Mylingar - Út (2026) Review

Following the malignant trilogy of dead roads, dead dreams, and dead souls released by anonymous Swedish (?) project Mylingar between 2016 - 2019,  we were left stunned and aghast but also almost forgot about them thereafter. Nearly seven years is a long time to wait, as the band’s return to action with their third full-length album, Út, and first chapter of another trilogy, begins something new without a single edge softened, picking up where it was buried in 2019 with Döda själar. The long break has only allowed the darkness to insistently seep into Mylingar’s domineering black / death metal anticosmos, crying out in phrases of ritual and dissonance from a wound once opened, and now re-torn. 

The new record consists of seven tracks, whose titles form a sentence in old Norse that translates to the grim following: “May my blood cultivate the soil from below” [1]. Út’s production provides a distinct sense of a cold enclosure, a chamber sealed and echoing riffs sometimes distinct, sometimes under impenetrable layers of buzz. Mylingar’s ever-present pressure concedes to some unsought blurriness, however there’s an appreciable level of compositional intermixture and rhythm fracturing that not only destabilizes the listener’s footing, it also adds to the album the intrigue and substance necessary for such works to float. Both sound and music are disturbing, a cohesive descent to places of unlight with disharmony woven into every formal decision the record makes.

A strange tension between motion and stasis is established under the overarching wall-to-wall carnage, where it’s not directly clear when the band slides from one track section to the next. Closest relatives to this kind of relentless, compressed savagery would be bands like Altarage or Abyssal, with moments distantly reminding me of Serpent Column / Impetuous Ritual at times, however Mylignar also use restraint as a weapon, unlike their tempestuous contemporaries. Opener “Megi”, alongside following tracks “blóð” and “mitt” are overtaken by this trance and keep pummeling to a point of meditative disconnect. Slower passages are dragged along for extended torment, and the first side is not even the most unsettling of the album.

Alongside the surplus of primitive force encountered on the vehement lines of “raekta”, lies the complete surrender of the band to its bestial self, as Út slowly introduces elements of harsh noise electronics in the beginning and end of “jarðveginn”, one of the most punishing pieces of the album. Inside the turbulence, one can also notice the verminous, Cruciamentum-esque death metal riffing on “af”, as well as the truly monstrous middle part. The closing "Neðan", the longest track on Út, opens with what could be a seriously malformed, late ‘00s - early ‘10s era Krallice guitar notion, and then indulges in distorted electronics that completely liquefy the album into abstruse harsh noise. 

Mylingar always proceed with a playing style that defies segmentation, and the overall musicianship nails it: uncanny and foundational bass work, drumming that articulates the record’s processional rhythm, and the highlight of these absolutely agonizing vocals moaning against sizzling magma (most notably, for me, on “raekta” and the high-pitched screams of “jarðveginn”, but really, everywhere). By the time it ends, and due to the album’s otherworldly denouement, it feels like Út has taken the listener somewhere fairly far from the point of departure, despite an apparent homogeneity.  Considering the period in which the band released their previous trilogy, it’s only safe to assume there’s more from Mylingar in the works, and maybe closer than you think.

Release: April 17th, 2026 | Amor Fati Productions
Rating: 4 out of 5

    [1] AN NCS PREMIERE: MYLINGAR — “ÚT”. No Clean Singing. (2026).

Guyođ - Death Throes of a Drowning God (EP, 2026) Review

I came in contact with Guyođ from Austria quite abnormally a few years ago, around the time of their first split release with Lehm and before their debut album, Heart of Thy Abyss, was even on the horizon. The band hit the mark with that album of abyssal doom / death metal and left overall positive impressions to anyone who came across it, especially when convincingly communicating it live during their concerts. Latest effort, Death Throes of a Drowning God, extends the foundations of the debut and pushes its vision to darker, more introspective territories.

The EP consists of four main tracks, interspersed with short dark ambient / drone interludes, all titled “Signal” followed by specific numbers. While the structure may seem unconventional at first, for people who dwell within the discographies of bands like Teitanblood or Necros Christos, this is no mysterious domain. From the start, the record establishes a dense, claustrophobic sonic field nurtured by the drone waves of “Signal 00347”, and then the deathlike pressure exerted by the oppressive first full track “A Thousand Invisible Eyes”. 

Despite Guyođ’s dim lit setting and gritty sound, guitar melodies are discernible all along as riffs undulate between a variety of tempos from speedy considerably slow. Along them, the remarkable vocal performance often takes the lead and faithfully serves the needs the composition, be it growls, shrieks or hushed whispers. The band steps on the aggression in the following tracks, "Behind Walls of Ice" and "Vortex of Infinite Despair", which feature furious blast beats surfacing from the murk before tempos drop to depths, structurally providing distinct moments when the EP embraces its doom side, and when it moves in frenzy. 

For me, the last piece “Hestia Drowning” is to me the most complete compositional statement on Death Throes of a Drowning God and the most successful in suffocation. A church organ introduction (which can also be heard earlier, on “A Thousand Invisible Eyes”) and a series of inescapable guitar lines and agonizing vocals, continued by the last short distorted ambient outro, “Signal 79357”, finish the EP off in panegyric terms. A few efficient tracks connected with brief intrusions of oceanic static and drone to reset the atmosphere, Guyođ’s authentic presence on Death Throes of a Drowning God has enough to compel you. 

Release: January 23rd, 2026 | Grazil Records
Rating: 3.5 out of 5

Pig's Blood - Destroying the Spirit (2026) Review

With less alarm and greater eagerness we seize the third full-length album by Milwaukee-based war metal moniker Pig’s Blood, whose first two drops of venom I absorbed with foolish confidence. Seven years after the release of A Flock Slaughtered, and after a sensible transfer to the ghastly carriage of Dark Descent Records, the band’s imposed brutality presents itself with a refined sound, and a constant pressure of blackened death that never ceases to shock. Destroying the Spirit doesn’t shy away from the usual constant bashing and blasphemy, while also now harnessing an attenuated conception of buoyancy across its 33 minutes of duration that boosts the outcome above the genre's bar of mediocrity. 

The first and most notable aspect on the album is the sharpened production, which is less clouded than in previous works, and yet not at the expense of heaviness. A tightly mastered sound offers the instruments discernible space, it’s audible and binds everything into notable cohesion, finally exposing all the grisly tools of the band openly to the listener. Destroying the Spirit's core still remains what is expected from Pig's Blood: the band operates on all speeds as guitars, drums and vocals erupt and spill molten phrases that violently march with clear delineation in the liminal zone between old-school death and black metal. 

The tracks on Destroying the Spirit are immediate but deceptive, as the small rhythmic changes and recurring patterns indicate an exquisite compositional grasp on war metal. “Rabid Dogs” and “Satanic Hammer of Justice” lean the strongest into that direction and praising the corpses of Archgoat, while there’s an odor of Incantation everywhere, especially e.g. in the main riffs and transitory soloing of “Power to Stop It”, or the opener “Standing In Depravity”. Nothing but pure delight is to be experienced when listening to the bestial madness of tracks like “Tartarean Infection” and even more so “Ravenous Hellslaught”, which also has a Profanatica flavor in its logic of scale riffing that always delivers.

Same goes for the opening lines of one of the Destroying the Spirit’s standouts, “Aftermath”, which draws from all the aforementioned and also features well-implemented higher-pitched howls, unlike the orkish growling that takes place for the most part of the album. You’ll find the same vocal terror on the convulsive closing piece, “Strikeforce of Isolate Will”, where the band finishes things off with an epic blast. Across the record, strains of blackened thrash (for example, in the middle part of the title track) can also be picked up, and there’s a fixed feel of forward momentum akin to early Deicide, but through a considerably more blackened lens and militaristic cadence.

Ultimately, the tenets of the genre are not reinvented, but with Destroying the Spirit, the grip is certainly tightened. Pig's Blood remain ruthless, the desecration is controlled and happens in broad daylight. The album is offered for repeated listens, seeks to overwhelm with precision and brute force, resonating with the savage legacy of old assailants from Blasphemy to Order From Chaos. I found its clarity to be a big advantage in appreciating the new material and its impact, hinting how the band can manage just fine based on musical merit alone. The spirit has been destroyed.

Release: April 24th, 2026 | Dark Descent Records
Rating: 4 out of 5

Ultha - A Light So Dim (2026) Review

With an overly potent series of full-length albums that peaked with 2022’s remarkable All That Has Never Been True, Ultha have slowly outpaced most of their contemporaries the last decade, in a way that one not even have noticed if one hasn’t been observant. As fine practitioners of misery-fueled atmospheric black metal, the band’s low-key confident, promotionless release of fifth record A Light So Dim stands at the crossroads of a well-settled sound and experimentation that feels quite natural, given their individuality.

We’re looking at a considerable expansion of the atmospheric black metal skeleton, which now houses, even more distinctly, some of the band’s impulses towards ambient, darkwave, post-rock or even dream-pop, without losing the thread of what makes them Ultha in the first place. I found several characteristics that I love from the band in A Light So Dim, especially in the soaring guitar riffs that made them so effective to me in the first place. At the same time, there’s an accustomed focus on a more widespread, anguished sound that hangs over you like a sky that refuses to clear.

Right off the bat, the band doubles down on what, in my opinion, they do best. Long-form black metal heavily into post-metal territory, with the guitar lines having an unmistakable potency on “Love As We’re Falling Down”, the first longer piece after the three-minute, nonconformist introduction “The Unseen World”. Bracketed sequencing rightfully earns Ultha’s conceptual ambitions, and there’s constantly new elements to discover in each track, or part of a part of a track. Most sections take minutes to fully reveal themselves, and no matter how long it takes, there’s always a tremolo that finally surges.

A Light So Dim has a less of a pugnacious viewpoint compared to previous records, one that can also be found on the ominous “Hex Upon Our Heads”, mostly fast-paced tension with death metal growls before a last minute of ambiance. At other times, Ultha defy the metal backbone completely, as for example on “The Quiet Current”, fully on clean vocals and guitars until right about the end, where a switch is flipped again. The record is wholly characterized by vocal diversity, and apart from the band’s known black metal howling or growls, there is frequent both male and female clean singing. 

A personal highlight is the avantgarde track “What's Yours Is Yours To Carry”, which relies on a beat-like opening tempo and then is embraced by angelic female vocals. In the middle of the track, the band introduces perilous slow-paced riffing that is essentially carved out of classic Black Sabbath, coupled with a female voice that makes you think it’s someone like Windhand instead of Ultha. Interchanging with lower growling and a distorted opera sample at the end, it’s one of the most interesting tracks of the album.

Listening to this could be a test of patience, as passages are conveyed with repetition that might be too much for some to put up with. This was more evident to me towards the latter part of A Light So Dim, particularly in the closer “To Part The Abelia Springs” (i.e. a handful of melodies across 11 minutes) as well as “Pink Lights Soiling To Copper” (monotonous but on the heavier side). If you have trained yourself in the likes of, e.g. Ash Borer or Fauna though, there’s nothing to be afraid of here. The production is polished but with a raw edge, melodies and textures are clean and always present, even at the album's most repeated moments.

"Cherry Knots (The Sun Shines Through You)" is track that dwells outside what's strictly metal, pressing with a sharp noise / dark ambient introduction and a powerfully emotional, and highly memorable echoing piano melody (strangely reminding of an older track, "Peccatum" by doom metal band Isole, from their 2009 album Silent Ruins) with dark clean vocals. The electronic / trip-hop twist in the track is one of the multiple instances Ultha shows their predilection for experimentalism on A Light So Dim. However, this must have already been clear from the eerie voices, synth handling and gnarled guitar riffs of "Her Still Singing Limbs" earlier in the album.

Taking a clear step towards unexplored soundscapes, the band doesn't seem to be out of ideas for new music, which now grows into its completely own form. With all its poignant melancholy, A Light So Dim manages to drift into something approaching devotional beauty, and it doesn't feel forced or overblown. I've struggled with similar mutations of atmospheric / post-black metal bands in the past, but here it seems to click perfectly, once you let it. It's not the instant eye-catcher, but real splendor lies within.

Release: April 2nd, 2026 | Vendetta Records
Rating: 4 out of 5

Incendiary - Product of New York (2026) Review

Compilations like this make a lot of sense. Surely, Incendiary fans waste no time hunting down copies of their main LPs, especially since band's considerable rise in fame after the release of Cost of Living (2013), but it's always more difficult to trace smaller-scale releases, or long-time sold out mini albums. So now, we get the chance to enjoy almost all the early material (debut EP, three split releases) in one neat package, freshly remastered by Will Putney (Fit for an Autopsy, End, Better Lovers), walking down memory lane and getting fists bloodier and bloodier as it goes. 

Tracks are then also smartly placed going for the most part backwards in time, starting from the split with Xibalba in 2012, and arriving to the Amongst the Filth 7" inch, released originally in 2007. After the opener, "Not Your Prophet", which is actually an unreleased song from the sessions of the band's latest album, Change the Way You Think About Pain (yet another reason to get on this), listening to this material made me hit my head in annoyance of how I had forgotten how awesome early Incendiary were. 

Who doesn't remember the band's rampant fury on the split with Suburban Scum, where both "Victory In Defeat" and "God's Country" are absolute demolishers. The whole debut EP is a favorite, especially the guitar's short sludge adventures on "Angels With Filthy Souls", while the breakdown on "Rome Is Burning" truly is unbelievable. What I had heard the least were the tracks from the split with Unrestrained, and I was unfamiliar with "Bond and Break" (another unreleased song..?). 

The aggression is clear on the album as lyrics, voice and guitars seem to strike with an honest moral insistence, nicely showcasing the blazing early days of one of the best modern hardcore bands worldwide. Product of New York closes with an incredible cover of "Sabotage" by the Beastie Boys, a track you didn't know you needed in a crushing hardcore version. What a bass sound on that one. The grand city across the water so often promises, and now also delivers. One listens, and one feels implicated. These streets are the veins of Incendiary.

Release: March 23rd, 2026 | Closed Casket Activities
Rating: 4 out of 5