In 2013, Irkallian Oracle dropped a bomb on the extreme metal underground's collecive consciousness with 2013's Grave Ekstasis. The record was originally released on cassette by Bolvärk, then summarily inflicted upon a greater audience when Nuclear War Now! Productions reissued it on various formats in 2014. The band remains anonymous, veiled by noms de plume like Transplutonian Afterbirth and Radiating Abyss, but even with such a faceless exterior has struck a serious chord with its brackish, thoroughly uncompromising interpretation of apocalyptic black/death.Now, on the band's second full-length (they consider Grave Ekstasis to be their first, despite the demo status regularly conferred upon it by outside observers), Irkallian Oracle has withdrawn even further into the abyss. Apollyon checks every box an aficionado of this breed of technically advanced death worship might wish for—the oppressive, hypnotic riffs (that occasionally crawl into filthy death/doom territory), buried rasps, primitive drums, droning bass, and sepulchral atmosphere all coalesce into a perfect document of true darkness.Apollyon drops March 31 via Nuclear War Now! Productions, and will be available from the label's webstore (and digitally via Bandcamp). For now, listen to the album in all of its horror below.
Kim Kelly is conjuring the expulsed on Twitter.