» Blog Archive Review: Burial In The Sky's 'Creatio Et Hominu' -
Evan Conway Hard Music, News, Reviews, Streaming

I’ve become somewhat lost with progressive and technical death metal in recent years. Not that the genre has grown stale, but rather that my interests have been directed elsewhere while the two grew and prospered. Around 2015 is when I fell off the wagon, but through the early years of the decade I was all about the techically-inclined bands of that time. Burial in the Sky makes me nostalgic for that point in my life, but granted it’s probably not worth visiting those albums again because I’m quite certain Burial in the Sky are far more impressive to me today than what caught my attention back then.

Hailing from Mount Carmel, Pennsylvania, Burial in the Sky is a cosmic brand of tech death that, surprisingly, isn’t about playing soundclips of pseudo-intellectual quotes from movies or TED Talks and putting them between 8 minutes of sweeping and blast beats in 17/16. Rather, the band is a very well rehearsed, tightly knit trio of musicians that don’t make you wait for things to get interesting. Cutting it just below 36 minutes and at 7 tracks, Creatio Et Hominu gets its point across and does it without overstaying its welcome. The opposite of your relatives on the holidays, the band keep it quick, keep it interesting, and for the most part keep it tasteful.

Let’s get this out of the way first: these guys can play their instruments, but the technicality of the music never takes away from the actual core of it. These songs just happen to be technical, and are done in service to the vibe and the aesthetic of the band. Without being overbearing and having to remind you every 30 seconds, the band find a seemingly perfect balance between showing their chops and carrying melody and atmosphere in between it all.

Think Fallujah and The Discovery-era Born of Osiris’ guitar work when thinking of Burial in the Sky, especially on tracks like “Tesla” or “The Pivotal Flame.” The album isn’t afraid ot change the pace up, what with the inclusion of sung vocals, a saxophone that makes frequent appearances, and a great amount of atmosphere that always manages to remain present. In particular on “The Pivotal Flame,” the song quickly transitions from tech death to emulating the original Blade Runner soundtrack towards the middle, heralding in the actual sax solo and wow does it work.

The production is so damn near perfect, too, yet the one weakest aspect is the tone the bass takes at times. The higher register of bass sounds great and cuts through perfectly when the parts become more important, but it’s during the heavier sections where the bass sticks out in unflattering ways. When these low chugs come in and you can clearly hear the player’s fingers hit the pick-ups, your own internal rhythm starts to fall off and it becomes diestracting.

But even with the bass having moments of fault the album comes to a grand climax with the closing title track (a 7-minute instrumental) that employs everything great about the album in one excellent summation. I’m having a lot of fun with Creatio Et Hominu, and between the tight songwriting and superb performances present, I dare say it’s one of the more interesting and head-turning releases of the year. Burial in the Sky have something good going on here, and I’m very inclined to see where their exploits take them in the coming years.

Creatio Et Hominu is available everywhere now. You can download it here and stream “The Pivotal Flame” below.

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