Review Summary: Solid 2012 revival death metal band, which means, yup you got it, they are rehashing ideas that have been done a thousand time. Nothing new here guys, just solid osdm.
So here we are again guys in 2012. It's about that time when we evaluate what death metal has put out for the year. Some, I'm sure have had some expectations, some may have had low ones. I personally feel metal is for the most part dead and I still stay up to par with what's available. I know from time to time there will be solid death metal released and Ataraxy's Revelations of the Ethereal is without a doubt solid.
But I'm not gonna waste too much time saying with an intro because we all want to know if this album is good or not and what makes it good and what doesn't. So I'll stop with the fourth person semantics and say that you should definately check this album out. The music here is similar to Horrendous, Convulse, and most Swedish styled bands. They favor the typical old school styles of death. The music is definately cohesive and varying. This album starts with a pointless two minute clean intro and honestly from there most of the music is typical osdm Swedish style.
I found that many of the songs here flow very well, meaning that the transitions are smooth. For instance on the first real track "Necrotic Shadow of Decay", there is technique used of slow passages that are almost doom like and ones that are faster with blast beats. The little transitions used to fused the two together are smooth. Each tempo has its chance to play itself out.
I want to make special mention on the vocals as they are very tasty and fit the music very well. The vocals are aggression and powerful yet they fit the albums emotional contact with flying colors. All the other instruments are executed well which is usually typical of artists under labels but I'm always more concerened about the compositional aspects which this does have but everything is rehashed and nothing really stands out as being new to the revival scene.
If were to try and the say the remaining tracks were anything different I'd be lying as they all sound pretty much the same. They are all still very good as the band is but this album is barely above average but still one of the best death metal releases of 2012 so far, but yeah metal is dead. Rehashing old ideas doesn't bring life. It's worth checking tho. Have fun.
