Hey there, tech fiends. It's that time of the week again. Before we dive into today's focus, here's the usual weekly reminder that if you're looking for even more sick bands to hear, all prior editions of this series can be perused here.
As I touched on recently, there's really only a handful of tech-death releases by well-known bands left to drop in 2020. However, there's a fair number of releases by brand new or purely underground acts that I still plan to cover between now and January. One of which is Anotos, the debut album from Slovenian technical brutal death maestros Mephistophelian. The self-released album dropped on September 4th and boasts ex-Necrophagist drummer Romain Goulon in their ranks along with a sick guest spot from Benighted vocalist Julien Truchan on "Flesh Canvas".
Active since 2009, the group had only released a 2014 demo prior to the recent release of Anotos. The quality and insanity of this album is stunning considering their lack of prior efforts, and, as they explain things, "Mephistophelian spawned almost a decade ago, yet it dwelled since then. Now they bring their vision of how death metal should sound." Musically, Mephistophelian draw from the past and present of both brutal death metal, and technical death metal, with a usually not overly flashy "noodly" sound much of the time. To me, Anotos calls to mind the first two albums by Spawn of Possession but also will really appeal to fans of Archspire for the sheer speed and sensory overload their music induces. It's hard to place but the songs here sometimes remind me of Behemoth at their most death metal too. Every so often the group shifts gears with more modern technical licks weaving in and out, breaking out into heavy nasty grooves, utilizing almost slam type riffs, and noticeable bass-driven moments all add more dimension to what is essentially an absurdly brutal and full-throttle as fuck all the time sort of album.
Clocking in at just 35 minutes split between ten tracks, there's not much in the way of filler and the release has no dull cuts to weigh down an already tight run time. So if you haven't heard this gem yet, Mephistophelian – Anotos is embedded below for you to check out. This is seriously one of the coolest releases of the year and I hope somebody signs them soon. You can follow the band over on Facebook and Bandcamp.
