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Kalaratri
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PostPosted: Wed Sep 15, 2021 10:32 am 
 

German melodic black/death metallers Thulcandra will release their fourth full length, A Dying Wish, on October 29 through Napalm Records. From the press release:

Quote:
Black/death metal veterans THULCANDRA are back! After six years of silence, the band’s brand new studio album, A Dying Wish, will be released on October 29, 2021 via Napalm Records – once again carrying the burning torch of the glorious death metal era.

Since their foundation by Obscura mastermind Steffen Kummerer in 2003, THULCANDRA became an indispensable protagonist in the European extreme metal-sphere that reaches way back to the magnificent origins of their genre. THULCANDRA are musically and visually shaped by bands like Entombed, Sacramentum and Unanimated, but mainly influenced by genre carving act Dissection.

A Dying Wish was produced at Unisound Studio by Dan Swanö, keeping the black flame of Jon Nödtveidt alive and worthy. A Dying Wish transports the listener right into an icy soundscape of a never ending, severe winter. With 10 blood-freezing tracks delivering clashing guitar riffs, epic slow moments driven by atmospheric acoustic guitars and rapid outbursts of dark and raspy screams, THULCANDRA creates another record that continues the great legacy of true death metal.

Today, THULCANDRA released their staggering opener track from A Dying Wish, entitled Funeral Pyre, alongside a strong music video! The track swiftly showcases clear direction: a mystic intro launches the calm before the snowstorm, which arrives seconds later with freezing riffs, grim growls and powerful drums.

Steffen Kummerer on the first single:
“With “Funeral Pyre” we present you the opening track of A Dying Wish and show you a first glimpse of new music in years. With a foul, unpolished and rotten attitude “Funeral Pyre” takes you on a ride between bitter sweet melodies, fast forward pushing up-tempo blast beats and a sheer steamrolled performance.”


Image

Tracklisting:
1. Funeral Pyre
2. Scarred Grandeur
3. Orchard of Grievance
4. In Vain
5. Nocturnal Heresy
6. The Slivering Silver
7. In Bleak Misery
8. A Shining Abyss
9. Devouring Darkness
10. A Dying Wish

Funeral Pyre has been released as the first single:

Spoiler: show


I know some people consider Thulcandra to be nothing more than a Dissection clone, but I've always enjoyed their output. The first single sounds really good IMO, it definitely gives me those classic 90s Swedish meloblack vibes that I listen to this band for.

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MRmehman
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PostPosted: Wed Sep 15, 2021 11:48 am 
 

Oh sweet, a new Dissection album! :boo:

I'm hopeful for this release and given I'm a big melodic black metal fan, I'm probably going to enjoy it but I hope they've taken the last couple years to find a voice more their own. Thulcandra albums end up being a little "one and done" for me because there's just not that much to their sound.
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Spiner202
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PostPosted: Wed Sep 15, 2021 7:57 pm 
 

I'm only familiar with Thulcandra's third album, but I really like it. I know they're a Dissection-worship band, but this new song felt way more blatant in ripping off Dissection than what I recall from the third album. Still, I'm looking forward to this and will probably pick it up. Great artwork too!

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Gunslinger21
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Joined: Tue Oct 03, 2017 4:11 am
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PostPosted: Wed Sep 15, 2021 8:20 pm 
 

I could swear I was listening to The Somberlain again when I hit play on that video. Not bad but I'll just stick to the original to be honest.

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ChildClownOutlet
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Joined: Fri Dec 16, 2011 4:52 pm
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PostPosted: Wed Sep 15, 2021 11:08 pm 
 

Speaking of, I still think Thulcandra's cover of The Somberlain is superior to Dissections.
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Bingewolf
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PostPosted: Wed Sep 15, 2021 11:39 pm 
 

For as much hate as this is getting, I like the track. I get that it's totally Dissection worship black metal.... but I love Dissection and they haven't existed in 15 years. So I get a bit nostalgic and appreciative of the music here. I'll say the album cover and title are terrible, but the music is cool.

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Discordant
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Joined: Fri Oct 05, 2018 2:27 pm
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PostPosted: Thu Sep 16, 2021 2:48 am 
 

Always enjoy some Dissection worship! Been waiting for a new Thulcandra for a long time and this new track is solid enough!
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draconiondevil
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Joined: Wed Mar 26, 2008 4:21 pm
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PostPosted: Thu Sep 16, 2021 9:57 am 
 

Recently ran through these guy's discography and now I'm pretty excited for this release. Melodic black metal rules.

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cultofkraken
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PostPosted: Thu Sep 16, 2021 2:51 pm 
 

Such a sucker for this style, between Unanimated’s new one coming this year and Thulcandra it’s exciting to see bands continuing the style. Now if we can just get the new Sacramentum and Dawn..
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LycanthropeMoon
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PostPosted: Thu Sep 16, 2021 3:11 pm 
 

^Necrophobic also released a ripper of an album last year. Swedish (and Swedish-style) meloblackdeath is back, baby!

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cultofkraken
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PostPosted: Thu Sep 16, 2021 3:21 pm 
 

LycanthropeMoon wrote:
^Necrophobic also released a ripper of an album last year. Swedish (and Swedish-style) meloblackdeath is back, baby!


Oh don’t I know it, my favourite band!
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Kalaratri
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PostPosted: Thu Sep 16, 2021 9:30 pm 
 

cultofkraken wrote:
Such a sucker for this style, between Unanimated’s new one coming this year and Thulcandra it’s exciting to see bands continuing the style. Now if we can just get the new Sacramentum and Dawn..


The new Sacramentum is in progress. I listened to an interview Nisse Karlen did back in June today and they're well into the writing process. The biggest issue is that it takes a lot of time for Nisse to get his songwriting ideas across to the other members, since he doesn't play guitar well enough to just show them. But yeah, the new album is taking shape and, fingers, crossed, will be out through Century Media next year (Nisse didn't offer up any timeline for when it'll actually be done but I'm going to be optimistic). They're also going to reissue The Coming of Chaos and Thy Black Destiny with new artwork by Necrolord.

As for Dawn, who knows. They're somewhere in the process of recording based on the snippets of music they've shared this year on Facebook but given their history it's anyone's guess if and when a new album will surface.

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Bingewolf
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PostPosted: Thu Sep 16, 2021 10:03 pm 
 

How does Century Media have all of the bands we're talking about (except for Thulcandra)??? They should really re-launch Century Black.

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Kalaratri
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PostPosted: Thu Sep 16, 2021 10:11 pm 
 

Bingewolf wrote:
How does Century Media have all of the bands we're talking about (except for Thulcandra)??? They should really re-launch Century Black.


Well Sacramentum were on the label before the broke up and are still under contract after reforming. They signed Unanimated back in 2018 IIRC and Necrophobic around the same time, and they reissued both of Dawn's albums a few years ago so I think they at least have some sort of license deal with them. Not to mention Naglfar have been on the label for years, and they have non-Swedish melodic black metal bands like Dark Fortress as well. I guess someone from the label is a huge fan of Swedish melodic black metal in general.

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Bingewolf
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PostPosted: Thu Sep 16, 2021 10:27 pm 
 

Yeah, for sure someone does haha.... When I was a kid, I loved the Century Black label. I remember ordering a comp they made that had a burning church on the cover and the CD case had a match in the spine. Thought it was a really cool CD (I still have it somewhere). Over the past couple of years, I see that Century has moved away from a lot of the mainstream metal sounds and moved back towards the underground so, for nostalgia sake, it would be kind-of cool if they did relaunch Century Black. As a BM fan, it would be awesome if one of the 'big' metal labels really started trying to develop BM again.

After Century, Nuclear Blast signed a bunch of black metal bands in the earlier 2000s - but they don't do that as much anymore either.

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Kalaratri
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PostPosted: Thu Sep 16, 2021 10:34 pm 
 

Bingewolf wrote:
Yeah, for sure someone does haha.... When I was a kid, I loved the Century Black label. I remember ordering a comp they made that had a burning church on the cover and the CD case had a match in the spine. Thought it was a really cool CD (I still have it somewhere). Over the past couple of years, I see that Century has moved away from a lot of the mainstream metal sounds and moved back towards the underground so, for nostalgia sake, it would be kind-of cool if they did relaunch Century Black. As a BM fan, it would be awesome if one of the 'big' metal labels really started trying to develop BM again.

After Century, Nuclear Blast signed a bunch of black metal bands in the earlier 2000s - but they don't do that as much anymore either.


Yeah, that would be pretty cool. While they're at it, they should make Century Death a real thing (to explain, when they released Blood Incantation's Hidden History of the Human Race outside of North America on all the physical products the Century Media logo on the back was altered to read Century Death). They've turned their focus to signing a lot of OSDM recently as well so they might as well do it.

Nuclear Blast does still sign some black metal although I don't think it's a priority for them. A lot of it is post-black metal/blackgaze stuff like Alcest, Ghost Bath and Mol, but they did recently sign Watain.

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Bingewolf
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PostPosted: Thu Sep 16, 2021 10:45 pm 
 

Kalaratri wrote:
Bingewolf wrote:
Yeah, for sure someone does haha.... When I was a kid, I loved the Century Black label. I remember ordering a comp they made that had a burning church on the cover and the CD case had a match in the spine. Thought it was a really cool CD (I still have it somewhere). Over the past couple of years, I see that Century has moved away from a lot of the mainstream metal sounds and moved back towards the underground so, for nostalgia sake, it would be kind-of cool if they did relaunch Century Black. As a BM fan, it would be awesome if one of the 'big' metal labels really started trying to develop BM again.

After Century, Nuclear Blast signed a bunch of black metal bands in the earlier 2000s - but they don't do that as much anymore either.


Yeah, that would be pretty cool. While they're at it, they should make Century Death a real thing (to explain, when they released Blood Incantation's Hidden History of the Human Race outside of North America on all the physical products the Century Media logo on the back was altered to read Century Death). They've turned their focus to signing a lot of OSDM recently as well so they might as well do it.

Nuclear Blast does still sign some black metal although I don't think it's a priority for them. A lot of it is post-black metal/blackgaze stuff like Alcest, Ghost Bath and Mol, but they did recently sign Watain.


Oh that's awesome! I didn't know that about the Blood Incantation release... I knew that they signed a bunch of ODSM too but you make a good point... Century Black was one of my first exposures to the black metal scene and I bet a bunch young kids go through the same thing now so it would be really cool if they leaned into it.

You're right about NB - I just don't find myself liking much of their output, which is totally my problem. I could be wrong, but maybe the last NB black metal signing I liked was Keep of Kalessin. I don't like Alcest anymore and I didn't like Mol or Ghost Bath ever...

I didn't know they signed Watain though, that's cool. Jens Pruter, who used to be A&R at Century is now the A&R at NB so maybe he moved them over as part of him moving.

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Kalaratri
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PostPosted: Thu Sep 16, 2021 10:54 pm 
 

Bingewolf wrote:
Kalaratri wrote:
Bingewolf wrote:
Yeah, for sure someone does haha.... When I was a kid, I loved the Century Black label. I remember ordering a comp they made that had a burning church on the cover and the CD case had a match in the spine. Thought it was a really cool CD (I still have it somewhere). Over the past couple of years, I see that Century has moved away from a lot of the mainstream metal sounds and moved back towards the underground so, for nostalgia sake, it would be kind-of cool if they did relaunch Century Black. As a BM fan, it would be awesome if one of the 'big' metal labels really started trying to develop BM again.

After Century, Nuclear Blast signed a bunch of black metal bands in the earlier 2000s - but they don't do that as much anymore either.


Yeah, that would be pretty cool. While they're at it, they should make Century Death a real thing (to explain, when they released Blood Incantation's Hidden History of the Human Race outside of North America on all the physical products the Century Media logo on the back was altered to read Century Death). They've turned their focus to signing a lot of OSDM recently as well so they might as well do it.

Nuclear Blast does still sign some black metal although I don't think it's a priority for them. A lot of it is post-black metal/blackgaze stuff like Alcest, Ghost Bath and Mol, but they did recently sign Watain.


Oh that's awesome! I didn't know that about the Blood Incantation release... I knew that they signed a bunch of ODSM too but you make a good point... Century Black was one of my first exposures to the black metal scene and I bet a bunch young kids go through the same thing now so it would be really cool if they leaned into it.

You're right about NB - I just don't find myself liking much of their output, which is totally my problem. I could be wrong, but maybe the last NB black metal signing I liked was Keep of Kalessin. I don't like Alcest anymore and I didn't like Mol or Ghost Bath ever...

I didn't know they signed Watain though, that's cool. Jens Pruter, who used to be A&R at Century is now the A&R at NB so maybe he moved them over as part of him moving.


I'm pretty sure it was Jens who signed Watain. A lot of Century's old A&R guys work for Nuclear Blast now, actually. The guys who work at CM now are very much focused on a lot of underground stuff, not just extreme metal but a lot of traditional heavy metal (Bewitcher and Spirit Adrift are pretty good examples of recent signings on that front) as well as thrash/crossover (like Enforced) and even prog (i.e Wilderun).

Coming back to Swedish style meloblack, it's cool to see it having a bit of a resurgence. There were always bands pursuing this specific sound after the 90s but it seems to be getting a bit more popular now, with old bands reforming and releasing new music and newer bands popping up. The fact that fairly high profile bands like Uada, whatever you may think of them, are clearly indebted to that sound and don't try to hide it probably helps in terms of getting new people into it.

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FLIPPITYFLOOP
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PostPosted: Fri Sep 17, 2021 12:15 am 
 

Kalaratri wrote:
Coming back to Swedish style meloblack, it's cool to see it having a bit of a resurgence. There were always bands pursuing this specific sound after the 90s but it seems to be getting a bit more popular now, with old bands reforming and releasing new music and newer bands popping up. The fact that fairly high profile bands like Uada, whatever you may think of them, are clearly indebted to that sound and don't try to hide it probably helps in terms of getting new people into it.


Agreed. I think 20 years ago we would likely scoff at a band like Thulcandra, but from what I recall there hasn't been much happening with this style of meloblack for a number of years (granted I'm not super familiar with Necrophobic or Unanimated as mentioned above - I should give them a look - but aside from them, who else was doing this???). I don't mind this old style resurfacing a little bit, even if the bands aren't completely original - if they make good tunes, I'm in.

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Kalaratri
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PostPosted: Fri Sep 17, 2021 12:33 am 
 

FLIPPITYFLOOP wrote:
Kalaratri wrote:
Coming back to Swedish style meloblack, it's cool to see it having a bit of a resurgence. There were always bands pursuing this specific sound after the 90s but it seems to be getting a bit more popular now, with old bands reforming and releasing new music and newer bands popping up. The fact that fairly high profile bands like Uada, whatever you may think of them, are clearly indebted to that sound and don't try to hide it probably helps in terms of getting new people into it.


Agreed. I think 20 years ago we would likely scoff at a band like Thulcandra, but from what I recall there hasn't been much happening with this style of meloblack for a number of years (granted I'm not super familiar with Necrophobic or Unanimated as mentioned above - I should give them a look - but aside from them, who else was doing this???). I don't mind this old style resurfacing a little bit, even if the bands aren't completely original - if they make good tunes, I'm in.


As long as it's made with passion, in the right spirit, and the tunes are there I'm all for it. Steffen is obviously more well known for Obscura but he's always had a love for this style of black metal and for me it shows in the songwriting. I'll admit that Thulcandra might hew a bit close to being a pastiche of Dissection at times but honestly speaking I can't think of many newer bands that are able to channel the spirit of those first two Dissection albums with anywhere near the same conviction. Considering that Dissection has been dead and buried for close to two decades now I'm totally fine with them continuing in this style if they can keep writing killer tunes.

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Bingewolf
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PostPosted: Fri Sep 17, 2021 4:48 pm 
 

Kalaratri wrote:
FLIPPITYFLOOP wrote:
Kalaratri wrote:
Coming back to Swedish style meloblack, it's cool to see it having a bit of a resurgence. There were always bands pursuing this specific sound after the 90s but it seems to be getting a bit more popular now, with old bands reforming and releasing new music and newer bands popping up. The fact that fairly high profile bands like Uada, whatever you may think of them, are clearly indebted to that sound and don't try to hide it probably helps in terms of getting new people into it.


Agreed. I think 20 years ago we would likely scoff at a band like Thulcandra, but from what I recall there hasn't been much happening with this style of meloblack for a number of years (granted I'm not super familiar with Necrophobic or Unanimated as mentioned above - I should give them a look - but aside from them, who else was doing this???). I don't mind this old style resurfacing a little bit, even if the bands aren't completely original - if they make good tunes, I'm in.


As long as it's made with passion, in the right spirit, and the tunes are there I'm all for it. Steffen is obviously more well known for Obscura but he's always had a love for this style of black metal and for me it shows in the songwriting. I'll admit that Thulcandra might hew a bit close to being a pastiche of Dissection at times but honestly speaking I can't think of many newer bands that are able to channel the spirit of those first two Dissection albums with anywhere near the same conviction. Considering that Dissection has been dead and buried for close to two decades now I'm totally fine with them continuing in this style if they can keep writing killer tunes.


Fully agreed. I loved Dissection and I love the style, so if bands are doing this in a meaningful way, I'll respond to it. Thulcandra is doing it in a meaningful way... The song is cool. I'm always down for listening to something that is good, whether it's inspired by someone or a unique take.

Let's be honest, black metal in general is often inspired by the early wave.

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Kalaratri
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PostPosted: Tue Oct 05, 2021 10:21 am 
 

The second single is out. It's much more riff driven than the first one.


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Bingewolf
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PostPosted: Thu Oct 07, 2021 11:45 pm 
 

I like this! A lot... The new project is certainly promising.

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Bingewolf
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PostPosted: Wed Oct 27, 2021 5:03 pm 
 

Another new track has been released:


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Kalaratri
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PostPosted: Sat Oct 30, 2021 1:45 pm 
 

The full album stream is up:


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ChildClownOutlet
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PostPosted: Sat Oct 30, 2021 4:38 pm 
 

Bingewolf wrote:
Another new track has been released:




That solo and after was amazing, can't wait to listen to the whole album
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