The more I listen to this record, the more I get entwined and absorbed into their music. This is the first time I’m listening to Impending Doom and let me tell you I was blown away by their sound and raw maddening energy. The American Deathcore outfit refers to their style of music as “Gorship”, which is described by Reeves as “Worshiping God through our gore-sounding music”. The band hails from Riverside, California and have released six studio albums till date, “The Sin and Doom Vol II” being their latest was released on 22nd June 2018 under the record label eOne Music.
Guitarist Manny Contreras and vocalist Brook Reeves are the two remaining original members from the time of the bands inception, the band saw a lot of line-up changes over the years and at times have a floating members on tour. One thing that stood out was the band having a street team to promote them, which is listed on their Myspace page, pretty cool!
The band lists out a number of influences which includes Deftones, Korn, Slipknot, Lamb of God, Aborted, Guttural Secrete, Origin, Despised Icon, Ion Dissonance, Meshuggah, Nine Inch Nails, Radiohead, Napalm Death, Suffocation, Metallica, Cannibal Corpse, The Acacia Strain, As I Lay Dying, Killswitch Engage, and Morbid Angel. Brook Reeves on the other hand lists Underoath, Living Sacrifice, Advent, Sinai Beach, Aborted, Cattle Decapitation, and Septic Flesh as some of his influences, mainly comprising of the Death metal bands.
Without much ado, I spun this record and plunged to delve into a genre that I’m quite new to and have high hopes from. The first track, “The Wretched and the Godless” starts off with an atmospheric soundscapes setting up an eerie start to the album, and explodes up with hammering riffs with odd time signature and well-crafted breakdowns. The guitar tone complements the guttural growls and makes one groove to the beats. Next up we have, “Burn” taking up time with its chugs on the low B string adding substance and ruggedness to the song.
“War Music” brings in pinch harmonics and jarred distorted guitars opening the track, the blast beats carry forward the song supplemented with a catchy riff. What I liked about this song was the panning done across instruments, and love the bit where the drum gets a little muffled and gives an impression of a live unplugged kit. “Evil” hammers you for a really long time with its blitzing blast beats and guitars chugs acquiescing seamlessly.
“Paved with Bones” got some electronica at start but punches you hard with its offbeat delivery of blast beats coupled with some crafty riffs, which will surely get you head-banging. “The Serpents Tongue” and “Unbroken” brings in a chilly atmospheric soundscape, plunges and hits you hard with maddening blast beats and guitar riffs which are more or less spread across the song, and delivers some powerful verses.
“Devils Den” has plenty of odd time signatures and breakdowns to get one grooving, and the blast beats deliver a strong neck-breaking experience to the fellow head banger. “Everything’s Fake” adds some rugged guitar riffs to an otherwise completely sonic throughput ploughing your head, and brings forth a catchy riff to get you grooving. The vocal delivery doesn’t change much from song to song, but I guess that’s what sort off defines the deathcore genre, as it doesn’t leave much room for the vocals to verbalize.
The album ends with “Run for your life (She calls)” which takes on hammering guitar riffs and marries it well to Electronica and gives out an Industrial metal outlook. The track plummets and rises in intensity and gives one chills when one hears, “She Calls”.
Production : The production on the album is mature and I loved how the tracks were panned and brought out unplugged flavour to the songs.
Conclusion : It is very hard to gauge a deathcore record, since there are bounds to the genre and very little that gets to be experimented on the table. The delivery was tight however I miss hearing some tunes or melodies or maybe that’s just my inclination to death metal. Keeping all else aside, this is a tremendous record and would definitely demand multiple spins for sure. I would recommend the average Metal-head to give this album a try because they are worth the buy!
Rating: 7.5/10
Written by: Ankit Sood
Track listing:
01. The Wretched and Godless
02. Burn
03. War Music
04. EVIL
05. Paved With Bones
06. The Serpents Tongue
07. Unbroken
08. Devils Den
09. Everything’s Fake
10. Run For Your Life (She Calls)
Band Members
Brook Reeves – vocals
Manny Contreras – lead guitar
David Sittig – bass guitar
Eric Correa – rhythm guitar
Brandon “B-Town” Trahan – drums
Albums:
“The Sin and Doom of Godless Men” EP (2005)
“Nailed. Dead. Risen.” (2007)
“The Serpent Servant” (2009)
“There Will Be Violence” (2010)
“Baptized in Filth” (2012) [review]
“Death Will Reign” (2013) [review]
“The Sin and Doom Vol II” (2018)
Record Label: Entertainment One Music
Release Date: 22 June 2018
Buy the album here:
Holland: First Paradox
Norway: Nordic Mission
Video for ‘Everything’s Fake’
Lyric video for ‘The Wretched And Godless’
Video for ‘Paved With Bones’