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Abyssal: Novit enim dominus qui sunt eius
14/01/13 || Sokaris
First off, this album is free to download and can be streamed in full at Bandcamp, so why not just listen along as you read? The bottom line is that Abyssal is a band very damn good at what they do and if what they do is something you dig you’re in for a treat. If you’re not, you’ll know pretty damn quick. It might be a bit anti-climatic to start a review off this way but this is the kind of band that’s developed to serve a very specific niche. Abyssal are devotees of a particularly potent kind of death metal darkness, worshiping at the altars of the eeriest moments in an Incantation or Immolation composition.
It seems lately there are a lot bands playing reverb-soaked, ultra-twisted death metal with a heavy influence from the aforementioned two big I’s. It’s kind of the new Carcass-worship, although the results have been a lot more consistent (nothing as godly as Exhumed or Impaled but nothing as bad as the Myspace goregrind glut). Abyssal takes things a step further, stripping away the riffiness and groove from something like Ignivimous or Emptiness and focusing more on abstract atmosphere. Though I find them to be a death metal band in spirit, they take these wretched, writhing musical pieces so deep into decay that there’s potential to appeal to the black metal crowd, especially those that dig Deathspell Omega and the like.
Like Deathspell Omega, Abyssal is cloaked in mystery. At the end of the day it’s purportedly a/some British dude(s) posting songs on Bandcamp. No social networking sites, no biographical indulgences, no label involvement. An esoteric logo and obscure images of dust and rot are all that accompany the sounds. But these grungy images presented under the brand of “Abyssal” prove a kind of truth in advertising. Really, this British act has done my job already. The best way to describe this sonic descent is to just call it what it is… Abyssal. A pitch-black, hellish free-for-all.
Though the decrepit atmosphere is the band’s biggest strength and their obvious source of appeal, one can find fault within their approach. There’s not much to grab on to, so to speak, not much in the way of hooks or necessarily memorable parts. This is just something that comes with the territory though and there’s a certain state of mind one should be in to fully absorb this sort of thing. They’re a “sit back and stare at the wall” kind of band. Just how far removed this is from death metal’s thrashy origins is testament (no pun intended) to the genre’s continued ability to adapt, mutate and stand as a method of expression open to interpretation. And Abyssal interpret this music as something that NEEDS to be dark as hell.
Somewhere between the abstract technicality of Portal and Mitochondrion and the fundamental sinister heaviness of the New York death metal scene, in a parallel universe from their country’s gothic doom heritage lies Abyssal. Take the plunge.
- Information
- Released: 2013
- Label: Self-released
- Website: Abyssal Bandcamp
- Band
- ???
- Tracklist
- 01. Forebode
- 02. The tongue of the demagogue
- 03. Under the wretched sun of Hattin
- 04. Elegy of ruin
- 05. The headless serpent
- 06. A sheath of deceit
- 07. Elegy of staves
- 08. A Malthusian epoch
- 09. As paupers safeguard magnates
- 10. Created sick; commanded to be well
- 11. The last king
