Acranius Archives - NO CLEAN SINGING

(Andy Synn says get ready to turn off your brains and turn up the volume with Acranius)

It’s pretty well-established that we tend to favour music of the more cerebral and artistic type… while still, for the most part, being heavy as hell… here at NCS.

In fact, it’s almost become something of a running joke (just take a glance at any handful of my most recent reviews, such as the artful blackened beauty of Miserere Luminis, the abrasive, pitch-black anarchism of Trespasser, or the complex Prog-Tech contortions of Cryptic Shift) that the older we get the more “progressive” (or “pretentious”) our tastes are getting.

But there’s a time and a place for proggy pretensions and artsy indulgence… and this is not one of those times.

(Andy Synn lays down the gauntlet with the new album from Germany’s Acranius)

Sometimes, to really understand how a band got to where they are, you have to take a close look back at where they came from.

In the case of Germanic brutes Acranius this is particularly revealing, as in hindsight it’s clear that 2017’s Reign of Terror marked a major turning point away from their more Slam-influenced early work towards what’s best described as more of a “Brutal Deathcore” sound.

Sure, there were still several recognisable elements still hanging over from their first two albums – especially the slamtastic snare and the largely unintelligible gurgling monotone of the vocals – but it was clear even then that the band were in the process of becoming something else… something which has finally achieved its final, fearsome form on Mercy Denied.

ACRANIUS – WHITEOUT

ACRANIUS – MERCY DENIED