Written By Kevin McSweeney
Infected Dead Invicta Review: Cosmic Horror Meets Technical Brutality
Technical death metal has always struck me as being the musical equivalent of reading a novel by the famously verbose British writer Will Self.
One might marvel at the magnitude of the lugubrious literary Londoner’s sesquipedalian skill, but having to consult the dictionary every thirty seconds detracts somewhat from the reader’s ability to become engrossed in a narrative.
Such is the case with music that places greater emphasis on overt displays of virtuosity than on vibe and emotion. Like free form jazz, it is music for the mind, but not for the heart or soul.
Or is it? Infected Dead, Medway’s masterful manufacturers of metal, might wish to challenge that assertion. They have returned with a new lineup featuring former members of Pupil Slicer, Dawnwalker and Overthrow.
They also have a new EP, Invicta, which was released independently on May 1st. It is their first collection of songs since 2017’s Archaic Malevolence EP. It seemed only fair to give it a spin to see if they could confound my expectations, and, to a certain extent, they did.
Infected Dead Invicta Review
Astral Divination begins abruptly with a black metal-style digit-destroying tremolo-picked riff over a blast beat, and it doesn’t really let up thereafter.
Every finger placed on every fret by Chris Rahman, Alexander Brown and Luke Fabian is performed seemingly to inspire incredulity.
As someone who never progressed beyond three chords on a guitar, it certainly has that effect on me. How do they even remember such a wide-ranging sequence of notes? I fared a bit better on drums, but Scott Lindsay puts a shift in here that I could never have hoped to emulate.
There are neoclassical elements to the arrangements and there’s something akin to a breakdown in there as well, though it is notable for its John Myung-style high-lying bass flourishes from Fabian over sporadic synchronised blasts of guitar and drums resembling bursts of machine gun fire. For much of the song, it sounds like Cryptopsy covering Muse.
There’s an element of groove metal to Organic Monolith, with its mid-paced, meaty swagger.
It’s still ornately embellished with all the technical jiggery-pokery that comes with the territory, however, despite adhering to a 4/4 time signature and being a mere slip of a track by this EP’s standards, coming in at under four minutes.
In Spaces Beyond is accompanied by a promotional video (and a few playthroughs on YouTube, if you’re interested), possibly because it’s the most conventional death metal track in show, with its pummeling drums and its Cannibal Corpse-style trills.
This track also remains largely in 4/4 time. There’s an absolute doozy of a guitar solo in there, with more of that twangy-sounding high bass backing it. It don’t mean a thang if it ain’t got that twang.
Realm of Ichor – Ichor being the stuff sloshing around in the veins of the Godly Greeks instead of mortal blood, apparently – is a 6/8 time snarlalong that alternates between bludgeoning blasts of strings and sticks and more highbrow proggy passages that are still somehow no less intense.
The bass when the vocals kick in brings Cynic’s Veil of Maya to mind. Complexity is very much the order of the day here, such as when the Danny Carey-style polyrhythms start to impose themselves on proceedings towards the end.
It’s a captivating combination of violence and virtuosity, as exemplified by the solo, which sounds to my laymanlike ears like one in the Marty Friedman mould, played out almost plaintively over buzzsaw blasts.
As impressive as all that is, what I appreciate more than anything is the lyrical content. H.P. Lovecraft is perhaps the most obvious influence, with the themes being a continuation of the “cosmic horror” (to quote the EP’s press release) that characterised Archaic Malevolence some nine years ago.
The evidence of this is not least in the use of such “Lovecraftian” words as “gibbous” and “eldritch.” I concede that, in the case of the latter, it might just be that they are big fans of The Sisters of Mercy, and are paying tribute to Andrew.
To the uninitiated, the style might seem instead like a curious blend of Edgar Allan Poe and William McGonagall. There’s a melodrama to it that delights me. Take for example this passage from Astral Divination:
I saw it in the heavens and it hastens all our deaths
Bloated, this thing below me
I saw it in the entrails
God, it’s bringing forth the end
Blighted, we are blinded
Cannot fight this
Age of mankind is done
I imagine Lou Ede delivering these lines with the back of his hand pressed firmly against his forehead. I am almost certainly alone in this. Consider also the following lines from Organic Monolith:
Find me washed up cold & dead
Where the shore is stained in red
Sea it gnaws and pounds my head
Draws me in, drowns me in dread
This passage has the quality of a grisly children’s rhyme, like Oranges and Lemons or Ring-a-Ring-a-Roses.
Lovecraftian horror might not be suitable subject matter for children, but neither are decapitation or The Bubonic Plaque, quite frankly.
The concept of “the doomed somnambulist” as expressed in the lyrics of In Spaces Beyond makes me glad to be someone who struggles to sleep. Then there’s the following lines:
I will fall to my knees
She comes, death in my lungs
Terror, exaltation
She leads me to the old ones cell
For graphic invocations
I’ve been trying to think of a joke about Epstein Island that I could possibly get away with, but I have failed.
Finally, there’s Realm of Ichor, where we are invited to “drown in the blood of the Gods.” That sloshy stuff I mentioned earlier is fatal to mortals, apparently.
There’s an almost Biblical quality to the end times depicted therein, with mention of black and rotten soil and yawning abysses.
There’s also talk of the beckoning void and of everything we know being lost, so they could just be describing the current political situation in the West, to be fair.
Sorry. Got a bit carried away there. Anyway, there’s the EP: 21 minutes of intricate instrumentation and thematic theatricality, ostentatiously overwrought and all the better for it!
To quote HP himself (and I love his sauce, by the way!) “The oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear, and the oldest and strongest kind of fear is fear of the unknown.”
Maybe don’t allow this band’s music to remain unknown to you, despite whatever reservations you might have. It’s possible that you’ll find something in it that really appeals to you. I did!
Metal Lair awards Invicta by Infected Dead four devil horns out of five.
TRACKLISTING
1. Astral Divination
2. Organic Monolith
3. In Spaces Beyond
4. Realm of Ichor
LINE-UP
Lou Ede (vocals)
Chris Rahman (Rhythm Guitars)
Alexander Brown (Rhythm and Lead Guitars)
Luke Fabian (Bass and Backing Vocals)
Scott Lindsay (Drums)
INFECTED DEAD ONLINE
About The Author
Kevin McSweeney is Metal Lair’s resident scribe of the underground, eternally rummaging through the global metal scene for riffs worth your time.
As the guiding hand behind Seven Deadly Songs every Friday, he has an uncanny knack for finding the track you didn’t know you needed, usually before finishing his pint.
Equal parts loyal, kind, and quietly razor-witted, Kevin brings deep knowledge, impeccable taste, and a steady, reliable presence to Metal Lair.
Read More From This Author:
EP Review: Knowing It Shall Wake by Olympus
Album Review: Wildcard by Death Warmed Up
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