EP REVIEW: Lithification – Samskaras

Sometimes, it pays to expand on one’s craft. With technical death metal seemingly plateauing, much like many sub-genres of metal before it, such as thrash metal in the mid-90s and death metal in the early 2000s, it has become apparent that more must be done to stand above the crowd. It is no longer a case of being the fastest, the heaviest, the nastiest, nor the most complex. No, in following its forebears, technical death metal has moved into more exploratory realms, as thrash and death metal before it did. It was such exploration that birthed technical death metal in the first place. But because of said exploration, it has made finding diamonds in the rough significantly more difficult. The genre has begun to lean towards EP-focussed release schedules, presumably because they are easier and cheaper to produce, which in turn makes listening a short-lived experience. And that is precisely the problem with SAMSKARAS‘ new EP, Lithification.

Boasting a plethora of influences, the band has stumbled upon a fantastic blend of sounds, mixing the death metal sensibilities of earlier RIVERS OF NIHIL and more recent DECAPITATED with the high-adrenaline tremolo picking of THE BLACK DAHLIA MURDER, to create a churning stormfront of crackling with all the key components of the genre, barring one: there is a distinct lack of shred.

While normally, this would not be anything to mark against a band, when songwriting of a significant quality is compressed to but a mere four tracks, certain elements of creativity, and musical experimentation, get lost in the effort of squeezing into that tight EP stencil. And Lithification is certainly guilty of that. While the songs themselves are well written, well produced, and well paced, they lack any creative individuality. There is no place for thoughtful musical expression, but merely riff after riff after riff. And certainly, there is a place for that in the world, but when trying to set oneself apart from a myriad of other extremely similar bands, it can’t hurt to break from the constraints of rhythm and structure to tap a vein of unapologetic noodling.

That said, Lithification is a confident little EP from SAMSKARAS, worthy of a background listen. It’s not ground-breaking, and it’s not going to reinvent the wheel, but it’ll give a quarter of an hour of blast beats and high-octane riffing to a reasonably high standard. It isn’t particularly ambitious, but it is good at what it does, even if what it does isn’t anything more than its peers.

Rating: 6/10

Lithification is out now via self-release.

Like SAMSKARAS on Facebook.