The first clear cut death metal song is "Divine Abysmal End' which lashes out with an Obituary like sneer. The riffs have all the hook of classic death metal, but propelled by hard core anger. Romeo also brought aboard Exhumed guitarist Sebastian Philips to join him on guitar so that leans them in more of a death metal direction there. "Serpent Messiah" feels like something Starkweather would have done, back in the day. Hyper aggression is a mood shared by both death metal and hard core, here it is hard to tell where one begins and the other ends, I think this would be better called death core than a band like Whitechapel, who has little hard to their core.
"House of Thieves" finds the punk part of the equation settling in. "Giving Life to Tragedy" finds melody expanding the emotional range of the sonics they hit you with. They declare they speak for the dead on "Chasing Divinity" which stays around the same sonic zip code most this album has raged within. They remind me of when Slayer would embrace their more unhinged punk roots on "When Death Comes Crawling". They are at their most effectively metallic on the last song that howls with great feeling. Benefitting from a organic production that is mixed to put the action in your face, you get a feeling this is what they sound like live as well. I will give this album a 9, it is being released on Relapse Records on July 14th.
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