Auditory Labyrinth

The Pitch:  Technical, progressive death metal band, Ingurgitating Oblivion design an "auditory labyrinth" with their third album via Willowtip.  FFO Deathspell Omega, Gorguts, Ulcerate. 

What I Like: Time to get technical again, ya'll.  A little preface: the reason I tend to prefer artists like Coma Cluster Void over Gorguts is that I feel the former has a strong handle on how to unite insane musicianship with an otherwise palatable listening experience while the latter is interested in freeform expression above all else.  Ingurgitating Oblivion falls into the former group, which I find to be infinitely more impressive.  Playing at this caliber is no easy feat to begin with, but I think it's much more difficult to marry chaos with enjoyability than to simply explore chaos.  Vision Wallows In Symphonies Of Light is a very impressive study in what happens when disorder creates order: a death metal Big Bang, if you will.  While the drumming and guitars are absolutley maniacal, and the growls vicious and unforgiving, all of this comes together to create a highly engaging and cohesive experience.  And all of this despite the lengthy runtimes.  This is precisely what I mean about justifying song length.

What I Don't Like: There are some more experimental parts later in the album that could have used a little more of the structure of the first half, but they still contribute to the overall concept and don't bore me like others have in the past.

The Verdict: This is an amazingly talented group of people who know their instruments inside and out, but also understand the complex nature of songwriting.  To put it scientifically, being an amazing guitar player or drummer is necessary to creating music of this caliber, but not sufficient.  Ingurgitating Oblivion understand that one must consider the greater sum of the parts.  2017 just keeps getting better and better.

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