In Memorium
Lost To Antiquity
6.3
Lost to Antiquity is the second full length release from Seattle’s In Memorium. In Memorium plays a fairly straightforward style of black metal, but with a modern, robust sound. The band seems not to suffer from any allergies to production values or low-end. Like oh so many black metal bands, however, blast beats and tremolo picked melodies are the band's principal tools. While the band sometimes manages to conjure up some of the frantic swirling majesty of early Immortal, ultimately, In Memorium spends at least half of the album executing a competent, but prosaic blitzkrieg of riffs that sound all too familiar.
In the band’s defense, In Memorium does try to rescue itself from complete redundancy by introducing a fair amount of slower paced material and throwing in a few nods to death metal in the form of some deeper growls and chunkier riffs. Unfortunately, while the downshifts in tempo provide a nice break from the blasting, the band just has no swing. Steve Fournier’s drumming, which sound so ferocious at hyper-speed, seems to lose all its fire once the tempo drops below two hundred beats per minute, and the rest of the band just seems to lay the music out there rather than ram it down your throat. "Erosion," for instance, with its crawling pace and sinister main riff strives to be threatening, but in the face of tepid, uninventive playing, the song just ends up tedious.
For better or worse, In Memorium is at its most effective when playing fast: the results may not sound very original, but on raging tracks like "O’ Hail Glorious Death" and “Beneath the Endless Ocean,” they at least sound like they mean it.
Lost to Antiquity is a respectable black metal record, but little more. If In Memorium could find a way to maintain their intensity and fire throughout their compositions, their work might bear investigation, but as it stands, you can probably skip this one.
