OUTERGODS
OUTERGODS "A Kingdom Built Upon the Wreckage of Heaven"
By Dr. Abner Mality
Although the press brings up names like MORBID ANGEL and STRAPPING YOUNG LAD as points of reference, England's OUTERGODS are pretty much a deathcore band when you get down to brass tacks. But yes, there are certain points on this, their debut, that hearken back to elder days of metal and there are some interesting little quirks that keep this from being as tiresome as most deathcore is.
They don't lack intensity, that's for sure, and much of "AKBUTWOH" is an aural blast furnace of cyclone beats and hyperblasting speed in the vein of FULL OF HELL and TEETH. Like full on war metal, it is extreme but has no memorability. The harsh jabbering vocals of Sam Strachan are pure core and just as exhausting as that would indicate. I don't care how intense it is, deathcore vocals will never equal the individuality of classic death metal frontmen like John Tardy, Karl Willets, Kam Lee and so on. You heard one core guy, you've heard them all.
But OUTERGODS are not hopeless by any means. There are some tantalizing tidbits to be found, like the cool MORBID ANGEL riffing on "Into the Howling Void" that mixes seamlessly with that FULL OF HELL kind of blast furnace. At certain points, the guitar sound here achieves a weird kind of flanged, jangly tone that almost shimmers. That's heard to best effect on the album';s standout track, "Tangled In the Cogs Of the Nightmare Machine", where those jangly riffs become majestic and let the song breathe. The lengthy title track also experiments with slower, moodier riffs to good effect and many of the songs here will have at least one segment or solo that sounds different from the white noise deathcore stuff. Plus, no ultra-typical breakdowns here, a phenomenon to be devoutly thankful for.
The record is pretty short which is good because 40 minutes plus of OUTERGODS would have me yelling "Uncle". These dudes don't have quite enough identity yet to warrant a full endorsement from me, but there's enough promise to make me wanna check out their next album.