Gnosis "Omens From The Dead Realm" CD

After three years of lurking dormancy, GNOSIS reemerges from the depths with OMENS FROM THE DEAD REALM, their latest full-length offering. From the Greek word for “knowledge”, GNOSIS is adept at translating Greek sonic arcana into their own distinct language. Straddling the line between black and death metal, GNOSIS treads this bottomless sea with an aplomb matched by few others. Blunt brutality is complimented by breathtaking melancholia with tasteful nods to archetypes found throughout the history of heavy metal music. Album highlights such as “Apzu, Sea of Death” can confidently stand in conversation with elder Greek progenitors VARATHRON and ROTTING CHRIST, while still maintaining their own distinct thesis. This is the sound of aquatic Babylonian chaos, albeit through the lens of the ancient depth-dwelling elders of Lovecraft’s abyss. OMENS FROM THE DEAD REALM is the second GNOSIS release. This morning I jumped into my 665eder (for one more level to get my 666eder, my money wasn´t enough) time machine and turned on the computer. Then I started the new Gnosis album “Omens from the dead Realm” and told the computer to bring me to the year when this music was originally from. The years went back and suddenly the machine stopped. It´s the year, Bill Clinton became POTUS, a new discovered spider was named after Harrison Ford and Germany got new post codes. Fortunately, the machine didn´t stop in 1994, when the German soccer team did a horrible performance during the WC in the USA.
But now let´s come to the reason why I stranded in 1993. It is very obvious that the trio from Florida have a big weakness for the good old times. The first thought I had when listening to their third output was “Mystifier” combined with “Rotting Christ”. They play a solid mixture of death and black metal, which is very often combined with creepy, gloomy doom parts that remind me of the two first Mystifier albums. Even the sinister vocals remind me of the Brazilians (or if you want, also Necros Christos from Germany (R.I.P.)). When they start using keyboards in their songs or increase the tempo, you canbeam yourself from South America directly to Greece, just to visit Rotting Christ or Varathron for a cool drink. This break between the Mystifier and the Rotting Christ part is made through the track “Apzu, Sea of Death”. It´s a slow, evil track which starts to get very catchy and melodic in the middle of it. Here the band first starts with a doomy part interrupted with a keyboard and some really well-arranged melodies that spreads evil Mediterranean atmosphere. “The eleventh step, the Gate unknown” is a pure worship of old Greek black metal, really great performance. Especially when you think about the last felt 2000 releases that Rotting Christ did and you liked the old stuff, you will be happy to hear the three guys from Florida.
One could accuse Gnosis because of lacking self-reliance if you want, but hand on heart, which band is reinventing the wheel these days? I am really happy with this old-school stuff and have a nice feeling of return to my youth. I guess, I am not the only one who may think so. Well, if you grew up with the aforementioned bands and like their old outputs, it is really worth checking it!!!
Well, now I have to return to 2021 (though, this is not the nicest time to live, I guess) and some of you may ask if I can predict the lottery numbers – no, I cannot. This is time traveler law!!

Sample: https://www.youtube.com/watch?...