Abysmal Gates – Divine Deception
Anti-christian blackened death metal, pure and simple arises from the destruction left behind by Abysmal Gates. A deep and down tuned guitar tone gives AG a thick persona and mighty crunch when they need to pile on the ugliness, but they offset this undeniably death metal characteristic with piercing synth lines which honestly sound a bit fruity in the mix since they basically mirror the main riff lines. The vocals try to maintain a harsh mid-ranged snarl to capitalize on the blackened side of their personality, but the screamer often loses the abrasion in his voice (or it has been washed out by too much reverb) as the power in the guitars often steps all over his performance. Deeper death moans do enter the equation along with some nicely added pitch choral singing for effect, but the vocals in general are just too low in the mix. The strength of Abysmal Gates is indeed the well-written guitar lines that effectively walk the line between a slight Swedish melody and full on euro styled death brutality. And I’d like to add, you can actually hear a clean bass tone poking through the mix to add even more of a unique sound to accompany the tight arrangements and shredding solo/riff work that permeates this 5 song album. Overall, my only complaint that sticks with “Divine Deception” is the keyboards. They just strike me as completely unnecessary. A better production and some minor refinements will indeed hurl this band into a new realm of intensity. – Marty
BLACK FLAME RECORDS
Worm Gear 