The Usurper - Hell Breaks Loose (2024)

3.5★

Originally, I wasn’t even going to include this album as I stumbled upon it randomly, but as the days went by, I found myself coming back to it more and more. There’s just something about it that’s so different from a lot of the new bands I’ve heard coming out of Greece – it’s raw and aggressive, with a feral bite from their nasty riffs and huge drum sound, but in a different sort of way that I struggle to put into words. The vocals are deep and demonic-sounding, pairing brilliantly with the macabre lyrics and overall atmosphere, but even that is fairly old hat. So what is it? Perhaps it’s the lead guitar parts, as they sound like they’ve been programmed with some kind of MIDI controller; synthetic in a way. They’re very, very melodic and go with the songs incredibly well, but with a distinct lack of natural tone or really any vibrato, it just seems almost inhuman. Who knows, maybe the leads are real since a guitarist is credited? I can tolerate programmed drums if they’re done correctly, but this just sort of blows my mind! Despite these odd quirks, I believe this album to be very well-written and with such a short runtime (~31 minutes), what excuse do you have to not at least give it a shot?

FAVORITE TRACKS: “Still Nowhere,” “Killing Machine,” “Under His Spell”

FOR FANS OF: Celtic Frost, Discharge, Zorn

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Originally published in Aug. '24 (Issue No. 4)