ALBUM REVIEW: Return To Realms – Cryptic Shift
The sudden rise of CRYPTIC SHIFT in the last few years, and particularly since the release of the band’s debut album, Visitations From Enceladus, seems almost meteoric, but is definitely well deserved. With their uniquely progressive and futuristic take on death-thrash, Visitations… garnered the Leeds-based quartet well-deserved critical acclaim, seeing them sign to Metal Blade Records, tour across Europe and Australia, and open for Canadian progressive thrash titans VOIVOD on their most recent string of UK dates. For long time fans of the band, the start of this rise to prominence can be directly linked to the release of their 2016 EP Beyond The Celestial Realms, a record that showcased the inventive and technical prowess that was to come. Now, with the band putting the finishing touches on their second album, they are looking backwards as well as forwards with Return To Realms, a record that not only revisits this EP but also provides a wealth of demo versions and an unreleased track, providing an incredibly deep dive into one of their earliest high points.
After the electronic ambience of Beyond The Celestial Realms sets the scene, the record proper begins with Voyage Through Dimensions, an excellent, punchy slab of death-thrash with sharp rhythms, frenetic leads and rabid drumming all combining to make a sound that is lean and chaotic, occasionally touching on the melodic technicality that they have become well known for. Deathcrusher – arguably one of the band’s best loved tracks – is a magnificent blend of unhinged riffs and intricate flourishes that pushes the music into a faster, more progressive sound, interspersing virtuosic leads and sudden tempo shifts into the dense and ferocious death metal that underpins everything to result in a track that is catchy and incredibly imaginative.
Spore sees even more inventive guitar and bass hooks, with the polished hooks shifting from one brilliant motif to another, with each contributing to the overall effect. There’s also a hypnotic, cleaner middle section which provides a brief break from the darkness that defines the rest of the song, giving it an epic edge. The vocals match this visceral feel, morphing from coarse gutturals through to acidic snarls, complementing the biting nature of the more driven sections extremely well. Glacial Reclamation leans heavily into the technical thrash influences within the band’s sound, bringing to mind the likes of VOIVOD at their best, and pushing the music to new heights of cacophony and intensity, with jarring rhythmic bursts, fantastic sludgy bass lines and angular, crushing guitars, with even the vocals reaching greater depths to match the fiercer, energetic sound.
Entombed In Flesh – a track initially written during this period but omitted from the original EP – slows the music to a relative crawl, with a few aggressive moments peppered liberally throughout, making for a chunky and groove-laden piece of death metal with a few discordant touches. It shows that even at their most reserved this band are capable of making some exceptionally savage and punishing death-thrash.
This unreleased track, along with the final four offerings on this record, demo versions of Voyage Through Dimensions, Deathcrusher, Spore and Cosmic Dreams, were recorded in 2015 before the band went on to record the EP proper, and it’s interesting that even on these demos many of the core elements of that subsequent EP’s sound are present so early on, showing just how much effort and attention the band place upon their music even in its early stages. Of course, Cosmic Dreams closes on a different solo to the remastered version that featured earlier, but almost all of what made Beyond The Celestial Realms so stunning is present here, albeit with the sort rawer production quality that you would expect from demos.
Whether you first heard the music that features here back in 2015 or this is your first introduction to it, Return To Realms is a fantastic look at what is arguably one of the most singularly magnificent debut EPs by a UK extreme metal act in recent memory. For new fans, this is an excellent starting point for discovering the band’s earlier material, and showing that CRYPTIC SHIFT, even in their embryonic stages, were just as impressive as they are today. For long time fans, it’s great to revisit this, knowing full well that all of the promise and talent that this short but powerful record held is finally being realised on a wider, global scale. Entombed In Flesh, although a marked departure from the style of much of the band’s music, is a great addition, and shows a more ponderous and brooding side that it would be great to see explored further. Above all, regardless of how long you have been appreciating CRYPTIC SHIFT‘s music, Return To Realms is a great record that should help get listeners in the mood for their next full-length.
Rating: 9/10
Return To Realms is out now via Blood Harvest Records.
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