This Chilean Black Metal band's 2020 album scored a respectable 8.5, which did not place it in the upper tier of black metal released that year, so fell short of our Top 10 Black Metal albums of 2020, which found Chrome Waves taking the top spot. Chrome Waves was not the heaviest or angriest band on the list, they just wrote better songs, This is also the barometer we are measuring this album by after all you can play the fastest blast beats but that is not enough to make someone want to listen to that album years later.. How music stands the test of time is how it is weighed here. This band starts off the album with blast beats set against eerie guitar cascading rather than just holding the buzz of tremolo fury giving them a slight sonic edge over the status quo.
This album also has an edge over the average black metal band, as the production is on point. It is almost mixed like a Deathspell Omega album. There is enough tangled chaos to sit back in the shadows of the reverb, but the bulk of the instrumentation is front and center so the sound is not obscured. Some great guitar playing opens up "When True Loneliness is Experienced". This is cool as black metal albums are not normally known for ripping solos. This is coming from a guy who gets bored easily with shredding for the sake of it, so it is tasteful almost blues-based playing. It crashes into a darker cascade of dissonance smoothed out with melody. I was not expecting the clean singing, so that means it is effective.
"Third World Wretchedness" is more of a straightforward black metal affair, while the emphasis is placed on driving forward with a flurry of double bass under it there is still plenty of nuance. "Chant of Self Confrontation" is more nuanced in its construction even though it hits hard and then expands the sounds they are building this from. A more King Diamond-like crooner emerges at one point in the song. Things get dramatically more melodic going into the more contemplative "The One Who Blackens Everything" . The vocals have more of a throat bellow, and guitar heroics eventually emerge.
More stellar guitar playing unfolds on "Between Seclusion and Obsession". There is a slight Latin underpinning to the almost flamenco guitar. The sung vocals sound great though this song feels like it wants to be an instrumental. The vocals make it feel like it wants to be Ihsahn. Things blast off a little more here which given the breadth of what this album does feels like it's an obligatory gesture to check off all the black metal boxes. I will give this album a 9, it's pretty impressive and an improvement over what I last heard from this project, Out on Debemur Morti Productions.
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