Had the chance to listen to “Devian” today, a new death metal group with vocals by “Legion” (the voice we all know / knew “Marduk” by).
By their descriptions on Last.fm “…taking focus off the blastbeating using a wider palette of sounds from slow grinding gloom to exploding primal fury raising the standard of their body of work in a sharply tuned firewind or strong brutal songs…” and themselves “…DEVIAN decided to go for a more dynamic old school vibe, which is built upon a very catchy combination of melody and aggression.”
The opener “Serenade for the Fallen” was very atmospheric and touching, so I was expecting something great to come my way. But the remainder of the disc doesn’t have any dramaturgy whatsoever. Everything sounds like monotonous thrashing at pretty much the same intensity throughout the whole tracklist.
It’s analogous to someone shouting, all the time at the same pitch and volume, “Kill! Kill! Kill! Kill! Kill!” - you don’t sense much emotion and after a few seconds it already feels weak, uninteresting and you’re wishing there was some buildup in tension or a melancholic part that explodes into hate allowing you to pick up the emotion. It would feel just that much more intense with some variance or melodic parts.
My personal rating for “Ninewinged Serpent” is maybe 2 out of 10. Without the great atmospheric opener, that would become a 1 out of 10.
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