Godless Enthropia - "Tetracyclic Dominion" (Symbol of Domination Productions/Hecatombe Records, 2018)

Band: Godless Enthropia
Title: Tetracyclic Dominion
Genre: Technical and Progressive Death Metal
Time: 59.37 min
Release Date: 28th April 2018
Rating: 93/100













You know, I love to support the rawer and most-old-school forms of extreme metal but, sometimes, you can find on these pages bands with a more technical and modern approach. For example, this is the case of Spectral, an excellent trio from Romania whose debut album was reviewed here some months ago. And today it's the case of Godless Enthropia, a promising quintet from Italy that, after being founded in 2012 from the ashes of the death/thrash metal act Beyond the Unholy Truth, released this year their debut album "Tetracyclic Dominion" under the auspices of Symbol of Domination Productions along with Hecatombe Records. Coming from Turin (surely one of the most beautiful cities of my country!), Godless Enthropia were founded with the intentions to create something creative also taking inspirations from non-metal genres, so to surpass the classic borders of the extreme metal. Now let's start to see how those ambitious intentions became reality with this debut album!


As first thing, the band dub their style as "Hybrid Death Metal". In other words, it is a definition to describe a kind of death metal in which notable technical skills, labyrinthine structures and clear influences from other genres such as jazz or post-rock collide to offer something really creative and unpredictable. At the same time, Godless Enthropia thought well to combine all these features with plenty doses of mighty violence and malice, so you have a style that, close in certain points to the most surgical forms of brutal death metal, is very balanced between its different sides. All this is completed by outstanding solos played by both the guitarists (Simone Cavalera and Wael Ben Halima), the expressive growls of Davide Ponzetto occasionally helped by the backing vocals (included some cleaner and whispered vocals) of Claudio Colla, and by unusual themes focused on psychology, linguistics and chemistry.

The most incredible thing about this album is that it lasts even 59 minutes per 14 songs but, despite this absurd lenght, listening to it is always a big pleasure since every track is a true monument to the creativity. At this point, how can you not appreciate the wicked mid-tempos of "Witch Burning Princess" or the elegant lead guitars of "Erase, Delete, Annihilate"? And how can you not appreciate also the ballad "Solecism I" (that contains surprising post-rock influences with ultra-clean vocals), or the schizoid closing song "The Heights of Eidos (Mother of Cain Part II)", that is opened with somehow epic melodies but it is closed with an absurd sequence full of demented synths? And how can I forget to mention "Adynaton", that's surely my favorite number? This song is pure madness because, for example, it starts with a hypnotizing lead guitar main riff that is obsessively repeated for more of 60 seconds through many variations also by the drummer Simone Cottura; and it ends in a more melodic way starting from a djent passage close to Meshuggah. In brief, I mentioned the most notable tracks of the album in according to my broken ears but, to say the truth, every song is good and can hidden touches of pure class.

Some of these "touches of pure class" are about the structure of the songs. For example, many songs contains abrupt and often short breaks that can be very atmospheric but they can be also integrated with the metal parts (like in "The Heights of Eidos..."). Another example is that the tracks can be structurally obsessive by repeating again and again the same riff, and this feature is great because it allows to the listeners to memorize the different riffs, even though every number is practically a maze.

As you can see, "Tetracyclic Dominion" offers many points that you can talk about but I think that it's time to end this review, or it risk to be an endless novel! So, "Tetracyclic Dominion" is a real masterpiece in which there is a technical and progressive death metal played with violence and malice, with the result that it can be surely loved by the fans of bands like Atheist, Death, Cynic, Cryptopsy but also of nowadays bands like the same Spectral or Cronaxia. Offering guest appearances coming from the Turin extreme metal scene like Lord Jotun (better known as Lord J.H. Psycho when he was in Lilyum) and Davide "BrutalDave" Billia (Septycal Gorge, Xenomorphic Contamination, Hour of Penance and many others), this album has the only flaw to have a too simple and too minimalistic booklet...but is really important this flaw for an album that, full of songs written between 2014 and 2017, last 59 minutes without never being boring?

P.S.:

it was a lot of time that an album didn't take a rating so high on these pages! The previous time? The mighty "Hero" by the very innovative Swiss black/death metal band Bölzer!

Tracklist:

1 - Al-Qalyah (intro)
2 - Mother of Cain
3 - Into the Asylum
4 - Witch Burning Princess
5 - Unpredictable Dementia (Mechanical Disease)
6 - Erase, Delete, Annihilate
7 - Dysphemic Phænomenons (synth instrumental)
8 - Third Eye, Cauterized
9 - Solecism I
10 - Cause of Disease (Sprouts of New Hate)
11 - Palace of Fornication
12 - Adynaton
13 - Solecism II
14 - The Heights of Eidos (Mother of Cain Part II)

Line-up:

Davide Ponzetto - vocals
Simone Cavalera - guitars
Wael Ben Halima - guitars
Claudio Colla - bass
Simone Cottura - drums

Guests:

Lord Jotun - vocals ("Solecism I")
Davide "BrutalDave" Billia - backing vocals

FaceBook: https://www.facebook.com/pg/GodlessEnthropia
BandCamp: https://godlessenthropia.bandcamp.com/
Symbol of Domination: http://satanath.com/sodp
Hecatombe Records: https://www.facebook.com/hecatombe-records-171144762973227/