The debut album from Ukranian Death Metal guard Heruvim lands an appropriate home on the Redefining Darkness roster. One demo and two EPs allowed the band time to fester and craft a masterfully dynamic yet brutal Death Metal album with a powerful set of lungs on it.
The opening track of ‘Mercator’ lumbers and sways with hefty groove, leveraging the always powerful dual guitar attack for harmonies throughout before breaking into an atmospheric passage for an appropriate amount of space. The song closes out with a head first dive back into a more riff forward section and guitar solo.
Many of the remaining songs on the record take a similar structural form but the band’s bag of melodic and atmospheric tricks is different throughout. The production is warm and balanced, the perfect blend of modern without being “overproduced”. The guitar work is jarring and dissonant at times, ala Demilich or Outer Heaven, but similar to the latter, Heruvim master staying in the pocket for grooves when needed.
‘Mercator’ is an interesting and fresh take on Death Metal and should be paid special attention to by fans of the Conan universe.
