We try to avoid hyperbole when we can, but it’s hard to do that sometimes as a writer who’s trying to describe music you likely haven’t heard yet, at least not in full. There are a lot of really good records that come out each week, and we try to get to all the ones we liked. But you get a really special one only now and again. A world-altering record is something I can remember a handful or so times the last decade, and today is one of those.
Yes, there’s a lot of hype and anticipation any time cosmic death metal band Blood Incantation does anything, and for good reason. The arrival of their third full-length album “Absolute Elsewhere” brings with it nervous anticipation of what exactly this thing would be. Last time we heard from the band—vocalist/guitarist Paul Riedl, guitarist Morris Kolontyrsky, fretless bassist Jeff Barrett, drummer Isaac Faulk—it was “Timewave Zero,” their ambient EP that wasn’t really a surprise but definitely led some to wonder where death metal stood in their universe. Turns out it’s still right in the fucking center, though there are plenty of passages that prove “Zero” wasn’t a lark, as they expertly combine the two worlds and create the most magnificent thing in their catalog. This is a record that, once it’s available to you, should be appointment listening, preferably in the black of night, on headphone or turntable (or both) so you can disappear into this landmark moment.
“The Stargate” is the opening track, running 20:20 and spread over three tablets. The first opens in a whir, a propulsive rush that tears apart and mangles its way to the stars. The playing is vicious and channeled, simmering into a synth haze that feels like it transports you five decades into the past, a heavy Floyd-esque excursion that is a tenet that returns often. “All life is temporary unless its consciousness,” Riedl howls, the leads smearing slow-falling ash that washes into the second tablet that simmers in the great beyond. It feels like oranges and purples are sinking into your psyche, shadowy sequences dashing past places undiscovered by humans, the playing picking up and getting more metallic. Guitars melt steel, crushing through a synth tidal wave, wrecking into the third tablet that stabs and illuminates. The battery spreads as glorious leads beam, voices warble, and the drumming decimates, a Middle Easten vibe tingling brain wrinkles. Trancey clean singing changes the temperature, howls returning to wrench muscles, the guitars catching fire and spiraling into a sound warp, dissolving into a black hole.
“The Message” runs 23:23, also divided into a triad of tablets, entering with catchy guitar work that feels strangely inviting. The fluidity multiplies as the playing grows more forceful, howls battering as a beastly explosion pulls at eyes. The tempo hulks, the leads diving and shimmering, raging into the second portion where sci-fi keys envelop like a sea of galactic matter. Clean singing again adds a different texture, and a welcome one, Weidel calling, “Can’t you hear them? The voices calling your name?” as it feels like the alien grandson of “Dark Side of the Moon.” The keys continue to ice the trails, the vocals continuing a smooth pathway, hypnotic visions taking over your dreams as you head into final third of this piece that rampages and destroys at dawn. Guitars crush as death howls turn maniacal, later evening out, singing that borders on folk easing fears, mellotron flutes breezing through your hair. The serenity is short lived as brutality returns and pummels to the point of decay, spilling through sieves of extraterrestrial keys, a slow fade beginning to take hold, the sounds hovering like a quiet storm as thunder melts into the clouds.
“Absolute Elsewhere” arrives amid a galaxy of expectations as Blood Incantation have become the flag bearers of the cosmic death metal movement, and they could not have been more up to the task of building onto their modern legend. It’s the best heavy metal record, from a pure artistic standpoint, that I’ve heard all year and one of the most impactful and soon-to-be-influential creations in the past decade. It’s an album that takes you into the deepest regions of the galaxy and into your own mind as you stretch beyond recognition what you thought was possible with heavy music.
For more on the band, go here: https://www.facebook.com/BloodIncantationOfficial
To buy the album, go here: https://centurymedia.store/collections/blood-incantation
For more on the label, go here: https://www.centurymedia.com/
Meat Mead Metal 