Nightfly Sometimes with technical death metal bands it can be a case of style over substance with a dazzling display of technique taking precedence over great songs with a bunch of killer riffs, one of the reasons why I generally prefer the more organic old school stuff. However with Adveniens, album number three by Italians Hideous Divinity you can have both. The moment Ages Die kicked in I was hooked. Incredibly fast, brutal and complex, yet displaying plenty of maturity in the songwriting department with hooks and captivating riffs aplenty.

A new band to me but a bit of research and I discover that ex-Hour Of Penance guitarist Enrico Schettino is a member and new Aborted bassist Stefano Franceschini too so if proof were needed these guys are clearly no slouches. Best of all Ages Die isn’t a one off as the album whilst completely relentless manages to stay inventive throughout. The brutal onslaught is occasional broken by strategically placed atmospheric sections adding to the overall tension before the song once again explodes with more precision riffing and drumming from the brilliant Giulio Galati with machine gun blastbeats, breakneck double bass drum patterns injected with fills George Kollias would be proud of. Nothing you haven’t heard before of course but so well executed you can’t fail to be impressed. Avenians certainly has more in common with the likes of Nile, minus the Egyptian influences, but they throw in moments of Immolation style dissonance at times which always works for me.

This type of brutal technical death metal can become a bit wearing and tedious with the never ending barrage of blastbeats but such is the quality of the songs here its edge of the seat stuff all the way making picking favourites futile. Impressive indeed and for now at least my favourite technical death metal album of 2017. Now to check out those first two albums.