Helmsplitter - Enraptured By Suffering

Helmsplitter

Enraptured By Suffering

by V. Srikar at 29 April 2014, 12:53 PM

Hailing from Rock Island, Illinois, United States, HELMSPLITTER brings with them their brand of Doom and Thrash flavoured Death Metal. “Enraptured By Suffering” being their 2^nd shot at a full length album, the band has come a long way since their inception way back in 2008. The band brings on its heavy Death Thrash music right from the first song “Tyrants For Blood”, unlike making a softer intro as is the fashion in recent times. Right from the first minute, there’s a sense of rawness in the music and the influence of old school Death Metal is written all over the music.

With doomy thick mid tempo riffs to fast paced blast beats driven music, the album moves between mid tempo and high tempo back and forth throughout the album. The faster parts of the album flirt on the lines of Brutal Death Metal and throughout the album illustrate very few innovative riffs, but it’s the slower doomy riffs that are really impressive and can get any listener to headbang immediately. Except with the most impressive song of the album - “Dance of the Heretic”, the album is quite unidirectional and lacks variety to keep the listener interested and really tests the patience of the listener with similar songs all throughout. The nasty growling vocals of Blakk are really impressive and works wonders with this band, as I can even hear the lyrics occasionally. “The Ground Bleeds Sorrow” is one of the better songs with its catchier riffs, and exquisite solos. The album has a whole impressed me on multiple listens and I realise it’s that kind of music that you can only enjoy upon repeated listening.

Lyrically the album speaks about witchcraft, torture and other horror related subjects; and the production seems to be raw and works just fine to bring the heaviness out of the thick riffs. As a whole “Enraptured By Suffering” has quite a number of brilliant moments and does impress with the sludgy doomy thick riffs, but it’s the faster Brutal Death Metal style parts that sounds far too monotonous and gives a feeling that the band is short of ideas, and I expect an improvement with their next album.