Condra "Aeonic Tempest from the Abyss" Cassette

With this release Korpituli Productions wander further geologically than ever before.
Condra comes from Chile and Anti-Cosmic Metal of Death is their thing!
Their melodic blackened death metal comes in the vein of the classic Swedish tradition with elements hinting at the old school grand master Dissection and Sacramentum, but there's also the new school approach present to the likes of Kvaen for example where classic heavy metal veins make their presence felt, along with some classy melodic leads - "Aeonic Tempest From The Abyss" is a total riff fest with great hooks and melodies.
Also, the fact that this album was a one man effort just makes it even more impressive and I had to offer him to release this on cassette.
If you like *that* particular brand of the late 90's/early 2000's melodic blackened Swedish metal, don't sleep on this one!
The cassette edition includes a bonus track, a demo version of the song "The Omen".

When it comes to this genre there are common themes that Condra has been able to elaborate on, while also displaying the bands amazing lyrical and musical potential. When it comes to the music this album provides a relatively unique take on the genre, mainly with it's somewhat unique drum patterns and vocal style. It is obvious that one of the bands biggest influences is Dissection with certain riffs paying homage to the band, in the song "Grave Digger" the beginning riff sounds like "Thorns of Crimson Death" the song has riffs that could pair well with the visual of fallen angels marching to battle. Not only that, but the lyrics for this album are amazing, they're dark, beautiful, imaginative, and occult/mythologically rich. Consisting of tales of the dark feminine, the quest for power and liberation, while also providing a unique perspective on the anti-cosmic luciferian philosophy laid down by Dissection and MLO in the 90's and earlier in the millennium. Not only do the lyrics provide a well written perspective but goes into deeper territory. The albums artwork like many of this genre, is captivating. This is just my speculation but the album artwork's background appears to be a picture or illustration of an actual landscape from this world that was then edited and added to, if that is true there's nothing wrong with that, it works.
The high pitch shrieks and shouts sound haunting and shrill with a unique character. The vocals could be improved upon slightly but still sound great, the composer for this band is still young and writes amazing music and lyrics who will most likely become a legend in this genre or in something if he continues to create music, so his vocals aren't perfect but he might still be perfecting and figuring it out. The vocals when sang with the melodies of the guitars sound very catchy, in fact their are many lyrics that are memorable for that reason, I also enjoy the lyrical chants in some of these songs such as "Io! io! io! Shaitan" or " Hail! Hail! Hail! Tiamat". The echo effect and reverb added to the guitars and vocals definitely helps with the portrayal of this albums dark atmosphere that is conjured in ones mind when listening, this is usually a needed aspect when composing this kind of music.
The guitars consist of sinister and captivating melodies both fast and slow, the slow gallopy riffs are also nice. The songs were structured usually with a slower catchier riff to get things built up but would then ascend into a faster and more ferocious riff and drum pattern. The drums sounded awesome, some very fast blast and many parts had similiar drum patterns but it did not feel too repetitive. The drums were recorded and mixed well, the album itself seemed to be recorded and edited in a way that allowed the chaotic atmosphere to persist but did not take away from hearing the crispness of the solos or the full drum kit. The clean guitar parts for the most part provided a melancholic quality to the chaotic and ravenous filled record. The opening track was not bad, it was a slightly somber folk melody perhaps latin based, that was decent. My favorite clean/instrumental track would be "Ain Symphony", "Spectres of a Dying Soul" was good aswell and provided a nice intro to the killer luciferian track "Shinig Lord". This is an album that I can easily see being one of the classics of the genre in years to come, it's compelling and unique for 2022, along with bands like Sinira and perhaps even White Rune.

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