I can’t imagine how my anxiety-riddled brain would react if I saw a being from another planet, especially if said life form is different from our human husks. It’s something that’s not impossible, but in reality, it would likely make my brain stop functioning at least momentarily. To look at something so awe-inspiring but potentially terrifying would be an experience that would change me forever.
That’s not what “A Dialogue With the Eeriest Sublime” is about, but its examination of things and/or experiences that are equal parts exhilarating and fear-inducing did make me think of what an alien encounter might be like, provided I survive. Vertebra Atlantis’ second record, a seven-track, 45-minute adventure through mind-altering death and black metal itself is something to behold, a journey that can enthrall but also bring you to your knees with horror. The band—vocalist/drummer RR, guitarist/synth player/vocalist GG (also is Cosmic Putrefaction), guitarist GS—push you to your absolute mental limits, piling on layers of carnage and mental insanity, and it sometimes is a lot to take. But it’s always worth the excursion, and it’s a pretty exciting record that challenges your mind to accept all kinds of metallic possibilities. The band also is joined by guest vocalists Giorgio Trombino (Assumption, Bottomless, etc.) and Daniela Ferrari Boschi on the title track to give that even more life.
“Into Cerulean Blood I Bathe” opens in a synth sheen, a dramatic voice booming and warbling, the breezy weirdness bathing in moonlight. The thrust then strikes, a strange prog death assault ripples, and creaky growls work on your nerve endings and sizzle into ash. “Frostpalace Gloaming Respite” explodes with vile howls, punchy verses, and hypnotic energy that digs deep into your brain. The leads take off and explore, meanwhile the growls carve tributaries toward your dreams, mystical strangeness launches and turns your visions into warped spectacles, and the cleanliness that interjects spreads through time. Detached calls chill, and then a final jolt rushes through before turning to ice. “Drown In Aether, Sovereign of Withered Ardor” arrives amid a deluge of sound, vicious growls digging into flesh, the playing shifting and exciting. A burliness enters and increases dangerously, feeling like your skull is being dragged across dimensions, breezy synth flooding and bringing everything to a massive end.
“Cupio Dissolvi” drips icily, the transmission worming its way to the surface, a progressive voyage finding its steam. The track keeps morphing, changing personalities, the instrumental piece bleeding into the stars. “In Starlike Ancient Eyes” unloads burly growls and a heaviness that has extra elements of dreaminess, whispery jolts making your sanity bolt. As your brain tingles, you’re confronted by grisly turns, shrieks that rewire your impulses, and a grime that’s thick and gritty, ending in mesmerizing fashion. “Desperately Ablaze, From the Lowest Lair” is hazy at the start, a long introduction smearing, the guitars churning as the shrieks mangle. Guitars blend and combine with the monstrous vocals, smoldering and presenting inventive carnage that makes your blood race. Things feel both gutting and slathering, woodwinds slip in and increase the possibilities of your imagination, and added synth layers bring on a fantastical surge. The closing title track starts softer, feeling almost cleansing, vocal harmonies adding a sense of noir, gently letting your bruised body find soothing. A long sequence creates a prog transfusion, Trombino’s and Boschi’s calls hover, and like a dream ending, it’s over in a flash, cortisol jarring your eyes awake.
Vertebra Atlantis are perfectly heavy and savage, giving you that serving of death and black metal you crave, but there’s so much more on “A Dialogue With the Eeriest Sublime” that goes far and beyond your expectations. There’s something both exciting and foreboding travelling through these songs, a sense that things are not what they seem, and there are equally thrilling and terrifying possibilities in that. This is an album that you don’t put on to tune out; it’s something that requires full engagement and will reward with an adventure through your mind you won’t soon shake.
For more on the band, go here: https://www.facebook.com/vertebratlantis/
To buy the album (U.S.), go here: https://metalodyssey.8merch.us/
Or here (Europe): https://metalodyssey.8merch.com/
For more on the label, go here: http://i-voidhanger.com/
Meat Mead Metal 