ALBUM REVIEW: V3 – Vernedering – The Monolith Deathcult
Hailing from the Netherlands, THE MONOLITH DEATHCULT are easily one of the best acts within the death metal underground, and have been so for close to a decade and a half. Although they are far from the first band to do so, the band’s blending of extreme metal with electronic and industrial elements has set them apart from many of their peers, allowing them to create some incredibly impressive albums, most notably 2008’s Triumvirate, an album that should by all rights be universally considered a modern death metal classic. Their latest album, V3 – Vernedering, the closing part of a trilogy of records, including 2017’s Versus and 2019’s Vergelding, is not only a brilliant record in its own right, but also a fantastic conclusion to a lengthy chapter in the band’s storied musical career.
Connect The Goddamn Dots is a bombastic, electronic-tinged slab of powerful death metal. The slick melodic flourishes that are spread throughout the thick, rhythmic approach slowly builds to a fiercer sound, with sharp vocals and thunderous drumming all lending a cavernous sound to the proceedings, proving to be every bit as engrossing as it is intense.
Gone Sour, Doomed, by contrast, is a more aggressive affair, with intricate guitar work and monstrous vocals, complemented by grandiose keyboards and making for a grippingly visceral and polished track. The musicianship is just demented enough to add an urgent edge to the music, with a few more focused motifs helping to give this an accessible side that lots of death metal lacks.
Vernedering heads down a primal, groove-laden route, with an almost military beat and marching hooks, interspersed with energetic, feral moments to provide some depth to the sound. The soundbites, much as they did on the first track, add a dramatic side to the music, without distracting from the bulk of the music, allowing the electronic elements that close the track bleed seamlessly into Blood Libels, another track that brings in the comedic Alex Jones impersonations. It serves as a more keyboard centric and experimental number, with the guitars and drums taking a noticeable backseat to soaring symphonics, stripping away much of the extreme metal from the sound, save for the machine gun drumming and imaginative guitars. It’s a short track that really pushes THE MONOLITH DEATHCULT sound to its most bombastic, exploring the range of the band’s sound quite thoroughly.
The White Silence is a slow brooding track which sees the music lurch abruptly to a much darker style, with juggernaut riffs and sludgy gutturals giving this a weightier sound, with the keyboards and leads flavouring the rest of the music with a bleak and beguiling melancholic side that elevates this from being a solid but otherwise unremarkable death metal track to a deeply atmospheric one. They Drew First Blood, with its lively guitars and rumbling bass-lines, takes the core strengths of the previous song and amplifies them, allowing for a more technical approach to the instrumentation and plenty of meatier, speed-driven moments. There’s a more generous dose of electronic passages than its predecessor had, creating an instantly memorable, and at times utterly cacophonous, offering that stands as one of the album’s more impressive tracks.
L’ouverture De Morose, the album’s lengthy closer, is a relatively repetitive track for the most part, with little variation in the guitar and drum sound. The keyboards, by contrast, are the focal point, ranging from angelic ambience to haunting piano accompaniments, constantly changing and keeping the music interesting, with a few slick guitar parts acting in a similar way, deviating from the relatively monolithic sound that underpins the majority of this song. It’s a solid and engrossing way to bring the album to a close, and manages to achieve a lot with very few musical components.
For longtime fans of this band, there’s everything you would expect from THE MONOLITH DEATHCULT here, from their incredibly modern take on death metal to its subtle, comedic edge. But this album, in contrast to the first two albums in the trilogy it is part of, has a stronger focus on creating memorable and catchy hooks in a way that its predecessors didn’t quite manage, scaling back the electronic influences and the more visceral moments within the music in favour of a sharp and groove-orientated sound that’s just as likely to draw newcomers to THE MONOLITH DEATHCULT as it is to please its diehard supporters, striking the perfect balance between this band’s more accessible and progressive sides.
Rating: 9/10
V3 – Vernedering is out now via on Human Detonator Records.
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