Vehemency It would be misleading to call Algaion’s firts effort in 13 years, Exthros, a pure black metal album; what we have here instead is a dark, melodic and perhaps slightly industrialized album of black / death metal with hints of Gothenburg sound - especially in the melody department - and an overall flavour of Rotting Christ which they also cover on this album (”Sign of Evil Existence / Era of Satan Rising”).

The driving force to the album is the rather bass heavy rhythm section: Robert Eng’s kit, though too triggered to my taste, pulsates tightly and so does the down tuned rhythm guitars. On the top appears the raspy screams of Mårten Björkman, lead guitar melodies and other melody dominant sound sources such as piano (”Nature Our Slave”) or even some techno elements (”Theos Tou Aimatos”). Sound-wise, everything is done really professionally, even too professionally so that the polished sound curbs the material a bit, but all is still enjoyable despite the really modern production values.

Compositionally, Exthros is throughout on the middle level when it comes to quality. Nothing harasses, yet nothing rises to goosebumps-inducing levels: these streamlined songs, often even chorus-based, are easy to listen to, which kind of bugs me as I’m afraid the album won’t have long durability. So far I’m still enjoying the album, especially during such tracks as ”The Last of the Cursed Days” and ”Ruach Adversi”. Exthros could be said to be the total opposite of anything underground, hence I’m sure this album is to trigger the interests of those who aren’t generally into black metal. Those purely into the rawest of metals, there’s not much to see here.