“The Halloween period is here. Carve your pumpkins, bob your apples, egg your neighbors’ houses and listen to some horror-themed brutality. Hailing from Jobbstown, New Jersey, Cognitive play tech-death straight from the grave.” Boo-urns!
Unique Leader
Carnophage – Monument Review
“Though billed as a technical death metal album, Monument has little to do with The Faceless-core being oozed out of southern California every few months. Instead, Carnophage plays a not unsophisticated mix of early-’00s influenced death metal, taking cues from Suffocation and Hate Eternal. It’s not a fantastic formula, but the band follows through, and there’s surprisingly little to complain about on Monument.” I’m sure we’ll find something.
Inanimate Existence – Calling From a Dream Review
“Advice is a tricky thing, really. I try to give only when asked and take only what’s given freely, but the general advice economy moves much faster than I like to. So instead of giving advice, I prefer to just point out issues and have people come up with their own solutions. This works well when you’re reviewing music since most of the job is explaining why that music isn’t as good as it could be. A case in point would be the last album from Inanimate Existence, A Never-Ending Cycle of Atonement, an album about which I had many complaints.” Is this an atonement?
Dawn of Demise – The Suffering Review
“Dawn of Demise, the irrepressible death dealers of Danish chunk, return after a quiet few years with their fourth LP of groove-driven brutality, entitled The Suffering. The boys have obviously been feeding on extra chunky hunks of beef and holding the potatoes, as The Suffering offers up another carnivorous serving of muscular, protein-fueled death in the tradition of the band’s solid previous work, including A Force Unstoppable and Rejoice in Vengeance. If Neanderthal’s had access to audio technology and the wonders of metal, Dawn of Demise would be at the top of their playlist.” Let’s go clubbin’.
Unmerciful – Ravenous Impulse Review
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Lords of War – Suffer Review
“No, Kronos hasn’t died. But yes, this is a Unique Leader record which he isn’t reviewing. Rather than his cold, dead hands, I obtained it via the surprisingly bureaucratic AMG promo distribution system instituted this year by our Weberian overlords. A quick glance at the Unique Leader roster will leave you entirely unsurprised by the record in question: Suffer by Lord of War, a US-based death metal troupe.” Enter the Iron Cage of rational thought!
Internal Suffering – Cyclonic Void of Power Review
“Don’t be surprised if this is the first you’ve seen of an album from Internal Suffering. The long-running Colombian brutal death metal band has been silent for the past ten years, shuffling from city to city without releasing so much as an EP. And I’m fine with that, seeing as much of their previous output was not to my liking. 2006’s Awakening of the Rebel was naught but a smear of blast beats to me, and the continuous aggression of their music largely defeated itself. Cyclonic Void of Power, however, is a step in the right direction.” Is this the dawn of Vagabond metal?
Deceptionist – Initializing Irreversible Process
“Another day, another release from Unique Leader; yet there is no release for me. As the de facto tech-death guru at the AMG offices, I’m caught in a near perpetual state of mild frustration as streams of 16th notes tickle my cochleae and bearded men scream putrid nothings into my ear. While the year thus far has been pretty kind to the genre, Sturgeon’s law is still in effect, and Deceptionist’s debut, Initializing Irreversible Process, is my latest helping of the caviar of middlingness.” Somebody needs a staycation.
First Fragment – Dasein Review
“I’d like to begin this review by discussing the gigantic fucking roll that French-Canadian guitarist Phillipe Tougas is currently on. Starting with last year’s release from Serocs, he has played on three downright kickass albums, all favorably reviewed on this very website. His work with Zealotry gained my notoriously stingy tech/prog-death approval, and his bizarre Timeghoul and Demilich-inspired project Chthe’ilist is almost certainly going to make the Kronos year-end list. And as if all of that wasn’t enough, his longest-running band, the neoclassically-inspired tech-death outfit First Fragment, is finally dropping their first full-length album.” Kronos is so cute when he’s not bashing tech-death production techniques.
Katalepsy – Gravenous Hour Review
“Slam’s audio palette isn’t especially varied. The death metal setup – already instrumentally optimized for a pretty particular group of timbres – tuned down and sometimes pitchshifted into an almost inaudibly low register doesn’t give you much to work with in terms of tone diversity, which is why so many slam bands have tight, grating snares and so many slam riffs go all in on pinch harmonics. And when Katalepsy go all in, I mean all in.” Go big or go home.
