Apex Terminator

“Hopefully they got something in store for 2021.” I stated that in my review for their Cosmic Satan EP I wrote back in December 2020 and my hopeful wish came true! I didn’t get this EP until March 2022. If I knew about it earlier, I would have gotten it earlier. Kilju is an awesome and unique metal band from Finland that more people should be aware of. I would say Apex Terminator has elements found on their previous releases.

This EP starts off with a weird spoken word thing on This Night is Infernal. The vocalist Sairas might be speaking. I can’t understand it all the way through due to multiple vocal effects. I guess I’ll have to listen to it more and more to understand It kind of reminds me Intro (Tireheb) by Beherit. After that spoken word intro, it sounds like a black metal song with black metal riffs and everything else associated with black metal. It’s a mid-paced tempo song. There’s a synthesizer for atmosphere and it sounds good. This may be the first time Kilju has used synths. Maybe they did on the previous releases, I’ll have to re-listen to those previous releases. The synths are noticeable and they add flavor to Kilju’s songs.

Apex Terminator is not purely a black metal affair like with the Black Empire Descending album they released ten years before this EP. The songs vary on here and I like the variety I’m listening to. The song Destruction Waltz sounds like a death metal song and then it turns into a black metal song. This may be the highlight of the EP. It is an awesomely constructed song and it’s also the longest song found on the EP. They put a lot of hard work writing and recording this song. It’s probably the best song found on the EP. Every aspect found on Destruction Waltz is marvelous.

Sairas vocalizes with various vocals found in the extreme metal realm. When you listen to the first couple of songs, he sounds like a black metal vocalist. Then on Destruction Waltz, he uses death growl vocals. He switches to back black metal vocal mode on Destruction Waltz. His vocals are some kind of death metal vocals that you might find in death ’n’ roll, they’re not as growly on the title track and Endless and Unrelenting.

Barbaric and the title track are two fast-paced songs. The fastest songs found this EP. Barbaric kind of reminds me of Nirvana’s Territorial Pissings at first with the guitar riff and drumming. It’s a super catchy tune, it may be the catchiest tune found on the album. It has punk rock riffs and black metal riffs. Barbaric has synths like in This Night is Infernal. Apex Terminator is the shortest song found on here. It’s sort of a death/grind song. It goes by quite fast. It’s pretty damn heavy as well.

Endless and Unrelenting has an accurate title. It has fast guitar work and drum work that seems endless and unrelenting. Incredible guitar riffs found in this one. Actually, there’s incredible guitar riffs on any of the songs found on this EP. Raven and Morbid Holocaust are great guitarists and they are a terrific guitar duo. There’s a little bit of technical guitar work found on Barbaric, I like that since they’re not technical metal guitarists. There’s one guitar solo found on the title track of this EP. They don’t do much guitar solos. I know they started to perform guitar solos on Cosmic Satan.

The drums and bass on this are excellent on this EP. Butch Armageddon is a really damn good bassist and I know this based on his bass work on the previous releases. He showcases his skills on Barbaric and Destruction Waltz. He has an excellent sounding drum kit and he puts to great use. He plays with fast precision while he drums on most of the songs. He does mid-paced tempo drumming on the first song. His best drumming is found on Destruction Waltz, the title track and Endless and Unrelenting. He has some sick sounding drum rolls on Destruction Waltz. He drums quite hard on the title track. He goes mega fast on Endless and Unrelenting. Of course, I also know he’s really damn good at drumming based on his drum work found on the previous releases.

It took Kilju nine years to release something new and I’m happy they did. I was thinking they wouldn’t release anything new. This EP is a good place to start if you’re new to Kilju. Check out their other releases as well, they’re readily available on Bandcamp. For those who like blackened death metal, death ’n’ roll and even punk, you’ll like this one. If you’re open-minded with metal in general, you’ll probably like this EP.