IV.I.V.VIII
Not sure what to expect beyond "metal" for this one. Primitive Man is in the related artists so it can't be too bad.
Track 1 Oh okay starting off rather quickly. Heavy ass guitar tones, loving that, also great vocal performance the tone he gets on his shrieks is just bloodcurling. This is much more uptempo then what I was expecting,I was expecting more of a dirge. Need some more of that clean guitar tone that was happening at around 3 minutes that was lovely and a need change of pace. Yay, got my wish! So I'm guessing that's the chorus then, it doesn't really matter anyhow. Great opener.
Track 2 Loving the driving rhythm section. The guitars are more or less giving a sort of atmosphere rather and worrying about being punchy which I think is a good choice as the drums are doing a fine job of that already. The chord progression right where the acoustic guitar comes in is absolutely twisted, absolutely menacing, almost reminds me a Slint-esque progression. This is way heavier than the first song, good stuff.
Track 3 This album is ****ing unrelenting in how brutally heavy it is. Each song goes farther and farther down the rabbit hole of crushing. You know the album cover to the Swans album Filth? Yeah well this is that photo personified. The vocals might be my favorite thing on this album right now, they crush. Woah complete change up right in the middle here, tempo change and stylistically from sludgy to more mid-tempo black metal influenced riffing. Back to section 1 again, love the little transitions they keep using. Are those strings I hear in the back?
Track 4 This sounds straight out the depths of hell. The sluggish riffs are just killing me. Nice wash over chorus laden guitar as well, that's nice touch. Not too much to take note of in this one, by no means is that a bad thing, just a more standard verse chorus verse chorus type deal. What's with the tin can percussion that just sort of pops in out of nowhere during some of these. Not bad, a little tame compared to the others, but not bad.
Track 5 Oh my **** that guitar tone is crazy. I couldn't imagine trying to scream like that all the time, I'd die. This sounds like a blend of sludge and BM and it rules. What effect is being used on the second guitar? It has the spacey vibe to it that I'm 100% getting behind. And nice ****ing touch withe tribal percussion coming in for a moment there. Oh this is beyond heavy at this point. And it got downright strange there un momento. This albums got it all, heavy enough for the metalheads and experimental enough for the pretentious hipsters like myself. Yeah this one is golden.
Track 6 This one is starting off straight outta Norway with some black metal flavored playing. Alright we back to America with the riff in the verse. Dare I say it... this one is downright catchy. Simple and memorable, at least so far anyways.A couple tempo changes throughout this song that are just perfection. Oh yeah, damn good closer.
Final Verdict: This was surprisingly amazing, I was just expecting to kinda like it, but I loved it all the way. Nothing is better than some metal that isn't trying to pussyfoot around metal and just be ****ing metal. And let me tell you, this album is ****ing metal as hell. This riffs were hard hitting, the drumming was powerful yet on tempo and in the pocket, the vocals were astonishingly good, and stylistically this hit the sweet spot. Some variation in the songwriting would have been nice, but honestly it didn't me liking this too much.
8/10