Elctrikchair
Eternity Into Darkness
6.7
This review will be a brief affair, as I’m dealing with less than 15 minutes of music here. Elctrikchair (not a typo) is an up-and-coming band out of Colorado that plays an intriguing amalgamation of various types of extreme metal. They label themselves as progressive death metal, which I suppose is as good a descriptor as any I’d come up with.
Upon the initial listen, I think of black metal, due to the thin, rattling guitar tone, opening screams, and machine-gun drumming. Unfortunately, the drumming is mixed way too low, especially considering that the drummer is very young (13 or 14), and it’d be nice to hear what he can do. The first track as a whole, “Carpathian Forest” fits nicely under the black metal moniker, as its namesake would suggest, even if it lacks that special evil aura. At 1:50, they toss in a flourishing riff that reminds me of the crazy riffs that Unearth created in the days of yore. The following song, “Corrupt Scene”, starts off black metal again, but then the guitarists turn it around with a proggy thrash section and guitar squeals at 1:05. The bass guitar grabs some attention with a punchy tone during the big riffs, and Andrew Rodriguez shows some of the shredding that he’s capable of as the song approaches its end. They open up further in “Shadows of Death”, with more than enough shredding to keep me occupied. In addition, they mix in a few different vocal styles here: an awkward clean voice teams up with a gruff growled throat for the choruses, while the standard blackened rasp handles the majority of the vocals. The last song isn’t really worth mentioning, as it’s more of the same styling and less than two minutes in length.
Elctrikchair’s quickie demo disc has managed to grab my interest, although I’m a well-known sucker for some fast guitarwork. Bring on the shred. As it stands, what I hear is more of a black-thrash romp than a work of progressive death, although nowhere near as blood-boiling as an Absu or D666 album, but they do write some compelling and catchy tunes. At least compelling enough to make me interested in hearing what they can do on a full-length. When it’s done, send it our way, fellas.
