A bitter sweet acoustic guitar "Prelude" opens up proceedings with "Infernal Place Within" having the band in full swing. The kick drum is a clicky blur of speed as Ben Morris' feet pound away relentlessly, as does his sharp snare. Matt Harrison and Alex Huzarsky play their guitar rhythms and lead breaks with great speed and dexterity, flowing effortlessly between staccato, tremolo and triplets. Jules Davies vocals are predominately a hard-core throaty shout, interspersed with deep roars and clean melodies on "Abandon All Hope".
While they never actually play any slow songs, "Darkest Hour" has a couple breaks in the drum pummelling where everything else follows suit for some dynamic tempo changes. The keyboard "Interlude" works really well to change the mood and up the intensity of "False Prophet" by contrast. I'm trying to decide how to describe the lead on "Damnation", as rather than just being full of guitar bends and squawks, it's more quickly played scales and runs, which work far better to complement what the rhythm guitar and Liam Huzarsky's bass are doing.
The speed and tightness of this quintet is clearly apparent on "Ninth Circle" where they go from breakneck speed to sudden stop starts and various breaks in tempo then back to speed without a single missed or out of beat note. "Reprise" has an awesome drone of a pipe organ over the clean guitar picking, filling the sound and making the ambience nice and sombre. I'm pretty certain there shall be plenty more interesting things coming from these lads from Birmingham.
http://www.Akrya.com
http://www.GlassToneRecords.com
Marco Gaminara
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