Canada has had its fair share of death metal bands, when you think about it. Atrae Bilis are the newest ones to hit my ears, with the Vancouver based four piece having formed back in 2018, with one EP to their name, the wonderfully named “Divinihility” from 2020. This then is their first album, and needs to set out their stall if they are to join the ranks of other highly acclaimed extreme Canucks.
Album opener “Theta” gives way to the churning bombast of “Lore Beyond Bone”, which definitely follows in a similar vein to venerable acts such as Immolation and Suffocation, being an immense maelstrom of low-end heavy technical death metal. It’s after about three minutes that things get a little more interesting, when the tempo slows down, and we get some tasteful choral vocals and a martial rhythm before the dizzying, discordant guitars make an entrance once again. I have to say, hats off to Luka Govednik on the drums, as his playing is really reminiscent of the golden mid to late nineties Polish Death Metal style – ruthlessly clinical and technically exceptional.
In terms of the rest of the band, the bass is much more prominent than you may have been used to, thanks to again some dextrous playing on the four-string beast by Brendan Campbell, which often locks into a massive chug with David Stepanavicius’ guitar playing, although it’s worth saying that there’s also more to this than heads-down palm-muted chug. There’s plenty of what I would call “the skronk factor” – that kind of dissonant, discordant axe-work that reminds of classic Voivod, but turned up to 11. Meanwhile, vocalist Jordan Berglund has a fine death metal set of pipes – from decipherable hoarse bellowing, to guttural grunting and through to deranged shrieking, he’s a little like an all-in-one solution for your extreme metal vocal needs.
Song-writing is a key attribute here, with each song having a memorable hook or two despite being more on the brutal and technical side of the house, which is often a failing for similar acts. This is backed up by an absolutely fantastic production, which is punchy, clear and feels like you’ve just had a body-blow from Tyson Fury. At eight tracks in just over 30 minutes, this also hearkens back to an era when a band was willing to be ruthless with quality control and ensure that there is no filler left in the album. This is a lean bastard, make no mistake, and all the better for it.
All in all then, are Atrae Bilis among the royalty of Canadian Death metal? After just one album, it’d be foolhardy to say so, but there is certainly the possibility that this will be the case in the future if they keep on with this quality. As it is – a definite pick up for fans of Brutal and Technical extremity.
(8.5/10 Chris Davison)
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