Crushing Onward into Oblivion

Tyrants Blood is a Canadian band who contacted me about their 2010 sophomore full-length, Crushing Onward Into Oblivion. One definition of war metal is that it "sounds like Blasphemy." Well, Tyrants Blood features a former member of Blasphemy, and is every bit as insanely aggressive as what you might expect from the genre.

I haven't listened to a lot of war metal, but I'm hearing the same kind of black/death/thrash full-on assault of bands like Black Witchery. If you're even less familiar with the microgenre than I am, your closest point of reference might be Anaal Nathrakh, without the clean vocals that have been popping up more often in their recent work. In other words, Crushing is not for the faint of heart.

The band has achieved the relentlessly brutal, mind-rendingly fast sound of war metal (in 2-4 minute bursts) without sacrificing musicality. They don't stop coming at you, but they're coming at you with grace and technique. It's not some rag-tag group of freedom fighters storming the castle, but the well-practiced, honed attack of the special forces. Well--it's not too graceful. The production makes clear this is happening in the field of battle, where plans don't survive contact with the enemy.

They do briefly slow down and turn off distortion for parts of the 8-minute closing track, but even then it doesn't sound like they're going easy on you--just waiting for the right moment to strike.

The Verdict: Yeah, I normally go for the doom and the more nuanced/experimental/"artsy" varieties of metal. But occasionally, I need to scar my eardrums with batshit-crazy bludgeoning. This scratched that itch nicely.

originally written for http://fullmetalattorney.blogspot.com/