Nadir: Empyrean is the latest release from Wellington-based Empyrvore, and their first full length album. It has been a labour of love for its two creators, Jared and Mike, who followed the complete DIY path for recording, mixing, mastering, and releasing...all whilst living in separate cities, holding down jobs, raising families, and never able to rehearse together. For me, that just adds another level again, to how good this album is.

Empyrvore draw influences from elements of second-wave black metal, death metal, prog metal, and atmospheric. The overall effect is one of power and beauty, darkness and light, aggression and reflection. Nadir is the instrumental opener, just shy of two minutes long. I'm aware that I'm just making up a collective term here, but what I can best describe as a "haunt" of guitars slowly builds atmosphere and intensity, leading deftly into the bombastically awesome Awaiting Bellerophon. You like riffs? This one's for you. Take-no-prisoners precision and drive, smashing its way into your brain like a tidal wave, pulling right back at around the two-minute mark into a deceptively soft guitar moment, before unleashing hell yet again. The vocals are roaringly full of power and venom and delivered with skill and clarity.

The sonic assault continues into Sic Semper Tyrannis, crisp, tight, viciously surgical guitars laying waste to the surroundings. The bass tone refuses to be outdone in terms of utter lowdown filth, and drumming with the accuracy and impact of some sort of mechanized cannon. Salem's Ouroboros is up next, clocking in at around the seven-minute mark, an epic collection of differing moods and emotions. A Moment In Purgatory has a quiet and brooding finger-picked guitar, eventually accompanied by some soft strings. This instrumental piece fits beautifully into this point of the album, amply displaying Empryvore's skill with dynamics and composition. All the more crushing is the doom-laden arrival of To Bind The Wounds, an artfully slow grind as compelling as it is forbidding. It juxtaposes nicely with The Eyes Of Mnemosyne, which has an altogether more atmospheric feel, and much more dynamic change going on over its six-and-a-half-minute span. The adventure comes to an end with Empyrean, a two-minute sonic statement exploding into blast-beat fury, before fading to black.

Empyrvore themselves say "For fans of Mgla, Gorgoroth, Grima, Dissection". Fair enough. I say for fans of metal, in general. This is fantastic stuff. Well done, lads, keep it up.

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