ALBUM REVIEW: Animate//Isolate – Obsolete

First impressions are everything when it comes to the inquisitive metal market, and OBSOLETE appear to know just how to nab a pedestal. This month their debut album Animate//Isolate is released via Unspeakable Axe Records, and it is one to convert the masses to thrash. The record sees the listener on a journey that is intricately ardent and transcendent by nature; with riffs that are ferocious yet progressive and melodious, the entire playback paints a celestial journey in aural form.

The style of this album manages to satiate every locus on the metal spectrum. For the purist, this is their daily mellifluous fix of adrenaline. For the alternative enthusiast, this is their portal to a further level of heavy music finesse that has the potential to extend their palette. Opening track Still has a title that deceives, as anything but this is stationary. From the get-go you are lured into meteoric thrash goodness that comprises break-neck drum licks and an epic guitar riff that keeps on pushing. This vehemence is immediately carried into the following two tracks: The Atrophy of Will and The Slough. 

When you thought you had experienced the multitudinous grooves this band have to offer in the first three tracks, Old Horizon then manages to bring an even newer flow into the mix. The first thirty seconds go from an assertive heavy metal stance to a revamped nu-metal groove that forces you to bop while you headbang. It is a snippet of the testament to what slick style these guys have. Next we’re onto an IRON–MAIDEN-whacked-up-to-1000bpm intro on Silent Freeway. This is yet another excerpt that provides us with a taste of what’s to come with the rest of the track – a truckload of double bass and note-bouncing dexterity. 

The punchy and progressive euphony continues into the remaining tracks, furthering this journey we are taken on into cavernous waters. The Fog wreaks an eerie and ruminative vibe with its overall slower framework; almost like it insinuates an obstacle in the journey. In Callousness of Soul however this is engulfed with determined and expeditious riffs that communicate a conflict is being rectified. Closing track Intercostal, also the record’s longest track, is the satiable finale that rounds the labyrinthine narrative of the album into one coherent conundrum of sound. When the final few bars of riff are delivered and echo into the abyss, the listener is left to reflect on the fervent voyage they have just endured.  

OBSOLETE do not hold back with this incendiary debut. The ever-changing stop-start riffs, the reckless yet focused drums and escalating melodies are a showcase of this band’s technicality and celebrated complexity. The record was designed to announce their arrival into thrash album officiality, and the chosen title rings true to their pursuit. With each track you are animated with propelling ferity and then left waiting for that next impossible riff to take hold. And when that next riff eventually doesn’t come, you wonder how OBSOLETE are going to unleash their sophomore effort with the same, if not higher, level of penetrative mastery.

Rating: 8/10

Animate//Isolate is set for release April 19th via Unspeakable Axe Records.