Expect nothing, receive nothing!
Not yet a decade of activities, yet Deadspace already put their undeniable and influential mark on the international map of the Atmospheric Black Metal scene. In nearly nine years, this band from Perth, West-Australia, did release quite some well-acclaimed mini and full-length recordings. Throughout the years, Deadspace, which consists of members that are also involved with the likes of Exitium Sui (with a stunning new EP released only a couple of weeks ago), Doomcave, Aethyr, Cancer / Woewarden, Humanitas Error Est or Aviscerus, amongst many others, grew up towards one of the most notorious acts with their own-faced, characteristic blackened elegance.
But let’s not stick to the past; let’s focus on their newest epos, called Unveiling The Palest Truth. This new material was recorded at the Oblivion Studio and mixed + mastered by no one else but our dearest Monsieur Déhà at his (legendary) Opus Magnum Studio. The result is a five-piece EP, which clocks almost twenty-four minutes. For the physical release, Deadspace did sign to Belgium’s finest Immortal Frost Productions, a Black Metal label with a huge connection to Australia; yet that’s another story. 500 copies have been pressed on compact-disc, which do come with a sixteen-page booklet (PS: a limited amount is hand-signed by the band-members). Besides (and once again), there are three vinyl editions (‘normal’, ‘opaque red’ and ‘transparent highlighter yellow / opaque swirl’), limited evidently (to 122, 111 and 100 copies respectively), all of them including an A2-sized poster.
This seventh full-album is inspired by a dystopian vision on our planet’s world-leaders, a society led by corrupt politicians and a greedy elite, followed brainlessly by a stupid mass of innocent / ignorant sheep. English literature, post-apocalyptic works and writings about the equilibrium of occultism and man’s narrow-mindedness, act as core to tell the story behind Unveiling The Palest Truth; a title that surely covers the pessimistic message and vision behind mankind’s futile existence. How typical it is of man to hold a flame up high in the darkness of the night, yet awake to cower at the very first sight of the morning sun.
The recording starts with a dystopian intro (Enter The Valley Of The Dead), narrating about inevitable apocalypse. It’s a mesmerizing piece at first, with haunting guitar harmonies, gloomy leads (at the background) and ominous spoken words, eventually joined by an eldritch drum beat and atmospheric synths. As from Within His Wretched Tomb, Deadspace offer us their mighty mixture of dissonance and melodicism, their unique vision on Post-oriented craftsmanship and harmonic melodies. It’s a wall-of-sound for sure, yet at the same much more than ‘just’ bruteness and heaviness. Once again, this band is able to create an overwhelming and multi-layered orchestra of vocalized, drum- and string-artistry. Fast and intense chapters (waw, some of the speed-up parts are like a sonic translation of an avalanche of all-scorching lava) interact organically well with prodigious slower fragments; the latter often breathing a opiating, nebulous, sometimes doleful air (A Feast For The Rats is an example of this band’s majestic grandeur when it comes to Doom-injected finesse!). Traditional elements get spiced with a technically high-skilled discordancy; I mean that timeless structures exist in a high-leveled symbiosis with semi-progressive, efficacious techniques. The mesmerizing element has nothing to do with dreamlike elements, yet rather with an intoxicating level of mental seizure.
The mix - as said courtesy of Monsieur Déhà - is top-notch. Even-though the guitars and varied vocals (most of the time, Chris’ corrosive voice spits venom and sulfur through dismal growls and atrocious screams, yet there are spoken words, more ‘melodious’ chants etc. as well) act like the ‘core’, one cannot ignore the well-balanced injection of the rhythm and bass guitars or the underlying percussion-based aspects. The whole sounds insurmountably massive with a splendiferous roughness on top of the vivid production.
https://lnk.to/unveilingthepalesttruth
https://deadspacecollective.bandcamp.com/album/unveiling-the-palest-truth
https://immortalfrostproductions1.bandcamp.com/album/unveiling-the-palest-truth