German blackened death metallers Ars Irae hit us with a second album of cleverly written songs that venture into uncharted territories. The riff in the opener “Des Jägers Fluch” is excellent, very catchy and backed by throaty vocals that sit well with the music as I can detect a slight hint of Rotting Christ within this album due its dark umbrous approach. As the title track enters next the drums sound chaotic, wild even after the black riff and here there is a definite Norwegian quality within the song similar to 1349 at times.
The shadowy riff of “In Die Tiefe” is despondent and even though there is a death rhythm styling to the songs, the blackened assault is obvious here but still manages to throw in a few riffing curve balls to keep you paying attention, which is why this album is a little different to its competitors partly. The death metal riff of “Wieland Der Schmied” is a slow motion cliff face sliding on top of you and is like Necrophobic and here yet again there are those aberrant riff changes as the tune veers into God Dethroned and Immolation realms due to the density and fluxing aggression.
A death metal riff starts “Als Nicht War” bolstered by a fat double kick that sounds organic not resorting to production trickery to make it sound polished for the sake of it. The massive increase in tempo is brilliant and has a guitar hook like Dissection that I absolutely loved right before it adopts an almost pagan like bouncing beat. This is a lengthy album as each song capitalises on the ability to push each tune in to uncharted areas enabling the songs stand out uniquely as on the occultist onslaught of “Blutrote Flammen” where a torrent of riffs and drums rain down like obsidian glass piercing with remorseless precision leaving the closer “Homo Sun Humani” to craft yet another angle of their music with some monastic like chanting being used at its start before the beastly deathliness crushes through. This album is extremely fulfilling, adventurous, brave and possessing a deft quality to test accepted norms within blackened death metal and I urge you to check the release out.
(8.5/10 Martin Harris)
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