Review Summary: Entropy in sound.
Being blindfolded and led into the woods is an unsettling idea. With each step, you'll be making your peace because a deeper sense of resignation comes with every unanswered question. To be candid, I walked into this record blind myself. This is my first introduction to the band, and it was quite the experience. Technical Death Metal is the genre slapped onto the group, but it doesn’t seem to encapsulate their sound sufficiently. The group flirts just enough with dissonant Death Metal as they do with progressive metalcore to stand out from their peers. Nothing is predictable, yet nearly every progression is met with familiar comfort. The beginning of the third track, Hallucinative Terror, seems to rip a page out of Where Owls Know My Name before delving into a more hardcore-styled delivery in the riffs and vocals. The vocals, performed by Stace Fifield, are dynamic and engrossing, but at times, it feels as if he hasn’t found a register where he feels at home. Granted, the nature of this genre demands quick transitions in pitches and distortion, but some of the lines still sound far more jarring than is warranted by the track.
Transitions are the shared weak point in this album. Hallucinating Terror is followed by Rejecting Obliteration, and these tracks could not be any more different. Rejecting Obliteration is far more visceral and sonically abrasive than its predecessor, starting off with a staccato riff that makes it's way slowly down the fretboard to meet the pounding blast beats and guttural bellows of Stace Fifield. Honestly, Rejecting Obliteration is an amazing track and very well could be the best on the record (aptly earning its title track distinction). Still, it should have been placed earlier in the record along with the more blood-pumping tracks rather than in the middle with the less dissonant numbers. The fifth track, Wraith, sees the album making a monumental downshift in tempo, exhibiting some death-doom influences that your eardrums will find exceptionally welcoming following the barrage of sound they have been subjected to. All in all, the musicianship on this record is exemplary. The drumming by Tim Stewart in Cicada is mesmerizing, and the bass work supporting the foundation that the guitarist treads upon is succinct and articulated
In short, Rejecting Obliteration is an excellent record that will keep you engaged. However, your level of engagement may intermittently be broken by some questionable directions the band is seeking to take you. That said, if you yearn for music that laughs at your expectations and makes an example of your premature assumptions, this is the record for you. Regarding the Technical Death Metal tag, Rejecting Obliteration brings some interesting takes to the genre, but I suspect that the enamoration with this effort will vary.
