Allegoresis

Exsul made their first appearance late last year with their self-titled EP. Now, the US death metal duo came through with a follow up titled Allegoresis, dropping another harsh and unlovable offering through Caligari Records. Their brand is incredibly murky, relying on a sludgy delivery factor, often sinking the vocals into the same cavernous depths as the riffs.

Much of this is present on the first EP as well, preventing this from setting itself apart too much. Though the complexity of the music itself steps up a bit, I find the muddiness to prevent it from reaching true peak, causing some songs to mesh. What you can pick up is strong, however. "How in the Land of Satin We Saw Hearsay, Who Kept a School of Vouching" has very explosive drumming that kicks in perfectly after the "Glaucon’s Dilemma" interlude. To contrast it, the doomy sections of this release keep you on your toes, which can be found almost everywhere.

A bit of a tough swallow, but those for an ear for jarring passages under the marshiest of umbrellas will find something to dig here. The smooth interludes help break things up, something that wasn’t present before. It reminds me of an early Nile demo, where the music is all over the place, but the production proverbially smashes it.

Originally written for Metalegion

Arizonian death metallers Exsul return for round two this October with the EP ‘Allegoresis’. This is death metal at its most informal, to the point where I would say aesthetics aside this has more in common with power violence or grindcore in the deliberately random and loose architecture of these tracks. As if barely holding it together, riffs are not so much played as they are fashioned from mud, only to collapse in on themselves lest they become too complex, unable to sustain their shape when formed from such overly malleable material.

Exsul’s intent seems to be one of taking the usual signifiers of death metal of a particularly doomy bent – the down-tuned guitars, the guttural vocals, the thunder of the double bass drums – and appropriating these for the sake of a more avant-garde pursuit. The tracks are not formally structured in the way death metal would normally be, rather they use riffs and basic rhythms as mere suggestion, hints designed to compound on one another with a view to creating a vibe. Said vibe is suffocating and evil for sure, there is an intriguing and almost mesmerising element to Exsul’s execution of this that warrants closer inspection, but as it trades on mood and invocation over formal narrative composition the appeal comes from a very different place to typical death metal.

Ambient death metal doesn’t really exist in the same way as ambient black metal, but ‘Allegoresis’ is a reasonable approximation of how I would imagine this subgenre to sound. The production is warm, heavy, all encompassing, with the low end only ever interrupted for the sake of a screaming guitar note or manic vocal outburst.

This idiosyncratic endeavour was only hinted at on their debut self-titled EP released in 2020. And the fact that Exsul have leaned into their quirkier traits on this latest EP is certainly to the benefit of all. This is still recognisably death metal in the most primitive sense of the term, but there are enough other elements – notes sustained just a little past the dictates of good taste, odd collapses in timing and other deliberate moments of sloppiness, an out of place slide guitar or light jazz breakdown – to make us think Exsul are only interested in death metal as a canvas for more experimental pursuits.

But these odd elements are not crass, overdone, or otherwise obnoxious. There is no wackiness for the sake wackiness. All is kept classically contained within a framework of death metal that would satisfy any traditionalist. In short, it seems that Exsul have nailed their aesthetic, which is undeniably lifted from primitve death/doom, and this in turn allows them to contain a greater number of unexpected avenues and twists within their music whilst maintaining the integrity of the whole. This is a process that is proving to be a pleasing curiosity to witness from one EP to the next. One wonders with baited breath as to where they will take this format on subsequent releases.

(I am aware I gave the debut EP 87% and this 85% even though I think this is the superior release, but a) my ratings are harsher than they were a year ago, and b) good reviews can't and shouldn't be boiled down to a number)

Originally published at Hate Meditations