UMUR "Starspawn" is the debut full-length studio album by US, Colorado based death metal act Blood Incantation. The album was released through Dark Descent Records in August 2016. Blood Incantation formed in 2011 and released three demos before being signed for the release of the 2015 "Interdimensional Extinction" EP. There has been one lineup change since the EP as bassist Jeff Barrett has joined Blood Incantation, making them a quartet on "Starspawn".

Stylistically the material on the 5 tracks, 35:19 minutes long album is a continuation of the progressive and at times almost abtract death metal of the "Interdimensional Extinction" EP. This time just even more complex in structure and challenging on the ears of the listener. Although some riffs and ideas are repeated the tracks often feel like a long journey with new ideas and riffs constantly being introduced. Some tracks feature some atmospheric parts which are nice for the variation of the album, because otherwise this is a very busy and layered release, which is quite relentless in its approach. The fact that Blood Incantation rarely play any riffs which are of the more regular death metal kind, but instead focus on playing unconventional and often dissonant and twisted riffs and rhythms make "Starspawn" a difficult listen with very few hooks to hold on to.

...and that is my main critique when it comes to evaluating "Starspawn". It features a relatively well sounding gritty sound production and the musical performances are arguably through the roof (how can these guys even rememeber these tracks?), but it´s an album with little soul or death metal integrity. Take the vocals for instance, which are delivered without any punch or aggression. They are just there and barely get the job done. The tracks are also so complex in structure and the riffs and rhythms so tech nerdy that they leave little impact on the listener other than an interest in how the hell they are played or how they got the idea to compose them this way...so to my ears this is a musicians album and less an album for the regular death metal listener to enjoy.

When that is said "Starspawn" is still an intriguing album on some levels and it´s certainly a bold and adventurous death metal release showing a band who defy tradition and want to challenge the concept of death metal. I can relate to- and respect that, but on the other hand "Starspawn" just ultimately leaves me cold and it´s definitely not an album which incites headbanging and moshing. It´s way too nerdy and focused on something completely different that the primal energies of regular death metal. A 3.5 star (70%) rating isn´t all wrong.

UMUR "Interdimensional Extinction" is an EP release by US, Colorado based death metal act Blood Incantation. The EP was released through Dark Descent Records in August 2015. Blood Incantation formed in 2011 and released three demos before being signed for the release of "Interdimensional Extinction".

"Interdimensional Extinction" features 4 tracks and a total playing time of 18:05 minutes, which serves as a good length and amount of material to introduce Blood Incantation to the world. Stylistically the material is technical/progressive death metal. It´s a combination of old school death metal elements and more contemporary elements like dissonance and an atmosphere of controlled chaos that many other contemporary artists also use. Lead vocalist/guitarist Paul Riedl has a decent sounding growling style, but his vocals are not placed very high in the mix and I also miss a bit more emotion from his performance. The vocals have a tendency to become a little monotone. The instrumental part of the music is both interesting and challenging, but a few more hooks or memorable moments would have been welcome. It´s details though, and overall the quality of the music is high.

The EP features a powerful, detailed, and well sounding production, which helps heighten the listening experience, and upon conclusion "Interdimensional Extinction" is arguably a good quality debut release by Blood Incantation. A 3.5 star (70%) rating is deserved.

siLLy puPPy Despite an ever growing number of technical death metal bands vying for the attention of a niche genre that has been growing in recent years, the Denver, Colorado based BLOOD INCANTATION has succeeded where most fail in crafting two gems of genre by fusing the worlds of tech death metal, progressive rock and the ambient and atmospheric accompaniments of spaced out electronica. While “Starspawn” caught the world’s attention, “Hidden History of the Human Race” was the slap in the face that no true metal head could ignore and after having poked the restless fanbase with a stick, it’s always a mystery as to how any given band once given such attention will react.

It seems that amongst the more technical minded extreme metal bands in this stage of the 21st century that there seems to be an ambition for any given band to prove themselves as worthy musicians outside of the context of the world of metal. This has been a growing trend in recent years often resulting in a double release in the same year. I guess this trend started all the way back in the 90s when Ulver decided to completely drop its black metal shtick and jump ship into the world of electronica. This trend was followed by Opeth, Devin Townsend and Anathema but for a technical death metal band on the top of their game?

Well in 2021 the tech death cavern-core band Portal released the one two punch of “Avow” and the dungeon synth “Hagbulbia” and many black metal bands have released dungeon synth non-metal accompaniments. Come to think of it Neurosis also released accompanying ambient albums to be played in tandem with its sludge metal albums under the name Tribes of Neurot so i guess this is somewhat of an underground tradition at this point but was anyone really expecting a Berlin School style album sounding more like classic Tangerine Dream from the 70s from one of tech death’s most revered up and coming acts? I have to admit that this one totally caught me off guard but then again nothing really shocks me any longer so my reaction was that at least BLOOD INCANTATION didn’t decide to make a country album about life in a coal mine. That’s where i draw the line.

And so here we are, the third official album by BLOOD INCANTATION titled TIMEWAVE ZERO which features two lengthy ambient progressive electronic tracks that could easily be mistaken for any given 1970s Klaus Schulze release complete without vocals, guitars, bass and drums. This is amorphous synthesized space drifting in all its freeform glory. If i didn’t know better i’d swear that Edgar Froese or Hans-Joachim Roedelius was behind these sinister streams of sound effects but lo and behold we have a modern day metal band feeling the need to take a chill pill this time around and craft an album’s worth of spaced out ambience that surely won’t sit well with the fanbase and yet for those with more open minds and the ability to just sit back and enjoy the ride, a sensual journey into the downtime between the metallic uproar episodes that allow the sensuality of astral body journeys to take place.

TIMEWAVE ZERO is very much influenced by the progressive Berlin School electronic acts of the 1970s right down to the running time of two tracks adding up to just over 40 minutes of playing time. While fans of classic Tangerine Dream and Klaus Schulze may have something to gravitate towards in this whippersnapper’s delight, modern tech deathers are scratching their head in dismay wondering what the fuck is up with these dudes! Two tracks titled “Io” and “Ea” swallow up an album’s length of extraterrestrial ambience that allow your consciousness to escape the confines of bombastic metal and enter the ethereal zone whether you signed up for it or not. I guess why not. Buckethead has mastered multiple genres over the decades with a whole series of progressive electronic albums so if you don’t like this one i’m sure the next album will blow your mind away with all those crazy guitar riffs, bass bantering and percussive blastbeasts. For now, it’s transcendental mind expansion.

As a lover of virtually every genre under the sun, it’s not really the fact that BLOOD INCANTATION has released an ambient progressive electronic album that really disappoints me at all but rather i find this album a bit lackluster in terms of what genre it exists in. I have in my vast collection of albums a fair share of Tangerine Dream, Klaus Schulze, Mort Garson, Jean Michel Jarre and other similar acts so i’m no stranger to the world of ambient and progressive electronic music by any means. In fact i downright enjoy it although it’s not my main staple of music for sure. This is a style of music that is reserved for those moments of contemplation where only a complete journey of transcendental existentialism is in order. This is a special kind of music indeed and one that literally makes you feel like you have entered a wormhole and are being transported from our fucked up reality on this prison planet and transported into some higher level civilization where all shortcomings of consciousness have been overcome.

Ambient album aside, i just don’t feel the band has mastered this style of music in a way that makes it their own. Rather they are merely emulating the progressive electronic masters of the past without really adding anything new to the style. Granted these guys have done a splendid job of mixing psychedelic electronica with technical death metal but as a stand alone project of this side of the equation i find this album a bit on the generic side of the progressive electronic equation without really adding that extra something that makes it their own. I’m not sure why BLOOD INCANTATION thought that this was a good idea just after they pretty much rose to the top of the tech death metal game but if this is what they want to release then i can’t say it’s an unenjoyable experience by any means. It’s just that for someone like myself well versed in this style of music, it’s not very inventive either. For metal-centric head bangers who have not yet experienced this music, then i do have to say that this very well may be an excellent introduction to the world of Berlin School progressive electronic music but i would advise you to head straight to the 1970s and experience the classics of Tangerine Dream and Klaus Schulze which exceed this in quality. Having said that, this is a decent album but not OMG great.

Warthur Album cover that could have been ripped off a 1970s sci-fi paperback? Check. Themes pulled from the likes of Erich Von Daniken's "Chariots of the Gods" schtick? Check. Song titles, lengths, and even compositional structures which could be prog rock numbers from a lesser-known band of the 1970s? Check.

But don't be fooled - Blood Incantation's Hidden History of the Human Race isn't some sort of attempt at straight-ahead retro-prog. Instead, it takes the song structures of classic prog and applies to them the sonic toolkit of technical death metal, yielding a short but sweet 36 minutes of mashup mayhem which sets Blood Incantation as a band to watch.

siLLy puPPy BLOOD INCANTATION has really made a name for itself in the last few years with its unique blend of psychedelic metal inspired by the legendary underground act Timeghoul mixed with the more rabid venomous bombast of classic early 90s Morbid Angel. While this Denver band hasn’t exactly reinvented the wheel when it comes to the world of death metal, they have managed to forge several disparate strains of extreme metal into the same playing field and in the process have managed to stand out in the seemingly endless supply of bands that are vying for recognition. Formed all the way back in 2011, the band released a few demos and the EP “Interdimensional Extinction” in 2013 but didn’t unleash the first full-length release upon the metal world until 2016 with “Starspawn” which displayed a fully seasoned band that mastered the art of the challenges of tech death metal without the ceaseless rapid fire assaults that turn many off. In other words they mastered the art of varied soundscapes.

“Starspawn” put the band on the map for its innovative mix of death metal and progressive rock with psychedelic elements and after that the band went even further with its sophomore release HIDDEN HISTORY OF THE HUMAN RACE which displays the 70s art of Bruce Pennington as cover art and incorporates many sci-fi and alternative history theories as a basis for its subject matter. This thematic approach goes hand in hand with the increased use of Timeghoul inspired psychedelia and in the process has increased awareness of a new strain of what is being called psychedelic death metal which merges the orotundity of the instrumental bombast and death vocal growls with more atmospheric eeriness that has been much more popular in the world of black metal. Due to the lengthy slower passages, it not surprising that the death metal cedes to a more doomy dirge-like pace.

While death metal is clearly the star of the show here, BLOOD INCANTATION led by guitarist / vocalist Paul Riedl has exponentially increased the influences from progressive rock as well and as a result this album of 36 minutes and 20 seconds only consists of four tracks with the showcase crown jewel “Awakening From the Dream of Existence to the Multidimensional Nature of Our Reality (Mirror of the Soul)” swallowing up half the playing time with classic prog twists and turns fortified with the metal attributes the band has already established for itself. Touted as one of the best new metal bands of contemporary extreme metal, HIDDEN HISTORY OF THE HUMAN RACE certainly has its appeal. It’s well paced with no nonsense tech death metal passages that will please the most jaded extreme metall-o-phile along with lengthy drifting passages that explore surreal and psychedelic textures with atmospheric eeriness that evoke astral terror. However there are a few things that bug me about this album as well so let me tell you about them!

“Slave Species Of The Gods” is a feisty and appropriate opener as it not only delivers the crushing metal riffs and blastbeat frenzies expected of metal’s most dangerous offspring but establishes the band as one that doesn’t compromise its core principles for the sake of expanding its tentacles into non-metal arenas. The subject matter evokes the mysteries of the hidden history that reminds me of the possibilities presented by such alt history researchers as Zecharia Sitchin which really make you wonder if humanity has been controlled all along by unseen alien forces that have the ability to shape shift and travel between dimensions. While establishing the band as a pyroclastic explosion of death metal energy, this is also the least varied track but manages to throw in a few classic Morbid Angel guitar squeals and yes this band does owe a lot to Morbid Angel in the heavier aspects of its sound.

“The Giza Power Plant” follows suit as another bombastic blood curdling example of tech death metal only the riffs are more jagged and angular while Riedl’s vocals are more tortured and set back in the mix. The track is more varied in that it not only pummels with an exhaustive array of tech death riffs but throws in some classic old school death metal parts as well. All is well until about the 2 minute mark a stylistic shift suddenly occurs and the death metal turns into a psychedelic menagerie of Egyptian styled folk music that sounds lifted right out of the Nile playbook. Given the theme and folk segment, it just seems way too derivative for its own good. The music is more melodic than the average Nile romp through along with the ancient Pharaohs and it does offer some interesting variations but considering Nile is a contemporary band this seems a little rip-offy for my tastes.

This brings me to my next complaint about this album. “Inner Paths (To Outer Space)” serves more as a psychedelic intermission between the first two tracks and the lengthy progressive closer. This one begins with dark ambient sounds bubbling up from the abyss and slowly percolates with synth swirls and a percussive groove that slowly builds up momentum. Joined in by guitar and bass, it sounds like a great idea but after hearing this it kept nagging me that i’ve heard this riff before. After a few spins it came to me that the melodic guitar riff is the same as the intro of “Red Barchetta” from Rush’s classic “Moving Pictures” which once realized gives you insight into how much the great Rush inspired BLOOD INCANTATION as well. Now mind you, this track is very cool and very well done especially how it builds and builds until it climaxes in a death metal orgasmic flow of angst and then drifts off into psychedelia but i honestly can’t get past that the riff was so blatantly lifted.

The true gem of this album is the grand finale “Awakening From The Dream Of Existence To The Multidimensional Nature Of Our Reality (Mirror Of The Soul)” which kind of amasses everything that came before, mixes it together in different proportions and then adds a bunch of new ideas that deliver a cosmic death metal delivery that lasts for over 18 minutes. Chock full of both finger breaking metal wankery and long existential drifts into surreality, this track embodies the very essence of what one would consider progressive death metal, that being a creative lengthy sprawl of death metal magic that is teased out into lengthy massive chunks of real estate. Basically this track is a multi-segmented one that meanders and trades off between surreal passages and more bombastic metal rampage. There’s even a small tribute to Pink Floyd’s “Dark Side Of The Moon” around the seven minute mark where those oscillating electronic noises gurgle up from behind the scenes before the metal mania resumes. This is a phenomenally brilliant track and is worth the price of admission alone.

Despite my gripes (which are significant) about this album and how BLOOD INCANTATION chose to use some too obvious references in its compositions, i cannot help but admire how well the album is stitched together otherwise. HIDDEN HISTORY OF THE HUMAN RACE basically carries the torch of the possibilities that could have been attained by the legendary Timeghoul if only they had stuck around beyond two mere demos. While very few probably ever heard those legendary sounds tucked away in the 90s underground, BLOOD INCANTATION has done a huge service in not only bringing Timeghoul to the metal world’s attention but has also taken the baton and run away with the stylistic approach never realized. In that regard BLOOD INCANTATION has crafted a brilliant display of psychedelic and progressive death metal unlike anything else. If only it weren’t for those too close for comfort experiences with Rush and Nile and i’d rate this even higher. One thing is for sure, BLOOD INCANTATION is an act to keep your eyes on. The next album will be eagerly awaited with high expectations.