Do the almighty Dead Kennedys get their just due respect? Sometimes I’m not sure they do. In the 80′s, I saw this band wreck so many stages I will never forget! Jello was one of the sickest frontmen during the heyday of SoCal punk, plus, he dropped so much knowledge on our young minds. Then you had musicians in this band who were always on point, and could play the fuck out of their musical devices. Dead Kennedys will always represent my youth and my love for not being deaf, dumb and blind to reality like the masses are. CVLT Nation is stoked to offer a full live Dead Kennedys set from 1982 in Germany – the sound quality is way above outstanding! It’s a holiday in CVLT Nation, get your Dead Kennedys on, download link below!

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Dead Kennedy’s DOWNLOAD LINK HERE!

Last week, Pitchfork premiered the new video from Christian Mistress for a track of their debut album, Possession, entitled “Pentagram and Crucifix.” Clearly, the occult forces are strong in Christian Mistress – “Pentagram and Crucifix” takes you on a cold voyage into Nature at its most hostile, interspersing inverted crosses and ritual scenes with the quintessential journeying metal band, the musicians striding through snowy fields and into decaying structures. This song is one of my favorites on the album, with a short yet mammoth guitar solo in the middle that destroys everything around it, and with its low-key production, the video, directed by Christine Davis and David Hoekje, brings a DIY sensibility to the song that endears me even more to this band. Also, they are about to embark on a European tour after they perform at this year’s Roadburn, so if you are in the old countries, you are in luck for the month of April! Check out the video below and tour dates after the jump…

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Do you fucking realize what today is? It’s when the world is touched by the hand of filth called LORD MANTIS. They are releasing one of the direst and deranged albums of the year, Pervertor, today via Candlelight Records USA. I was listening to this album the other day and I asked myself, is the world ready for what is about to happen to them? If the worst human-eating disease had a sound, it just might come in the form of LORD MANTIS. With Pervertor, this band has conjured up an album that is ahead of its time – they have been able to harness pure evil and shape it into sonic torment. The vocals that you will encounter on this record are half havoc, but all death. As songwriters, LORD MANTIS have created a killer album with hidden layers of bleakness, and with each listen, you will hear sirens of chaos. Fuck writing any more about how sick this band is – CVLT Nation is super stoked to be streaming Pervertor in full below! Now turn off the lights, blast this record and go numb!

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CVLT Nation is ultra excited to announce that the Sonic Cathedrals Mixtape Series Vol. XXXIX Curated by AGE OF WOE is live. This Swedish band released one of my favorite 7 inches of last year, so I was stoked when they said they would be down to curate a mixtape. Just like their sound, which is highly original, so is their Sonic Cathedrals mixtape. Just when you think they are going one way with their song selection, AGE OF WOE takes you some where else! So below, hear what AOW has to say about this mixtape, plus after the jump you will find the download link…Melt some D-Beat on your reality and fucking get ready to rock!

Here are 25 songs that may, or may not, sum up some of our biggest influences – both individually and as a band. We all hand-picked 5 tracks each for this mixtape, so of course it’s extremely varied and versatile. Just like Age of Woe.
It’s not easy to single out 5 tracks out of all the thousands of great songs that have inspired us throughout the years, but this is our best shot. We hope you enjoy Age of Woe’s mixtape. Bang your head and worship satan!

Stream Sonic Cathedrals Vol. XXIX Curated by Age of Woe

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In 1981, Frans Bromet of the Dutch television VPRO TV created an interesting documentary about the Southern California punk scene. What I dig about this film is that the filmmaker actually took the time to speak to the kids of the scene as equals, rather than make generalizations about them as many adults did at the time. Many of the kids he interviews bring up some points that are not always touched on – like that many of the SoCal hardcore kids came from upper middle class families. Also, it’s cool to hear how kids felt about growing up during the Reagan era. Bromet also recorded sets from a young Suicidal Tendencies, 45 Grave, Unit3 and Venus (who steals the show), China White and more. Teenagers back then were not perfect, but you have to realize that mass culture back then was even more closed-minded than it is today! It’s extra awesome that Bromet had the foresight to interview the girls of the scene. I think teenagers in the here and now could relate to this film, because no matter the decade, some young humans will always feel discounted from what society says is the real normal. Now check out the Surf Punks (what a lame name!) documentary after the jump!

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Why does religion teach that human beings are the superior life forms, when all we do is destroy everything in our path? Why does religion teach that the creator is a man, when all the species of the earth who birth life are female? Why does religion teach that blindly following an arbitrary set of nonsensical beliefs makes you a good person, when atrocities are committed in the name of said beliefs every day? I have so many questions when it comes to the bullshit I was force-fed as a child, sitting in the pews of an Anglican church, surrounded by hypocrisy that I recognized even as a young child. How many times did I wish that some natural force would sweep us all out of the heavy doors, leaving my family and I in safety while it carried the church and all its cronies to the bottom of the ocean? So how stoked am I to find a set of amazing images that made my young fantasy a reality! These “drowned churches” are poignantly beautiful – not just the decaying architecture, but also the reminder that for all of the bluffing of evangelists, Mother Earth will have her revenge. After the jump, check out a series of pictures that may bring a warm, fuzzy feeling to your heretic mentality…
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On March 27th, Black Breath will be dropping a new album entitled Sentenced To Life via Southern Lord, and it is fucking packed with weapons of maximum rawness. What will happen once you press play? A never-ending shower of gnarly riffs will take over your being. Then you will get a tremendous energy jolt from all of the war-like drumming that will have you saying damn, I don’t want this album to end! Demonic baselines will have you thinking that the next time you see Black Breath live, your skull might separate from the rest of your body due to all of the chaotic headbanging that’s going to take place! Unholy fuck, Neil’s vocal delivery on Sentenced To Life is so awesome that his voice is another instrument in this band’s arsenal. Black Breath’s songwriting on this album is perfect, and with each listen, I get more excited. When you hear “Feast of the Damned,” you realize the you are in for a ride all the way to Hell. What gets me going on this album are the high levels of giant blackened groove and murder melody. All of the songs on this album rain death blows on your ears, but at the same time they have a subversive catchy quality to them. When the title track, “Sentenced To Life,” grabs you by the throat, it won’t let go – you are sentenced to death by this tune. The production on this album is thick and dense with anger, with an added ultra heavy dose of wild fury. Every second of Sentenced To Life transports my mind to a place where metal heads run shit, and the corporate bigwigs are our slaves. You can tell that nothing separates Black Breath from their fans, because the glory of metal is running through their veins. Black Breath have set the bar high for Album of the Year – this is my top contender so far. I’m super stoked to see them perform this record live, I just know it’s going to blow my living mind into the undead!

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It all went down a couple of days ago in New York City at the NARROWS and ALL PIGS MUST DIE show at the Knitting Factory. The show was put on by Rich Hall/1000 knives, who did a great job, which was evident by the packed house of crazy fans. One of CVLT Nation’s favorite videographers, (((Unartig))), was on hand to capture both bands ripping shit. APMD performed both songs from their new 7″ Curse of Humanity/Extinction. I really like the recorded version of these songs, but seeing them performed live adds a new depth to them, and you can tell that the band has a blast playing these tunes! NARROWS rocked it with their off-kilter brand of awesomeness – Dave is a stellar frontman, and his band members are next-level gnarly! Both bands are on a small tour right now, peep the tour dates after the jump. In the meantime, check this footage so that you know what you are in store for when they hit your town!

All Pigs Must Die – Curse of Humanity / Extinction is ours from (((unartig))) on Vimeo.

Artwork by Rich Hall//1000knives

Narrows – Greenland from (((unartig))) on Vimeo.

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A forboding mire of dark synthesizers welcome us to Come the Thaw’s beautifully meloncholic landscape. The ominous drone is only allowed to build briefly before being pierced by a sharp inhalation and a breathy, unsure question:

…How…how will you ever find me now? When your wound is faded, and it’s lost its sound?

As Lorraine Rath and Jessica Way’s hauntingly serene voices swim circles around one another and the steady ambience both, I realized I was listening to the most heartfelt and crushingly depressing album 2012 has thus far offered.

Rath’s bass lines begin to drive the song as the keys slowly die and album opener Ruined Ground continues onward, steadily joined by carefully measured drum work and fleeting guitar notes that seem to gracefully waltz around the other instruments. In familiar Worm Ouroboros fashion, the band builds a spectacularly gentle procession before becoming truly heavy… but Come the Thaw approaches that heavy from a completely different angle than the band’s doom-filled S/T release. Things never really reach the crushing weight of Worm’s last album, whose murky depths drew many an apt Asunder comparison. For a band who have thus far tooled themselves around that transition between fragile beauty and ass-kicking doom and sludge riffs, you’d think that significantly downplaying that approach would hold this album back, but I will happily go on the record as saying this: Come the Thaw doesn’t need it.

Read the rest of the review after the jump!
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Interview by JSS of The Banner

A year or so ago, I started a website with the intent of shining a little light on artists I was into. As usual, shit got hectic, and I never got the thing up and running, but I did get to do a couple good interviews, such as this one with Ross Mooncalfe, who is responsible for such indie titles as Wet Moon and more recently Shadow eyes.

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