourite doom bands and the orange giant star circled by the dreaded King in Yellow, and the fact that this demo is from Portugal in 1994, I have no information at all on this mysterious cassette (not even a cover). I've been listening to it quite a bit lately though, it's a kind of rocking punk sound (in Portuguese) that somehow reminds me certain of a southern Florida sound from the 80's and 90's, especially The Eat/No Fraud/Fuckboyz. Without knowing what the man is singing about, I can tell you he certainly sounds like he means it! You might want to crack open a beer and pour it all over yourself while listening to this.

Mulheres De Hoje Sem Educação

Ossadogva - Iä Ancient One

Speaking of Hastur (get it?), it's no secret that your host takes an unhealthy bizarre relish in obscuritan sub-sub-genres, and this doomish one-man black metal hybrid beast from the one-shoggoth town of Kremenchug, Ukraine, virtually defines "depressive Lovecraftian ritual black/doom." This is their first release, a three song demo championing the three amigos of the apocalypse - Cthulhu, you-know-who, and Yog-Sothoth (on the excellently ESL titled and wildly disorienting "Gates to the Yog-Sothoth.") They are apparently quite fervid little cultist, eschewing "alcohol, drugs, tobacco and similar stimulators; do not watch TV, listen to radio, read newspapers, use mobile phones and do not give concerts and autographs." One may read a delightfully babelfished interview with them here, ending with a choice refrain:
IA Ancient One! Да пожрет Azagthoth ваше сознание!

The Hastur Cycle - Mike, Shut the Fuck Up

Salutations, scumbags! I have returned from merciful oblivion carrying copious amounts of medicinal resinated heavy metal in a garbage bag slung over my shoulder, scraping down your chimney like a loathesome Santa. A recent re-reading of The Dream Quest of Unknown Kadath goosed your foul narrator to the fact that Unspeakable Hastur hasn't been spoken of enough here in the Swamp, so let's annihilate life as we know it with this wacky thrash record, which is brief but extremely memorable, like being headbutted by a goat. Note the two subtle puns - not only the drug related band initials but also the seemingly silly album title, obviously a sly nod to He Who Shall Not Be Named. Say it aloud with me:
Hastur Hastur Hastuuuuurrrrrrrrrr

Aldebaran - Dwellers in Twilight

Poetically named after the distant star circled by a dark planet ruled by The High Priest Not to Be Described, a.k.a. He Who Cannot Be Named, Portland's crusty doomslingers Aldebaran deliver evil with the patience of an undying embodiment, an apotheosis of gleeful, dancing chaos. Wikipedia would ignorantly have it that this nameless entity is an avatar of our beloved Nyarlathotep, but true scholars know that all signs point to Hastur the Unspeakable, the half-brother of Cthulhu. Much like the monstrous yellow-robed flautist himself, the band slowly allows its "music" to unfold over a seeming eternity, drawing the incautious into its sinister bliss while draining them dry of life and hope. The album begins simply, with ringing open whole notes, but slowly melodic fragments appear and eventually begin to overlap and intertwine, with sinister growls and bellowed cries competing for earspace in an increasingly claustrophobic atmosphere. Surrender to their charms and be lost, little speck.
A motionless descent sightless and silent into blackened gulphs

Teach Your Plants to Talk

In celebration of the upcoming 100th post here in the Swamp, your host has compiled these varied fragments from several of the tomes already featured here and from the many more that remain, so far, obscure. Here is a track listing - I will let the yawning infinity of madness speak for itself:
Joseph LoDuca - Introduction
Anaal Nathrakh - The Yellow King
Argus - Bending Time
Ironsword - Overlords Of Chaos
Arkham Witch - Legends of the Deep
Rotting Christ - The Old Coffin Spirit
Dagon - It Came from Beneath the Waves
Payne's Gray - Within the Vault
Bog People - Slow Green Pace
Brown Jenkins - Dagonite
Crystal Eyes - Dead City Dreaming
Dayglo Abortions - The Spawn of Yog Sothoth
Teen Cthulhu - The Great Race Of Yith
Electric Wizard - Dunwich
Fall of The Idols - Cold Air
The Grotesquery - The Terrible Old Man
Harvist - He Who Rises From the Deep
Kataklysm - Mystical Plane Of Evil
The Lamp Of Thoth - The Doom That Came To Sarnath
Mercyful Fate - The Mad Arab
Dunwich - Strange Sacrifice
The Wandering Midget - I Am the Gate
Krallice - Dimensional Bleedthrough
Henry Wentworth Akeley - Akeley's Wax Cylinder Recording

Teach Your Plants to Talk