I know it's Black Friday so I should be catching up on black metal , but I just keep finding death metal or from the opener to this band's new one, death thrash. There is more melody in the guitars than brutality and I can understand why it ranked so high on a few of the best of lists I discovered it on. They pay attention to detail, and are more technical than you might suspect. The vocals are a very dry rasp almost like a throaty blackened hardcore in how it is punched out. This is also contrasted by some whispered parts. They succeed in impressing me with the feral heaviness and manic energy they attack the song with thus leaving me to ask the question...what else can you do ? or are they a one trick pony. They slow things down at the onset of the second song, with the defining factor the wave the twin guitar attack weaves around each other. There is some melody in the riffing, so they do not rely on brutality like you might expect from most death metal bands. They are said to be apart of a new wave of old school death metal and I don't hear this unless you are referring to the thrash influence staining the riffs. If old school means actually writing songs and using interesting melody then why is that old school and not just how music is made? There is a brief exclamation from distant clean voices calling out ,before rather hooky classic metal riff comes in.
It needs to be said that the bass player is really killing it on this album and if you are metal bass player this album is a wet dream despite the bass being mixed back behind the drums. A thrash like vein of melodic guitar playing dominates "Siderea" . This reminds me of another song from the new Hate Eternal album I just reviewed where they instrumental portion is more interesting than what is done when they are using vocals. This album it is not as much of a point of contention as it proved to be with Hate Eternal. "Polaris' finds the vocals returning to scrape pain from the more progressive riff they scream out over. Death could be a frame of reference here. They do not place as great of an emphasis on shred, but are no slackers on their chops. Much rougher than say even earlier Opeth, the songs still wind around a more open path than Morbid Angel. "Acolytes" crawls from a darker place before gaining momentum into a more acrobatic thrashing chug.Maybe a more dexterous version of Possessed would be a better way to wrap your head around this excursion. This become more thrashing than death metal no matter the age of the school you might pull from. It eventually finds itself in a bridge that has more in common with "Tom Sawyer".
They really hit their stride on "Sum of All Failures" going from the acoustic intro into a well harmonized groove. "Stillborn Gods" find the vocals getting more aggressive and leaning the song more towards the death metal side, though there are still plenty of moments with a classic metal sound that bring this closer to thrash or maybe Death's more accessible moments. They close the album out with a slower death metal groove. Then eventually punch into something with a more deliberate groove. This might not be the album of the year, but it's way fucking better than I imagined it would be and hits some pretty awesome moments when it comes to its command to head bang. I'll give this a 9.
7.4
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