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Non Opus Dei

Eternal Circle

Written by: PP on 24/11/2010 02:27:39

Time to venture into extreme metal territory, or more specifically, avant garde black metal as Poland's Non Opus Dei like to refer to their music. They've been releasing albums almost on a yearly basis for a while now, so "Eternal Circle" is their sixth album already, and one where the band shows why Poland is where it's happening when it comes to black/death metal scenes.

The first aspect that strikes you about "Eternal Circle" is its sense of experimentation when it comes to black metal. The riffs are extremely tight and convincing as a result of the band challenging themselves as songwriters and avoid the conventional tremolo riff so many other black metal bands utilize as much as possible. The riffs are inventive and unpredictable, coming across more like psychotic death metal than black metal in many places. But don't you worry if it's blast beat pummeling your after, for that is in plentiful quantity here, too, and you'll find the odd tremolo riff too, usually fired at you in breakneck speed when necessary.

There's some weird concept that's explained in an A4's worth of text about demons and spirituality but I stopped reading after the first paragraph, because what matters here most is the instrumental awesomeness and the Skeletonwitch-esque leading shrieks by vocalist Klimorh that bring Non Opus Dei into the upper tiers within the genre. Sure, this sort of stuff has been done before (the drumming reminds me of a German band called Fragments Of Unbecoming, actually), but it doesn't matter when it's this well executed - the wide variety of bands in the "for the fans of" section should speak for itself..

Download: The Prisoner Of The Worlds, Dark Nebula
For the fans of: Fragments Of Unbecoming, Skeletonwitch, Vader, Immolation
Listen: Myspace

Release date 15.09.2010
Witching Hour Productions