This album is 4 songs clocking in at 54 minutes, and it is one hell of a ride. I’d love to read the lyrics to this album. 3 of the song titles are similar and the other track is the shortest track on the album by a long shot, and has a much more atmospheric ambient quality. All 4 tracks run into each other nicely giving me more than a slight hint of a concept album, which in my mind is a good thing. The band shows a real maturity to their song writing throughout; I hear a lot of variety in the ebb a flow of the songs. Some changes are nice and abrupt, and at other times you are led slowly to a climax that seems natural when you hear it, but wasn’t always what you thought it would be. It sounds to me like a lot of thought has been put into making the most of each individual instrument and the relationship between them. Drums fills are always well placed and the bass line is not always just doubling the guitar, and the three parts together often give the idea that the total sound is more than the sum of its parts. Throughout the album the band play really tightly, and all of the changes are played confidently and with passion. The vocals to my mind have a black metal shrieking style through all of the songs except the guest vocals on Life Ritual, although they are a bit lower in pitch than many black metal bands.
The production is very nice and clear sounding, yet still powerful when the music calls for it. There is a good deal of separation between the 3 instruments, which is necessary for the interplay between the parts for them to be heard properly. This is a band I would love a chance to see live. There are many influences on display throughout this album yet it still seems really cohesive as a whole to me. I’d recommend this album to any metal fan that likes something a bit different from the normal list of subgenres that most new releases often fit all too comfortably into; I would also suggest listening to the album as a whole before judging it. Several times if possible.