Album Review: Antropomorphia - Devoid Of Light
Reviewed by Eric Clifford
I’m told that I was a happy accident, which is relevant insofar as I only picked this album because I thought it was by a different band. I was thinking of Antropofagus, and had girded my loins appropriately for a devastating bout of Italian brutal death destruction. What should fall darkly on my doorstep instead? Why, it’s only the impious spectre of blackened death metal. Ah well; Mea Culpas for yet more evidence of my resounding dickheadery aside, there are worse mistakes to have made in the grand scheme of things.
There’s this arterial pulse of sickly melody coiled throughout Antropomorphia’s work here there that sold me on it the second I got over my befuddled musings about “wow, Antropofagus have really switched up their sound lately”. They’ll take these conventional, salt-of-the-earth death metal riffs and build upon each one, seasoning them all with chitinous myriapoda melodies that curl and burrow within each one. A balance is struck between hooks and snarling aggression, less “Catchy” than “Ensnaring”. The more time I spent with it, the more I felt the infection core deeper; cloud-eyed pythons drawing their scaled noose tighter. Whether it’s the forlorn urgency of “Unending Hunt” and it’s knifing tremolo riffs stabbing down over and over as the kick drum punches your guts to shreds, or the malefic mysticism of “In the Shade of the Devil’s Horns”, black metal infuses the very soul of the album itself, possessing it, staring out of it’s eyes at the world and commanding it where next to conquer. That it stands in thrall to the forces of witchery only enhances the sacrilegious appeal of these heretical psalms; the appropriately-named “Devoid of Light” bristles with blackened trappings, from it’s ringing plucked chords to the harmonies that hone it’s blades to a lethal edge.
Yet what of the “death” side of the “blackened death” equation? What rotten edifices the album sees fit to raise, “Funeral Throne” and it’s opprobrious kick-snare OSDM stylings see fit to raze. By far the most typical death metal song on the album, it forms a thuggishly heavy counterpoint to the seconnd-wave conflagrations erupting elsewhere. When death metal makes it’s presence felt on this album, it does so with sundering force: observe as the actinic chords of “In Writhing Rapture” all of a sudden crush in around you at 2.49 with a castigating blitz of blastbeats and bottom string punishment. Really the only song I’m not altogether enamoured with comes right at the end, which is a shame as it’s relative weakness feels a rather supine way to close the album. It’s called “Triumphant Death”, and it forms a rather scuffed capstone for the tracklist as a whole, as though the release were capable of inflicting a horrifying mauling but just couldn’t sink in the mortal wound with the last blow. It’s slower, and goes for a more atmospheric soundscape, but instead it rather trudges past with none of the vampiric bite of earlier material. It’s fairly long as well at 6 minutes. Not exactly dopesmoker, sure, but if the component parts of a song aren’t capable of supporting a version that would be half it’s runtime then you’ve got a problem.
While I do side-eye it’s closing act, the bulk of “Devoid of Light” as whole is very strong irrespective. While that does make it all the more tragic that it can’t close out as strong as it started, I feel like I’m making something of a mountain out of a molehill here. The song isn’t beyond redemption by any means, it’s just that when there isn’t a whole lot else to complain about it tends to focus the mind a bit on the few things that do hold back a release. With that in mind, I’d like to spend a minute more on the sunnier side of things. Devoid of Light excels in it’s combination of elements; the stark beauty of the black mixed with the brawn of the death. Cutting through this connoisseur’s blend comes some excellent solo work, precise and nimble while retaining all the melodic sensibilities of the riff work. The way the band manage harmonies and consonance is remarkable throughout, as clear from the riffwork of “The Withering Stench of Hope” that ascends like flames licking up cathedral walls as it is to the penultimate track “In the Shade of the Devil’s Horns”, it’s leads darting over the monarchical riffs that armour it’s underbelly.
I’d never suggest – especially these days, what with the music business in it’s present condition – that extreme metal is played with the far reaches of commercial viability in mind, but even so, much of this album is downright viral in it’s catchiness, commanding repeat plays from me. It’s infectiousness does nothing to dilute it’s overbearing malignity – scornful and irate, Antropomorphia have nonetheless recalled how to carry a tune through all their boiling rancour. I can find no point of fault regarding the performances; Ferry Damen’s voice proves as authoritarian a presence from the first second to the last, and Marco Stubbe virtually assaults his drumkit. I especially enjoy the punch the drums have through the mix; they’re prominent, but not overwhelmingly so – we can all probably think of albums in which the rhythm section in general gets lost within the mix; not so here – the weighty boom of the toms on “Cancerous Bane” is as much a testimony to this as the suppressive fire laid down by the kick drum and the gorgeously clear cymbals elsewhere. There’s a drum fill at 1:18 of “Ash Drapes the Earth” and the way every strike just ignites through my headphones feels as though it were done specifically to avenge every drummer ever who has found everything but their snare entombed within the cellar floor of a production job.
There’s a profound difference between an accident and a mistake. I didn’t mean to wind up reviewing this band’s output, but was it a mistake? As in something that wound up detrimental to myself? Nah, not a bit of it. Based on this limited sampling of their wares, Antropomorphia’s pestilential brand of black/death rules. It’s daemonic hymns wound their way into my memory even as its charcoal claws rent strips of wet skin from the gleaming edges of innumerable pouting wounds. If you’ve not heard them before, this album might just make you a fan. Now please excuse me – I’ve a discography to run through with frankly juvenile enthusiasm.
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