Cosmic horror, fatalism, mental illness, isolation and philosophical pessimism: everything you need for a perfect Saturday afternoon.
It’s been a few years since we’ve been graced with a dissonant slab of sludge infused blackened death metal from the Colorado natives Glacial Tomb, but they have returned with a bang rather than the proverbial whimper. After adding bassist David Small (Khemmis) to the cauldron they band have created a refined, technically masterful 36 minutes of rip-roaring death metal, exploring the themes of everyday suffering, cosmic horror, mental illness grief and social isolation to pound your brain into an unrecognisable mush.
Drawing on the comic-tinged supernatural horror stylings of Thomas Ligotti, the pessimistic views of Peter Wessel Zapffe and Philipp Mainländer the lyrically dense topics are brought to life by Ben Hutcherson, coupled with the black metal elements it makes for something that is greater than the sum of its genres, deftly dodging time worn tropes, or making use of them to crushing effect.
From start to end the tracks are riddled headbangers, riffs abound that you can’t help but rock out to. Glacial Tomb seem to have a knack of fitting these moments in at exactly the right time, something that is acknowledged by the fact the band relentlessly practised the material before going into the recording process. These days, death metal is a genre of precision, although you can add stylistic elements to give it a messy edge like the titans of old, it can be more about the chops and less about the feel. Glacial Tomb manage to have both in buckets, their songwriting although not exactly bad before has come on in leaps and bounds and flourishes of grandiose black metal monoliths add a genre defying edge to the record.
The only problem with the record is that no track truly stands out on its own, just when there seems to be one peeking out above the parapet, the next song meets it head-on and slams it back down to the safety of the castle walls, avoiding the arrows of populism. The laser focused attention to detail taken throughout the recording process stands front and centre adorned with its tainted crown of fatalistic existential crisis, carrying the sceptre of life’s meanings. The album as a whole is an absolute triumph of dark, blistering metal, presenting a cathartic listen that at no point supposes to allow the attention of the listener to go anywhere other than the dark icy crypt the band have chosen their name after.