Æpoch – “Hiraeth”
Ontario, Canada natives Æpoch release, a five-song Ep “Hiraeth”. The Ep, serves as the follow-up to the group’s well-received 2020 Ep, “The Scryer”.
Active since 2012, Æpoch has kept up a steady pace between killer live appearances and new releases since their inception. While the group’s most recent effort, The Scryer, was focused on older unreleased material the band was proud of and wished to see released, Hiraeth charts a different course altogether.
In 2021, that takes the form of Æpoch focusing anew on the progressive and technical aspects of their old-meets-new approach to death metal. Albeit in a way that feels different than all prior material from the band. Aided in part by the group’s newest members, guitarists Marcus Arar and Nicholas Luck, bringing their own array of versatile ideas and songwriting capabilities to the Æpoch fold on Hiraeth.
An intense, fast and technical Ep, which without giving any discounts to anyone goes straight to the point. Energy and grit these are the main ingredients for five songs whose sonic impact is pleasantly devastating. The guitar walls merge perfectly with an aggressive voice that manages to give a nice dynamics.
There are no moments of pause the melody, the clean and watery one is completely absent, for a raw and decidedly metal EP, of the one played to perfection.
As the group explains: “The purpose of this EP is to showcase the more refined modern progressive/tech death direction of the band. This progression is completely natural with our new members. This EP features songs that were written by Marcus and Brett & Taylor Wroblewski (Amnesia) with contributions from Nick and Greg in all songs. Not to mention guest vocals by Jerry Martin of Alustrium in “Amnesia” too. This EP also features our first dabble in the world of dissonance, while we tried to do it our way. Perhaps a little more melody and a little less melancholy.”
The end result makes for another bold step forward in Æpoch’s sonic evolution, although you’ll have to stick around to see what the group churns out after this as there is no guarantee it’ll follow the same course Hiraeth does. Which is to be expected from a talented group not eager to stick to one path permanently.
Hiraeth will strongly appeal to fans of groups such as Beyond Creation, Fallujah, The Black Dahlia Murder, and Obscura.
Tracklisting:
- Atonement
- Amnesia (Ft. Alustrium vocalist Jerry Martin)
- Overwrought
- The Flesh Totem
- Hiraeth
7.5/10
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