#BAZUndergroundUpdates CLXXXI

How did it even happen that October was able to sneak upon us so easily?!? Our writers Julia Katrin and Tom Osman are just as flabbergasted as anyone, if not even more, however we all welcome Spooktober and so, here is a brand-new instalment of The Underground Updates!

So, let’s see what’s out there…

DER WEG EINER FREIHEIT This summer the German black metal avant-gardists of Der Weg Einer Freiheit crushed Hellfest Open Air festival, and on the 29th of September they had a live chat where fans could chat with them while they premiered the video for their 40-minute full set from the festival. If you happened to miss it there is still no reason to panic, as you can head straight over here to watch the awesome video right now!

GAEREA Black metal group Gaerea never ceases to amaze, and now have quite the interesting video from the ghost track Dormant, a track only available on the now sold-out media book from their recently released album Mirage! Head over here to stream the track, but if you are brave enough you can head over here and watch the video. Keep in mind however, that the video displays 8 minutes of torture experience, so it’s safe to say it’s not for the faint hearted!

NEUROT RECORDINGS A new week, a new album picked over at Neurot Recordings! The label always understands that life is hard and that people need music, so of course the weekly segment of Pay What You Want is going strong, and this week’s album pick is Light Will Consume Us All by Chrch! Head over here to claim your copy now and simply pay what you want!

FIRES IN THE DISTANCE Now is the month that Fire in the Distance heads on their tour alongside Dawn of Ouroboros so make sure you keep an eye on the dates and locations!

NOVERE Modelling themselves on bands like A Perfect Circle, Mastodon and Amenra, Novere describe their music as a combination of Post-Rock, Doom and Black Metal. You can hear the results on Nothing Stays Hidden In Daylight, their new album out now on Trepanation Recordings. Listen in full here, where you can pick up a copy on CD, cassette or digital.

HAIL started out in 1995 as a solo project of guitarist/vocalist/cellist Carl Annala. Several albums, a number of demos and several personnel additions later the Experimental Black/Folk Metal, Noise act see the release of We Are Nothing on Fiadh Productions. I don’t know what this music is, but it’s dark, it’s tribal, it’s sinister and I just saw Torsofuck perform for the first time on the weekend, so I’m ready for every shade of darkness you can throw at me. LET’S GO!!! Cassette and vinyl versions are available here where you can listen in full and also read about the history of the release.

RAT KING first showed up on my radar back in 2020 when they released their excellent Vicious Humanity, now the Seattle-based Deathgrind three-piece have released Psychotic Reality on Satanik Royalty Records and a mighty fine slab of pummelling Extreme Metal it is too. Check it out here and get yourself a copy on a range of formats.

Having to pay gigantic sums for international postage is a real gear grinder.

While it’s our default setting to link Bandcamp pages in the case of new and pre-releases, we thought it would be helpful to add some online stores that might provide a useful alternative.

So if you see a release you fancy, but it’s being sold in a far off land and you don’t want to fork out on exorbitant shipping, see if any of the links below can remedy the situation.

Dark Essence (Norway) Dark Essence (US)

Deathwish (EU) Deathwish (US)

Direct Merch (Australia)

eOne Heavy (EU) eOne Heavy (UK) eOne Heavy (US)

Ipecac (EU) Ipecac (US)

Metal Odyssey (EU) Metal Odyssey (US)

Napalm Records (Germany)

Prophecy Productions (Germany) Prophecy Productions (US)

Rough Trade (UK) Rough Trade (US)

Season of Mist (EU) Season of Mist (US)

Southern Lord (EU) Southern Lord (US)

Throne Records (World)

Transcending Obscurity (EU) Transcending Obscurity (US)

Even if we have checked our calendars multiple times, we still have a hard time believing that it’s already October. But we suppose there is nothing else to do about it but to indulge in this week’s offers on merch and great activity!

By Julia Katrin and Tom Boatman

**Please support the underground! It’s vital to the future of our genre.**
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