VoidCeremony – Threads Of Unknowing (Review)

Fans of technical, mesmerizing death metal with a thematical emphasize on entering new dimensions and transcending beyond human form, rejoice. Your favourite label for exquisite death metal 20 Buck Spin‘s got another highlight coming your way. VoidCeremony’s Line-Up, including members of Atramentus, Worm, Mournful Congregation and Chthe’ilist (just to name a few), should already tick all the right boxes for you. With Threads Of Unknowing the four piece is ready to unleash the successor to 2020s Entropic Reflections Continuum: Dimensional Unravel upon us. After issuing several EP’s before the later was released, the group’s full length debut quickly turned heads with its unique blend of technical old school death metal that captured the spirit of masterminds such as Death and Atheist. Now with their follow-up Threads Of Unknowing, they take their sound even further into space.

While starting relatively straight with its 3 minute title track, the record quickly moves into more complex and ambitious territory during the following tracks. With brain-melting riffs, fretless bass solos and very proficient drumming, VoidCeremony present a lot to take in. Typical for this genre, the more jazz oriented song structures offer way more than the usual verse-bridge-chorus type of stuff. Therefore listeners should be willing to invest some time into this record to fully grasp every twist and turn. Thankfully the brief 36 minutes of runtime easily enable repeated spins and increase the records replay value tremendously. In addition to that VoidCeremony are also great songwriters when it comes to offering space to breathe in form of spacey synth sections (see the interlude “At The Periphery Of Human Realms”) or melodic solo segments (“Entropic Reflections Continuum”). These sections are not only provided by the guitars but also by the (fretless)bass which is often times the highlight of the song and comfortably sits very high in the mix. Pre-released single “Abyssic Knowledge Bequeathed” is a great example of this and generally works extremely well in representing the albums overall sound with its magnificent rhythm section and melodic guitar inteplays, making the track one of the records highlights. As presented in the aforementioned single, the general riffing style is rather unique in offers a great balance between pummeling rhythms and melodic tonality throughout these songs. Sure, there are still clear drawbacks to the genres inventors and envelop pushers at display here but the creativity with which these influences are presented make them unique enough on their own. A great effect of the album’s enjoyability also comes from the production which is enabling each instrument to be appreciated in its complete glory, while avoiding a brick walled sterile sound at the same time. In fact Threads Of Unknowing sounds very natural, which is a huge plus. Closing out the record with an 11 minute mammoth of a song that is “Forlorn Portrait”, VoidCeremony demonstrate once more how fascinating this type of music can be if technical abilities are combined with clever songwriting and adventurous ideas.

With Threads Of Unknowing, the California based quartet refine their own musical identiy in a big pool of similar bands and should make everyone happy that is looking for an atmospheric, jazzy take on technical old school death metal. While not quite reaching the heights of their peers (which managed to craft more memorable songs), this is still a mandatory listen for fans of Blood Incantation, Atheist and Aenigmatum.