Epoch of Unlight - At War With the Multiverse (2022)

Seemingly frozen in time, today we have, after 17 years, Epoch of Unlight's latest opus “At War With the Multiverse”. We were huge fans of the band back in the early 2000’s and their fresh thrashy Melodic Death Metal music, which was echoed by bands like Estuary of Calamity and Sacramentum to some extent. In this new release, the band unleashes around 42 minutes of catchy and well-crafted music that has a certain nostalgic retro sound, but will please anybody that is a fan of Death/Black Metal with melodic tendencies.

The opening riffs of “The Anthropocene”, bring us back to the early days of North American Death Metal, namely Suffocation, Incantation, and similar outfits. However, the special Epoch of Unlight sauce lies in the melodic passages in songs like “The Numbing Stillness”, “Wrath of the Cryomancer”, and “An Amaranthine Line”, which perfectly switch between neck-snapping chugging sections, to clean and blistering guitar leads and solos.

Newcomer vocalist Scott Baggett does a pretty solid job in delivering harsh snarls that perfectly fit the mood of craftier pieces like “Beneath a Dying Sun”. Our favorite track in this release has to be the pummeling “The Möbius Path”, a song that mixes some old-school Dark Tranquillity influences with massive drumming and a crystal clear production. The playfulness of pieces like “Night Hunt”, is what initially made the band stand-out and it has aged quite well, as it is still engaging and effective in this release.

Closing with the crafty “The Lie of Tomorrow's Dawn” the signs off with a reminder of how skilled and crafty their execution is. Overall, “At War With the Multiverse” is one hell of a release from a highly underrated band that hopefully gets its time to shine. Epoch of Unlight’s sound, while a bit ‘retro’, is still more entertaining and engaging than the scores of uninspired Death Metal bands that plague the scene these days, so do yourself a favor and get a copy of this release.

Label: Dark Horizon Records

Release: Septmeber 16th, 2022

Genre: Melodic Death Metal

Country: USA