ALBUM REVIEW: VLBNR – Veilburner
Within the emerging micro-genre of dissonant death metal, Pennsylvania’s VEILBURNER are not just one of its more prominent acts, but arguably one of its best. Ever since the release of their debut album The Three Lightbearers in 2014, the band have made a name for themselves with their distinctive style which brings to mind the likes of IMPERIAL TRIUMPHANT or even AKERCOCKE in their more progressive moments, with their two most recent albums, 2018’s A Sire To The Ghosts Of Lunacy and last year’s Lurkers In The Capsule Of Skull, being their best work thus far, gaining the duo some well-deserved recognition and critical acclaim. Their latest, sixth record, VLBNR, once again exceeds and significantly raises the high benchmark of the band’s recorded output, and stands as perhaps their most musically ambitious and stunning work to date.
VI (Vulgar Incantations) is an interesting start, blending fluid basslines with intricate drums, disjointed guitars and monstrous vocals, with plenty of frenetic moments peppered in to provide an air of genuine unpredictability that makes this both unnerving and memorable. Envexomous Hex is a chaotic, lean piece of death metal with domineering, borderline psychedelic synths. It morphs into a very progressive track, especially with regards to the vocals, which take in rumbling gutturals and feral shrieks.
Interim Oblivion initially replaces the aggression of the preceding two offerings with haunting ambience and minimalist guitar and bass. It feels far more reserved, opting for a rhythm driven sound, with only the hypnotic vocals possessing any venom, resulting in a jazzier, engrossing sound that acts as a great counterpoint to what immediately follows it; Lo! Heirs To The Serpent is a fast, urgent slab of caustic extremity with a solid thrash undercurrent, throwing slick, technical melodicism into the mix, interspersed with jarring passages and the nauseating groove that defined the opening tracks on the album, albeit with a biting edge. Burning The Veil returns to the dramatic, slower sound of Interim Oblivion, with a measured, chord-based sound, bombastic synths and a darker, reverb-drenched guitar tone lending a Gothic touch to the song without detracting from the more cacophonous sections.
Unorthodoxagon pushes the music into progressive and experimental territories, with the discordance of the guitars, the ever-shifting vocal deliveries and the sudden lurches in tempo crafting a sinister, noxious sound that doesn’t have to embrace the band’s harsher side to make a significant impact. Repulsed By The Light uses cleaner tones to great effect, leaning heavily towards a black metal sound and using the ethereal quality of the guitars, along with the tight drum hooks and acidic vocals to create a monolithic, melodic sound with fewer dissonant moments than on earlier efforts to provide an adventurous, engrossing change of pace that works well. By contrast, None So Hideous is a muscular and bellicose proposition, with weighty guitars, snarling vocals and an unyielding intensity that makes it sound utterly bestial. The catchy, swaggering leads of the last track are still present here, taking a considerable backseat to the heft and subtle droning of the guitars and flavouring certain motifs later in the song as opposed to being the focal point.
The brief ambience of Exhibitionism In Limbo removes all traces of extreme metal from the music, providing an airy instrumental interlude that breaks up the unbridled ferocity of the preceding track and the album’s closing effort, Ruin. This track begins in a similar fashion to the album’s opener, sounding heavily industrial, but exploring this more thoroughly than on VI. The slow burning nature of the songwriting, along with the opaque production, contribute to this track’s effect, and it sounds enthralling from start to finish, gradually moving past the electronic feel of its beginning and ending up as a far more demented, cavernous affair that utilises soaring clean vocals incredibly well, bringing this album to its climax with one of its best moments.
It’s very hard to come across an album where every single track has its own distinctive approach that makes it stand out from the others, making for an incredibly powerful and imaginative sounds all the way through the album, but VLBNR is certainly one of them. More so than any of the band’s first five records, this album adopts a broader range of styles and tones within their songwriting, and alongside the production quality, which is just polished enough to let the finer details shine through whilst being murky and raw enough at appropriately darker moments, lends this a consistently high benchmark from the first track to the last. Considering the obvious talent and writing chemistry that the band’s two members share, it’s easy to assume that they will be producing better work even than this in the not too distant future, but if nothing else, VLBNR is another brilliant effort from VEILBURNER, and a shining example to other bands who create a more dissonant brand of extreme metal of what one of the genres premier purveyors are capable of.
Rating: 9/10
VLBNR is out now via Transcending Obscurity Records.
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