Later on in this short piece of writing you will find an embedded music video by a Finnish band named Stam1na. At some point you will see an act of dentistry being performed. Now, my girlfriend happens to be a dentist and so I showed it to her, asking her if it was how it’s usually done. She said “no, normally they bleed more”. But brutal dentistry isn’t the only thing painful that vocalist Antti Hyyrynen is subjected to in this video as you abso-fuckin’-lutely need to go find out after the jump.

But first a little more intel, as this band is apparently coming close to being a legend in Finland. They set things in motion in 1996, initially singing in English, but after only three demos switching to Finnish. Their list of releases is incredibly long, but contains mostly demos and splits. Full-length albums released count up to five so far, the last one, titled Nocebo, came out last week.

I noticed this thing pop online last week, but I was too much of a goddamn lame-ass to do anything with it. I just listened to it till my ears fell off and then I mangled my nuts. No idea why I did that, but it wasn’t nice. How different from the song that Eluveitie – which is Gaulish for The Helvetian, so basically The Swiss – launched last week!

Havoc is its name and it’s Eluveitie’s first single of a seventeen (!) song album they released last Friday. The album is titled after the band’s homeland, Switzerland, obviously: Helvetios. Not only is it long in terms of number of songs, it’s also long in terms of playing time: 48 seconds shy of an hour. As I’m intending to order this bugger the very minute I finish writing this post I have no idea yet what it will be like, but if it’s all as good as Havoc, I’m going to have an orgasm that lasts 48 seconds shy of an hour.

To stay with the current trend of Dutch Black Metal, set yesterday by Niek with Mondvolland, I present you the new video by Duister Maanlicht. It’s the first single from their upcoming album “Hoerenzonen & Heksendochters”, a name, which neatly stays in tune with the other albums put out, bearing titles like “Over Ketters, Heksen en Ander Gespuis” and “Als Zwarte Engelen Sterven”. Although in the past people concluded that Duister Maanlicht was a Christian band, regarding their pseudo-religious lyrical context. However, with the release of this video, they seemed to have put this fable to death:

Duister Maanlicht is not a christian band, even though past lyrics might have misled people. Our goal is the war against female vocals in ‘black’ metal, keyboardblack and folk-influences in black metal.

Clear words, but according to our colleagues at Mauce.nl, I’ve found a more plausible explanation for this change of heart. They mention:

Now they’re back with a whole new line-up: a new singer, a new guitarist, a new drummer and a new bass-player. They have been recording new songs for their upcoming record “Hoerenzonen & Heksendochters” . Which will be released via SneeuwStorm Produkties / Nokternal Hemizphear.

So I think the fact that they have a totally new line-up, without Heidendoder who started the band, more than makes up for this change of direction.

Thanks to motig we got ourselves some delicious Norwegian, classically-sounding Metal. Just Metal, no subgenre indicators – although the band itself seems to favor the descriptor ”Doom Heavy Rock”. I think this is just Metal as it could have been in the Eighties. Except that the band has only been together since 2004.

In the time since then, the band aired three studio albums, titled I, II and III. It doesn’t have to be complicated.

UK Doom Metallers Conan have just uploaded a video of them performing a new song of their upcoming album, at the Buffalo Bar, Cardiff. The name Hawk as Weapon, already sounds cool to me, and the live recording sounds promising. I’ve always wondered what these guys would sound like live, and all I can say is that they sound louder and heavier than in the studio. Which is a good thing.

Then who are Conan? We wrote about them little over a month ago, and we were all quite positive. I wrote about their latest record Horseback Battle Hammer

their music feels like you’ve just had a massive blow with a war hammer, and now you lie on the ground, which is wet from the rain, while you can’t feel anything.

While looking at Revolver Magazine’s favourite album covers of 2011, as Mhorgl’s Heresiarch was in there, I saw the cover of ChthoniC’s album Takasago Army come by and the album description certainly caught my mind. The first band that sprung to mind were the Finnish Whispered, who have a similar Japan-related theme spun through their music, and they also use the same weird string instrument. But where Whispered incorporates some traditional Finnish Melodeath influences in their music, ChthoniC uses more Folky elements.

Takao as a song is really good. First it got me craving for some melody which I later got, in the form of a bridge sung in Taiwanese. The song is very dynamic and diverse, and even though I generally despise Asian Metal (especially those weird Japanese bands), I think this is just great.

We have some wickedly brutal news tonight. California Deathcore outfit Impending Doom have released the first single of their upcoming album Baptized in Filth, called For the Wicked (as you’ve probably seen). The single comes with a lyric video, which seems to gain popularity in the Core scene.

Their Facebook page reads:

Formed in 2005, jumped right into the touring lifestyle and gained their success very quickly. The band has released 1 e.p. and 3 full length records, selling over 70,000 records world wide.

Sounds impressive, and it’s true, despite their Christian background and bold lyrics, they tour the world with the biggest bands in Metal, such as DevilDriver, Dying Fetus, Chimaira, Whitechapel, My Children My Bride, the list goes on and on.

Hell, we’re up to date. Yesterday “Melodic Death Metal”-outfit Miseration put out a video for their song Dreamdecipher. Yeah, the Melodic Death Metal is in quotation marks because our holy bible (aka the Metal Encyclopedia) says that, but I can tell you, this is not Melodic Death Metal. Sounds more like Technical Grindcore to me.

Who are Miseration? You ask. Miseration are a Swedish band formed in 2006, and have since produced two full-lengths, on which they play a very heavy, Grindcore-influenced kind of Melodeath. Stylistically they are a very interesting band, and I haven’t really heard something like what they did on their first two albums before. Dreamdecipher however takes their sound to a less original height, although it’s still a good song of course.

Great. I just vomited on my keyboard. Big fuckin’ chunks of breakfast soggy under my fingers as I type this. The reason? Blotted Science! Or well, the pieces of movie they used to score their music to, specifically the bit taken from the 2006 horror flick Slither.

Blotted Science is a San Antonio Texas based instrumental Progressive Metal outfit active since 2004. If you’ve been about on Metal blogs here and there, the name should ring a bell. The band is not only well known for its freakier than fuck tunes, but also consists of three musically experienced and appraised musicians: guitarist Ron Jarzombek (Watchtower, Terrestrial Exiled, Spastic Ink), bassis Alex Webster (Cannibal Corpse, Hate Eternal) and drummer Hannes Grossmann (Obscura, Terrestrial Exiled).

I would swear on my scrotum that I’ve heard this band before, just have no idea where and when. The track I’ve embedded only seems to be online since mid-June and either my short-term memory is leaving me or this just looks a lot like something else I’ve heard a longer time ago. It’s probably the former, combined with the scientifically proven fact that I’m an idiot.

But that’s not what I want to discuss today. Or ever. Instead, let’s talk about Brymir, yeah? They play a de-li-cious form of Pagan / Folk Metal, dark as an armpit inside a sweaty sweater, yet melodic as a motherfucker, like a mix of Ensiferum and Insomnium – thanks to motig for making that comparison and for recommending the band in fact. As inevitable as death, and you’ve probably already guessed it, these guys are Finnish.