We’ve got a divide this week, between those veering off the staked-out course to travel unknown waters, and those sticking to, and improving on, well-established turf.
Bloodred Hourglass – We Should Be Buried Like This
Genre: Metalcore/melodic death metal
Subjective rating: 2.5/5
Objective rating: 3/5
About as accessible as melodeath gets, this is superficial, metalcore-level heaviness on top of super-catchy, industrial-like beats, with plenty of synth-based melody as its centerpiece.
Breathe//Die – Gestalt
Genre: Death metal/hardcore
Subjective rating: 3/5
Objective rating: 3/5
Heavy, abrasive, hardcore-rhythm punishment with crunchy death metal riffs and a strained vocal style that gives the impression of teetering on the edge of frantic rage. It’s a bit one-dimensional overall, but has a really satisfying drive.
Cruentus – End Without End
Genre: Death/black metal
Subjective rating: 3/5
Objective rating: 3/5
A Swedish extreme metal projects mixing black metal sharpness and dark folk atmosphere with classic death metal roughness. It sounds like they’re on to something, especially in the mid-tempo sections where the mood tends towards doom, and they get to really explore what the music is supposed to be about.
Decayer – Memoirs Of Despair
Genre: Technical deathcore
Subjective rating: 3.5/5
Objective rating: 3.5/5
Decayer blends ferocity with symphonic loftiness on their newest album, meaning you get your obligatory, exceptionally hard-hitting breakdowns as well as a sense of monstrous scale. But in addition to the expected, gargantuan crashes, they also field an army of agile, furious fiends that both charge right at you and skip around to stab at your throat from unexpected angles. What I mean to say with that is that there’s a good deal of super-aggressive, speedy tech-riffing on progressive rhythms, and while some of it feels a bit forced and just for the show-off factor, it keeps the music feeling super-active, always on the move and never satisfied with the same approach for long. A few aspects of their sound does feel borrowed from what the big names are doing at the moment, but I feel like they’re on the cusp of really nailing their own identity with this one.
Highlight: “Opulence and Obsidian”
Dispossessed – Dêmocide
Genre: Doom/sludge/death metal
Subjective rating: 3/5
Objective rating: 3.5/5
Dark, cumbersome sludge that’s half a step away from death doom, it’s near-inconceivably heavy, like a city-sized worm bulldozing its way through the roots of mountains. Lacking variation and contrast, it does make 32 minutes feel fairly long, but its temperament is just the way you want it – ominously smoldering.
Dissona – Receptor
Genre: Progressive metal
Subjective rating: 3.5/5
Objective rating: 3.5/5
While you’re never in doubt about which subgenre of metal this belongs to, the band makes a commendable effort to instill personality into the music, and keeping it feeling vital by constantly tugging at the rhythmic, tonal and stylistic reigns. The sense of direction suffers a bit as a result, but It’s always going somewhere, and purposefully so. And the more you get to meet the different shades of its disposition, the less you care about the destination. It’s all about what comes around the next corner. It’s an album that is both frivolous and solemn, technical and atmospheric, vicious and gentle. All the while, it retains substance, suggesting that there always was a twisted vision for its final form, or at least the different flavors that would bloom out from its core identity.
Highlight: “Incisor”
Enragement – Extinguish All Existence
Genre: Technical death metal
Subjective rating: 4/5
Objective rating: 4/5
Better hold on to something, it’s about to get hairy! Entrapment is a Finnish death metal band that plays a technical, modern-brutal and intensely fierce variant of the subgenre. I had nice things to say about their 2022 release “Atrocities”, and I’m delighted to be able to repeat the praise this time around. The production is crisper and more detailed, it’s even more ferocious than before, which is saying something, and it doesn’t get lost in technical showmanship. While not quite as convincingly malevolent as last time around, it makes up for it with sheer aggression, leaving nothing but devastation in its wake. Delivering massive riffs, a good variation of harsh vocal styles and just the right amount of precision vs. savagery, it’s a beast of a record that will most likely leave you spent and in need of a sonic time-out.
Highlights: “Natural Mass Asphyxiation” and “Harbingers of Degradation”
Gorotica – Daily Grind Of The Medieval Age
Genre: Grindcore/death metal
Subjective rating: 4.5/5
Objective rating: 4.5/5
I have a soft spot for grindcore that knows how to have fun, and this thing is just riotously entertaining. Don’t get me wrong, it’s hyper aggressive and savagely heavy, but instead of starting each short track with the intention of simply causing damage in a slightly different, but equally punishing and straightforwardly chaotic way, these French(?)-Australian lads craft an 18-long series of flavorful, outstanding chapters in a mildly unhinged tale of cannibalism and medieval sadism, that’s about as serious as a Tarantino-film. While retaining the coarseness and relentlessness of deathgrind, the songs are structured like, or otherwise infused with, hardcore, punk, garage rock, melodeath and classic heavy metal. From acoustic, folk-instrument interludes to absolutely frantic outbursts of roaring fury, this is a massively enjoyable feast of tongue-in-cheek morbidity.
Highlight: “Connoisseurs Of Human Flesh” and “Nothing Left To Penetrate”
Hangatyr – Sumpf der Fäule
Genre: Atmospheric black metal
Subjective rating: 3/5
Objective rating: 3/5
Not to disparage the craftmanship, but this is pretty much what it says on the packaging – German atmospheric black metal. You get snarls and howls, plenty of blastbeats and icy, mournful melodies carried on winds from the desolate mountaintops.
Hooded Menace – Lachrymose Monuments Of Obscuration
Genre: Death/doom/heavy metal
Subjective rating: 3.5/5
Objective rating: 4/5
Now, I’m in no way a Hooded Menace expert, but it doesn’t take a deep familiarity with their discography to tell that this is a bit of a departure from well-established ways. Yes, it’s still old school death doom at its core, but a far cry from funeral-paced abyssal misery. The main differentiator is the appearance of a highly influential classic metal spirit that ups the tempo, groove, sense of adventure and occasion, and the use of guitar solos. It’s got that mildly synth-y 80s feel plastered all over it, with the horror feel of that era as part of the package, which suits the style very well, and it’s not overdone. Speaking of which, you get parts where they seem to be holding back in honor of their past almost as much as parts where they really let go, and embrace the galloping ride-to-battle bravado. The inclusion of a Duran Duran cover on a mere 7-track album underlines the offshoot thinking of the project, and while I’ve certainly heard far less tasteful flavor blends than this, I’ve also heard them less muddled.
Highlights: “Pale Masquerade” and “Into Haunted Oblivion”
Ofermod – Drakosophia
Genre: Black metal
Subjective rating: 3/5
Objective rating: 3.5/5
This thing must be like 90% blast beats. While being very riff- and drum-focused, the main draw of this band’s style is the darkly mythical feel that permeates every song on the album. For me there’s too much of a feeling of repetitiveness with how the songs feel and progress, but if you’re into cult-y fantasy black metal, then you’ll likely find this to be a solid, confident effort.
Orbit Culture – Death Above Life
Genre: Groove/melodic death metal
Subjective rating: 3.5/5
Objective rating: 4/5
Orbit Culture continue to utilize their talent for successfully combining the catchiest elements of heavy groove, melodeath, deathcore and metalcore into moderately anthemic, wall-shaking, systematized shockwaves. Not too harsh, not too soft, they strike a near-perfect balance of uncomplicated, energizing modern extreme metal that’s not too extreme for beginners and not too cringeworthy for the thoroughly initiated. The cleans and choruses are, at least in my book, their foremost weakness, lacking in both dynamism and originality, and like before my overall impression comes from weighing the appeal of massive bangers against far more lackluster and generic efforts. In the end, the entertainment factor is far too great to ignore, and it scores massively on the most important areas of chugging grooves and headbang-ability, but with their single tracks being some of the least interesting, they’re approaching a point where they’re in danger of growing stale. But not yet.
Highlights: “Bloodhound” and “The Storm”
Ribspreader – As Gods Devour
Genre: Death metal
Subjective rating: 3/5
Objective rating: 3/5
One of them many, many projects that bears the Rogga Johansson signature, you know very well that you’re in for solid crunchy, murky, groovy old school Swedish death metal. Apart from being fairly poorly produced, this one absolutely has its moments, but not quite enough to dispel the slight feeling of fatigue.
Rotting Demise – The Unholy Veil Of Silence
Genre: Black/death metal
Subjective rating: 3/5
Objective rating: 3/5
Offering a mix of gothic-like blackness and driving death metal ruthlessness, Rotting Demise aims for those that are attracted to the catchier and more melodic side to blackened death metal. More technically minded and less conceptually fleshed out than Rotting Christ, it’s got traces of thrash, save for the playfulness.
Sothoris – Domus Omnium Mortuorum
Genre: Blackened death metal
Subjective rating: 3/5
Objective rating: 3/5
Polish blackened death metal that’s technically tight, working through lightly chaotic, unholy sections of blast beats and ritualistic harsh-chanting to get to ripping riffs and sharp solos. Nothing massively outstanding, but a good hit of scorched anger and blasphemy.
Vimic – Open Your Omen
Genre: Groove/alternative metal
Subjective rating: 3.5/5
Objective rating: 3.5/5
Sadly not to be finished in his lifetime, it is finally time for the debut album of Joey Jordison’s Vimic to see the light of day, Being the product of a tumultuous creation process and, now, being less about an actual, coherent starting point for the band and more of a service to fans, there’s no denying it’s a mixed bag. A bunch of ideas and stylistic inputs are represented on this 15-track, 64 minute chunkster of an album, and while the production is quite good, it could definitely do with a bit of editing. Forceful, enthusiastic, technical brilliance has to co-exist with unfocused, lackluster material that sometimes sounds like it’s by a different band altogether. But aside from the lack of a strong, guiding creative vision, there’s plenty to enjoy. Bursting with groove, alternative edge and moody, grunge-like melody, it’s hard not to think about what this could have formed the foundations for.
Highlight: “Parasite Persona”
Wode – Uncrossing The Keys
Genre: Black/heavy metal
Subjective rating: 3.5/5
Objective rating: 3.5/5
Wode are back with their fourth full-length, and, to a significantly higher degree than on 2021’s “Burn In Many Mirrors”, they’ve paired their jagged black metal core with a strong influx of classic heavy metal, in mildly experimental fashion. A good deal of the primal. hard-hitting savagery of earlier releases has been sacrificed in favor of a nimbler, leaner and more flexible sound. When supported by doomy groove and riff-happy cool, this really works, fully proving the potency of the style shift and the band’s versatility. But they also tend to get lost in meandering, wander-tempo aimlessness and contemplative, warm-toned melody that contrasts rather oddly with the sharp, mean-spiritedness of the dominant aggressive sections. Overall, it’s a bit uneven, but still a highly worthwhile listen for blackened heavy metal fans.
Highlight: “Under Lanternlight”
As always, if you think I’m completely off on an observation, unfairly dissed your favorite band, or need to give an album another shot, why not pop a comment down below?
The Metal Dispatch 