There's a moment halfway through the making-of documentary for Blood Incantation's new album that unlocks everything you need to know about the Denver death-metal band. Sitting in front of a whiteboard filled with diagrams mapping out every new-age synth solo, krautrock interlude, and blastbeat slam, lead singer Paul Riedl listens back to the studio recording. As his vocal part comes up, he shuts his eyes, holding his hands in chalice formation as he imitates his own inhumane screams. The moment it's done, he giggles like an excited schoolboy.
Though many a band have sought to elevate metal in their own way, there's a winking absurdity to the way Blood Incantation approach the task. They want to be more than simply another OSDM band, to be sure, but while they aren't afraid of the occasional ambient zone-out, the quartet takes metal higher by leaning deeper into the genre's essential nerdiness, rather than trying to escape it.
Hidden History of the Human Race, with its psychedelic aura of alien conspiracies and dedication to shredding with third eye open, captured the zonked-out magic of alternating dorm-room bong hits with drooling over the gory details of your roommate's Cannibal Corpse posters.
On Absolute Elsewhere, Blood Incantation take that mission to heart by going straight to the source. Where Tomb Mold found a path to the heavens in the '80s guitar tones of the Blue Nile, Blood Incantation use the '70s as a launchpad to plunge into the starless prog-rock abyss.
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