Allegaeon – The Ossuary Lens Review

By Maddog

Allegaeon’s six albums have received tumultuous marks in these halls. After their fantastic 2010 debut Fragments of Form and Function broke the score counter, Allegaeon sank as low as a 2.0 for 2016’s Proponent for Sentience in the eyes of then-tadpole GardensTale. While their latest outing recovered to a more respectable score, Allegaeon’s techy brand of melodeath has polarized socialites and critics alike. The band excelled with their riffier onslaughts and soaring melodies, but fell for the forbidden fruit of proggy excess. The Ossuary Lens showcases a leaner, meaner Allegaeon. I won’t be listening to it in a decade, but it’s a worthy soundtrack for today.

Allegaeon have trimmed their bloat but not their ambitions. For the uninitiated, Allegaeon’s brand of death metal resembles a noodlier Arsis, with its melodicism matched only by its technicality. That said, Allegaeonites will recall that these Coloradans would rather cover Yes or Rush than classic death metal. Allegaeon’s career has sometimes descended into a vulgar display of prog, combining protracted tracks with a penchant for flamenco breaks. These proggy elements live on, as Allegaeon gallops from punchy riffs to melodic leads to clean jams and back again. However, The Ossuary Lens displays newfound restraint. At 45 minutes, this is the band’s shortest album by a full eight minutes. Allegaeon’s escapades no longer leave a salty aftertaste, and the band’s forays into other genres no longer feel like pleas for a yardstick. The Ossuary Lens preserves its identity without getting lost in its own reflection.

Accordingly, The Ossuary Lens hits across both its bigly riffs and its creative tangents. The album’s fierier cuts are a refreshing return to form, with “The Swarm” reviving Elements of the Infinite’s infectious riffcraft. As hoped, these sections still ooze technicality, as guitarists Greg Burgess and Michael Stancel dominate their fretboards even in their most explosive moments. Meanwhile, Allegaeon’s genre-bending experiments feel creative but not overwrought. Most notably, “Dark Matter Dynamics” pulls a First Fragment stunt of seamlessly transitioning between jubilant strumming (courtesy of Adrian Bellue) and formidable death metal melodies. Indeed, The Ossuary Lens hits hardest when these forces unite. For instance, “Carried by Delusion” voyages from serene melodies to Revocation worship to blackened tremolos to upbeat bass and guitar solos to downcast crunchy riffs, eviscerating both my heartstrings and my neck. The Ossuary Lens’ moderation goes a long way. Rather than clobbering the listener with decades-long Spanish guitar jams, The Ossuary Lens presents its creative side through measured four-minute tracks. Tech, prog, melody, and home sweet death metal unite into a potent concoction.

While each piece of The Ossuary Lens is impressive in isolation, the album sometimes loses my interest. One reason is its lack of climactic moments. During tracks like “Scythe” and “Wake Circling Above,” I zoned out and had to abuse the rewind button, because there weren’t enough valleys, buildups, and peaks to keep me engaged. Another reason is sequencing; while the five middle tracks from “Driftwood” through “Dark Matter Dynamics” shine, the bookends fall short. The most predictable reason is production. Despite aiming for creativity and dynamism in their songwriting, Allegaeon continues to brickwall their albums into tepid gruel. As a result, The Ossuary Lens often loses my focus despite its seemingly manageable length. Conversely, the album’s highlights show how it’s done. Most strikingly, “Driftwood” has colonized my brain with a soulful mix of melodeath and metalcore that recalls Venom Prison. With highs this high, it’s a shame that The Ossuary Lens often slips into uniformity.

Allegaeon is a relatively new band, but they inspire nostalgia. I vividly recall pimply nights with the addictive Fragments of Form and Function. I still think that “Accelerated Evolution” and “Genocide for Praise” are two of the greatest album closers of this millennium. And the iconic 2014 music video for “1.618” sealed Allegaeon’s place in my heart forever. Measured against Allegaeon’s first three albums, The Ossuary Lens falls short, hampered by its dearth of standout moments. Still, it isn’t a stinker. It still bangs; it still shreds; it still progs. Warts and all, it earns its keep.

Rating: Good
DR: 5 | Format Reviewed: 256 kbps mp3
Label: Metal Blade Records
Websites: allegaeon.bandcamp.com | facebook.com/Allegaeon
Releases Worldwide: April 4th, 2025

Iceberg

Allegaeon are something of a known quantity around here, having been nodded at by Steel, eviscerated by GardensTale, and patched up by Cherd. The Colorado crew helmed by guitarist Greg Burgess have amassed a legion of rabid followers (who are sure to raise a ruckus in the comment section) for their signature style of Gothenburg-meets-tech-death. I’ll admit to being a fan of 2016’s Proponent for Sentience, one of the first reviews I read on this site, but got lost amidst the dense material of Apoptosis and frankly didn’t even give Damnum a shot. Allegaeon’s latest LP, The Ossuary Lens, sees the return of original vocalist Ezra Haynes and a much-welcomed stripped-down runtime, two intriguing changes in my book. It’s been quite a while since I’ve been excited about an Allegaeon release, can The Ossuary Lens be the record to change that?

Allegaeon’s style of melo-tech-death needs little introduction here, but for those of you who haven’t been following the past decade’s worth of drama, I’ll provide the CliffsNotes. Sweeping, scalar guitar riffs courtesy of Burgess and Michael Stancel form the backbone of most tracks, and the dual guitars make for an indulgent offering of solos (“Driftwood,” “Wake Circling Above”). The drums here, while dripping with modern production sheen, are compelling and energetic without being overly technical, a sincere compliment for Jeff Saltzman. Allegaeon have never strayed from highlighting their bass players, and standout moments in “Chaos Theory” and “Carried by Delusion” show Brandon Michael has as much a command of melody as he does of relentless, galloping rhythms. Ezra Haynes, of Elements of the Infinite fame, comes roaring back to life on The Ossuary Lens, employing a gritty death roar alongside commendable clean vocals on “Driftwood” and “Wake Circling Above.” The performances on The Ossuary Lens are everything one would come to expect from a band nearly two decades into their career, and make for a wholly engaging listening experience.

Allegaeon albums tend to have similar issues holding them back, and the band have largely addressed them on The Ossuary Lens. First and foremost is the 45-minute runtime, a nearly 25% reduction in music from their last three records. The renewed focus on editing shines, with tracks that hit fast and get out of the way while still managing to be memorable (“The Swarm,” “Imperial”). This represents the first major improvement in The Ossuary Lens; Allegaeon have not only figured out that less is more, but they’ve also magnified the parts that work. Sing-along melodeath choruses lurk throughout the album (“Driftwood,” “Dies Irae”) but none so impactful as penultimate track “Wake Circling Above.” Clearly the best Insomnium track released this year, Allegaeon’s ode to all things Gothenburg is a monumental testament to what this band can do when they stop doing so much and let the music dictate the song’s course.

The hits don’t stop there. The Ossuary Lens takes a while to really get moving, with the first three tracks treading familiar territory. But then comes “Dies Irae,” a barnburner that incorporates the three-note musical motif for the Dies Irae text of the Requiem Mass, a nice music nerd Easter Egg that only enhances the ripping triplet-infused breakdown sitting in the song’s center. And Burgess’ requisite flamenco guitar, something sorely overused in Proponent for Sentience, is here condensed into the driving groove of “Dark Matter Dynamics,” a powerfully infectious rhythm ripped straight from a Rodrigo y Gabriela record, or the breath-before-the-plunge moments of the darkly harrowing “Carried by Delusion.” Whereas previous Allegaeon records were dense, academic affairs that required shoveling through noise and notes to discern, The Ossuary Lens presents a barebones masterclass on Allegaeon’s modus operandi.

This isn’t to say that The Ossuary Lens is infallible. Early tracks “Chaos Theory” and “Driftwood” are technically proficient, but fail to reach the emotional highs of the rest of their brethren. Final track “Scythe,” while holding some excellent verse grooves, feels underbaked after the astonishing “Wake Circling Above,” and its cropped ending leaves the album on more of a question mark than a statement. And there’s the lingering issue of the DR5 master and production, which, while not as obscene as earlier records, is still crushed and fatiguing. But overall, The Ossuary Lens represents a massively successful repositioning for the Coloradoans, making it one of my favorite spins of the year for its precision, refinement, and memorability. If Allegaeon continue on this trajectory, we may see their best work yet just over the horizon.

Rating: 3.5/5.0

#2025 #30 #35 #Allegaeon #AmericanMetal #Apr25 #Arsis #DeathMetal #FirstFragment #Insomnium #Melodeath #MelodicDeathMetal #MetalBlade #MetalBladeRecords #ProgressiveDeath #ProgressiveDeathMetal #ProgressiveTechnicalDeathMetal #Review #Reviews #Revocation #RodrigoYGabriela #Rush #TechnicalDeathMetal #TheOssuaryLens #VenomPrison #Yes

Purified in Blood – Primal Pulse Thunder Review

By Cherd

I came of age, musically and otherwise1 in the American Midwest in the 90s. Like so many of my adolescent male peers who lacked cultural outlets for our instinctive angst around blue collar upbringings, I latched on to the exploding scene of hardcore and early metalcore. For the better part of a decade, I mainlined releases from record labels like Victory, Revelation, SolidState, et al, but by around 2002, the prevalence of screamo and my own shifting tastes pushed me down other musical paths. Small wonder, then, that I was unfamiliar with Norwegian metalcore purveyors Purified in Blood when I selected—with trepidation, given the metalcore tag—their new record Primal Pulse Thunder from the promo sump. As I have learned, Purified in Blood formed in 2003 and have dissolved and reformed multiple times since. We may have been ships passing in the night lo these many years, and my introduction to them may come on their fourth full-length, but now I’ve found them I’m pleasantly surprised.

Any fear that I was in for some weepy post-metalcore with nasally cleans disappeared as the d-beat drums and beatdown riffs of first advance single “Jernbur” filled my Heavys. This is tough guy hardcore, but without the cocky barked vocals of most bands I’d categorize that way. Instead, vocalist Hallgeir Skretting Enokssen has an enviable harsh delivery for both gang-shouts and the death growls he frequently slips into across Primal Pulse Thunder’s nine songs. In fact, hardcore may be the structure of Purified in Blood’s sound, but melodeath is the cladding. The style pops up all over, from the tremolo sprint in the otherwise knuckle-dragging title track, to the bridge in “Key and Stone,” to the the harmonized chorus in “Jernbur.” While the band started as hardcore (sorry) proponents of the straightedge ethos, resembling Earth Crisis in philosophy and in sound , the remaining members have since dropped the overt social politics of it lyrically. Instead, there’s a lot of rumination on transcending a world on fire, and no small amount of chest-thumping declarations.

There are significant strengths to discuss on Primal Pulse Thunder, but the most impressive is how hardcore and death metal serve each other as the band deftly blend or switch between the styles. The title track is a great case in point. Before listening to a single note, I read the album’s title and thought “that sounds stupid.” Those three words in that combination came across as try-hard toughness. But by packaging those words in a perfect blend of dummy caveman death riffs and slowed-down beatdown, the song has me wanting to see it played live so I can join in shouting “PRIMAL! PULSE! THUNDER!” And then there’s that late tremolo riff that packs tons of Amon Amarth swagger into the song as Enokssen roars “I refuse to be killed! Set fire to everything!” Purified in Blood know exactly what each of their two main styles are for, and they deliver several choice cuts of monstrously heavy metalcore.

That’s not to say Primal Pulse Thunder is a world beating record. It’s long for as much hardcore as it has at 50 minutes, and there is definitely bloat that wouldn’t be missed if it were cut. The two song stretch of “Ascend to Nothing” and “Spiritual Thirst” is where that trouble begins. The first of these is actually a welcome slow down after the white hot intensity of the tracks up until that point, with a nice mid-paced groove that helps the record breath. Unfortunately it’s followed by an even slower, more experimental song. “Spiritual Thirst” is the low point of the album, starting with un-asked for throat singing, stick clicking, and riff development that feels out of place among the otherwise tight writing. At nearly eight minutes, it’s also the second longest song on the album. The longest, 11 and a half minute closer “Portal,” fits the album much better, but it’s fair to say a song like standout “Jernbur” does everything “Portal” does, but in almost a third of the time.

Relatively minor bloat issues aside, Primal Pulse Thunder is a three word phrase that, despite it’s awkwardness on the page, now conjures for me the sweaty basement shows and the live-wire energy I experienced as a 20 year old. I remember friends at the time telling me “You can’t listen to this kind of music forever.” Oh, can’t I?

Rating: 3.5/5.0
DR: 9 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps mp3
Label: Indie Recordings
Websites: purifiedinblood.bandcamp.com | facebook.com/purifiedinblood
Releases Worldwide: March 14th, 2025

#2025 #35 #Beatdown #DeathMetal #EarthCrisis #Hardcore #IndieRecordings #Mar25 #Melodeath #Metalcore #NorwegianMetal #PrimalPulseThunder #PurifiedInBlood #Review #Reviews

The Black Dahlia Murder – Servitude Review

By Angry Metal Guy

The Black Dahlia Murder lost a giant on May 11th, 2022, with the death of co-founding member Trevor Strnad, who had penned the lyrics and fronted TBDM across its nine-record discography. The question of how you replace someone as well-loved and well-respected as Trevor must have been a matter of some discussion internally. The solution from the veteran melodeath outfit was to keep the job in-house. Rather than bringing in a new face, guitarist and co-founder Brian Eschbach picked up the microphone, while he was replaced by Ryan Knight—who previously slung the six-string from 2009’s Deflorate to 2015’s Abysmal. Even though I appreciated this solution, it was still difficult to press play on 2024’s tenth The Black Dahlia Murder LP, Servitude. It felt strange to know that our affable, bearded, and dad-bodded metal nerd was no longer going to be screaming at me about lycanthropy. I wondered whether I could enjoy a Strnadless TBDM record or if it would change their sound irrevocably.

You know how The Black Dahlia Murder sounds. Giving strong Gothenburgian vibes, Servitude still deals in the bounce of the Björriff (like “Panic Hysteria” or “Asserting Dominion”), but with the post-Ritual light chaos and groove that helped to transform and mature their sound (“Evening Ephemeral,” “Mammoth’s Hand”). The guitars anchor Servitude’s sound, held firm by sick riffs at breakneck speed, accented with unexpected melodies (“Servitude”), stadium solos (“Mammoth’s Hand”), Gorodian gymnastic harmonies on an Obscura vault track (“Transcosmic Blueprint”) and even 29 seconds of Opeth (“An Intermission”). While Ryan Knight and Brandon Ellis give a master class in metal guitars from neoclassical to thrash, the rhythm section of bassist Max Lavelle and drummer Alan Cassidy1 rumble and blast, driving the sound forward with an intensity that stems from Florida rather than Sweden.

Over the flurry of guitar gymnastics and blast beats, Eschbach’s growls and screams pace a familiar path. At first, my brain didn’t want to accept what it was hearing. When listened to actively, however, I recognized the lower screams and throatier gutturals. And then suddenly, Eschbach was just the vocalist; barking lightning (“Panic Hysteric,” “Evening Ephemeral”), working both his slightly condensed upper and lower ranges in the trademark style of which Trevor was master. While familiar, Eschbach’s approach to rhythm feels like a guitarist doing vocals. He works in lockstep with the groove being carried by the band to create staccato punctuations (“Transcosmic Blueprint”) and syncopated swings (“Asserting Dominion”) that make his performance stand out.2 While Trevor was freer with rhythm and expression, Eschbach’s performance is percussive and precise. The weakness in his performance can be found in the guttural vocals, which don’t reach as deeply or hit as hard. But when all is said and done, Eschbach’s performance sounds like The Black Dahlia Murder.

Servitude seems like an album written to succeed or fail based on the execution of a well-established sound. The devil is, therefore, in the details: the songwriting, the riffs, and especially the guitar solos. And in those places, The Black Dahlia Murder isn’t taking risks. The writing isn’t suddenly progressive, “Aftermath” starts in 7, but they revert to 4/4 and never change time signatures again for the rest of the album.3 There is no revitalization of Ritual‘s or Everblack‘s adventurous arrangements. Where the songs surprise is when they sound chaotic, giving Carnosus (who gives TBDM) or euro-tech and straying further from the Björriffs that propelled them to prominence (see “Evening Ephemeral,” “Utopia Black” or “Mammoth’s Hand”). And Knight and Ellis drop killer solos. “Cursed Creator” hits with shred and harmony, “Transcosmic Blueprint” gives jazz fusion, while “Evening Ephemeral” starts Servitude off on the guitar heroics that made Ryan Knight one of my favorite guitarists ever. Oddly, though, there are a couple of duds as well (“Asserting Domination” is bland, while “Servitude” is fine).

The core of The Black Dahlia Murder hasn’t changed, so the core of Servitude was going to be good. At 35 minutes of riffy, guitar-driven melodic death metal, it’s easy to surmise that The Black Dahlia Murder couldn’t fail on Servitude. And yet, there is a risk inherent to releasing a record following the tragic passing of one of the scene’s most beloved personalities. In a way, you could criticize Servitude for playing it too safe. It hits all the notes you expect it to hit with its Industry Standard Mastering Job™. The Brandon Ellis and Mark Lewis production is functionally indistinguishable from previous albums. And there’s a familiar-but-not-quite feel to certain riffs or melodies. Yet, as a whole, Servitude succeeds at both being very good—hitting extra hard on those last three tracks—and feeling like an honorable way to continue the legacy of one of melodic death metal’s premiere acts.

Rating: Very Good!
DR: 7 | Format Reviewed: 320 kb/s mp3s
Label: Metal Blade Records
Websites: Bandcamp | Facebook
Releases Worldwide: September 27th, 2024

#2024 #35 #Abysmal #AtTheGates #Carnosus #DeathMetal #Deflorate #Everblack #Gorod #Melodeath #MelodicDeathMetal #MetalBladeRecords #Obscura #Opeth #Review #Reviews #Ritual #RyanKnight #Sep24 #Servitude #Slugdge #TheBlackDahliaMurder #TrevorStrnad

Música: At War With Reality
Banda: At the Gates

---

"A howling wind of nightmares
Howling through barren streets
Frozen in time
The city woke up, paralyzed

Where is the splendor?
All our ambitions decay
Among the ruins
Covered forever in dust

War

The sound of beating winds
Chaotic dreams asleep
As phantoms we answer
At war with reality

Where is the hunger?
With eyes of sadness it stares
The air it hangs dying
Dressed in the nightmares of old

Abandoned in panic, fortifications decayed
From our own indulgence, the golden age dead

'Reality is not always probable, or likely'

War

The sound of beating winds
Chaotic dreams asleep
As phantoms we answer
At war with reality

As phantoms we answer
At war with reality"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ze1K_mSO_Eo

My musical journey over the years has taken me through more than a few genres, but metal has long been my home. Here's my primary journey. Overlap happens of course, and I never abandoned any of these genres, my focus just shifted
Rock (mostly Linkin Park) -> groove metal -> death metal -> nu metal -> black metal -> folk metal -> melodeath -> aggrotech -> industrial-> horrorcore -> rap -> darkwave -> blackened deathcore -> 2nd wave deathcore (both melodic and technical)
I usually sum up my tastes as "black clothes music"
Reccs:
#groovemetal
Lamb of God
Otep
#deathmetal
Fleshgod Apocalypse
Amon Amarth
#numetal
Slipknot
SOAD
#blackmetal
Carach Angren
Møl
#folkmetal
Equilibrium
Finntroll
#melodeath
Nekrogoblikon
#aggrotech
Psyclon nine
Angelspit
Grendel
#industrial
Aesthetic Perfection
Faderhead
Combichrist
Kmfdm
#horrorcore
Necro
Vinnie Paz
#rap
Tech N9ne
Dax
Hopsin
#darkwave
Pertubator
Carpenter Brut
#blackeneddeathcore
Lorna shore
Shadow of Intent
Mental cruelty
#deathcore
Whitechapel
Brand of sacrifice