Rivers Of Nihil - The Conscious Seed Of Light (Album Review)

 

Album Type : Full Length

Date Released : 15/10/2013

Label : Metal Blade Records

The Conscious Seed Of Light, track listing :

01. Terrestria I: Thaw
02. Rain Eater
03. Birth of the Omnisavior
04. Soil & Seed
05. Central Antheneum
06. Mechanical Trees
07. Place of Serpents
08. Human Adaptation
09. A Fertile Altar
10. Airless

Bio : 

 

Formed in 2009 in Reading, Pennsylvania, RIVERS OF NIHIL took shape after Jake Dieffenbach (vocals), Ron Nelson (drums), and Jon Kunz (guitars) got together to create a band to push the boundaries of death metal. Formed out of the ashes of their previous band, Jake, Ron, and Jon played their first show as a three piece, but soon after the band recruited Adam Biggs (bass/vocals) and Brody Uttley (guitars) who had both recently exited their own band. RIVERS OF NIHIL went on to self-release two EPs—2010’s Hierarchy and 2011’s Temporality Unbound—played several shows, and toured throughout the East Coast and Midwest including stops at Midwest Fuckfest with Dying Fetus, Misery Index and Arsis, and Akron Deathfest with Complete Failure. RIVERS OF NIHIL continued to tour in support of their EPs, sharing the stage with Suffocation, The Faceless, Despised Icon, Revocation, Beneath the Massacre, Dysrhythmia, Decapitated, Six Feet Under, and Decrepit Birth, logging over 50 dates in the US alone. Enter the summer of 2012; RIVERS OF NIHIL and Metal Blade Records began talks, and in September of that year the band was officially signed to the label

The Band :

Jake Dieffenbach | Vocals

Ron Nelson | Drums
Jon Kunz | Guitars
Adam Biggs | Bass, Vocals
Brody Uttley | Guitars

Review :

There’s a kind of heaviness which makes your ears ring. There’s a kind of heaviness which makes your head bang. Then there’s Rivers of Nihil. They’re the kind of heaviness that tears your head clean off your shoulders. Yeah. That kind of heavy. Recently signed to Metal Blade, there’s been a fair deal of hype about their debut release, ‘The Conscious Seed of Light’, and let me tell you something for free: it lives up to that hype. Then tears hype’s head off, jams a speaker down its neck and turns hype into a blood-drenched gramophone horn. Winter may be here, but death metal music is still red-hot, folks.

For starters, this album is seven-stringed destruction of the highest order- strafing riffs and armour-piercing solos punch bloody holes through your eardrums, allowing Jake Dieffenbach’s mighty guttural roars to pierce straight through your brain. There’s seriously some magnificent death on offer here- fans of Messhugah, Thy Art Is Murder and Divine Heresy are going to find themselves falling in love with this diabolical band. Tracks like ‘Birth of the Omnisavior’ and ‘Mechanical Trees’ are just too maniacal to overlook. ‘Mechanical Trees’ is a particular highlight track for me: boisterous, oozing with black energy, it’s less a song, more a geyser of death metal, bursting forth with explosive sound and power. It’s that kind of HOLY FUCKING HELL metal that makes you feel good to be alive.

That’s not to say those are solely the tracks you should listen to. Oh my no- take the whole album, listen to it all. Then reattach your head back onto your neck, and tell me that experience wasn’t worth it. I mean, album opener ‘Rain Eater’ gives you all you could ever want in a death metal anthem: Ron Nelson pounds those drums to a wooden pulp, Brody Uttley and Jon Kunz shred guitar strings to splinters and Adam Biggs mauls his bass into howling submission. The twin guitar attack Rivers of Nihil have is none more surgical than on this fine offering- every note is struck with deadly motive, making for a dangerously brilliant track. And remember, there are eight other songs proceeding it which have just as much ferocity and technical prowess. My, Rivers of Nihil, you really do spoil us.

This quintet from Reading, Pennsylvania have made something special here. High-octane, take-no-prisoners death metal, with searing vocals and wicked, barbed guitar work, ‘The Conscious Seed of Light’ is an album that deserves to become a classic. If it’s brutal you’re after, walk on up to the Rivers of Nihil and dive into their dark depths. It’ll be the wildest sonic swim you’ll take this year.

Words by : Chris Markwell

You can get it here

For more information :

https://www.facebook.com/riversofnihil

http://riversofnihilpa.bandcamp.com/