Despite being an active band for a decade, New Zealanders Exordium Mors are just now getting around to releasing a full length album. On the surface, it would appear that they took ten years to arrive at nothing more than a huge heap of black/thrash apery. The Apotheosis of Death does, after all, sport decent quantities of Destroyer 666, Absu, and Aura Noir influence, making such impressions of no-more-than-mimicry understandable. But dig a bit deeper, and certain characteristics begin to set the band apart. Notably, an admirable if not always perfectly executed scope, and a whirling dervish of relentless hot messery in the combination of production and instrumentation.
The scope comes in the form of the six-track “Apotheosis of Death” suite that kicks things off. “Axiom” gives off a touch of an “overture” feel, hinting at that epicness while delivering oodles of razor-edged, cyclical tremolo parts and even shades of neo-classicism. Each song in the suite works well on its own, but the sum is greater than the parts, as key passages such as the Middle Eastern melodies finishing “The Purging Storm of Chaos Unfurls” help to glue it all together.
The suite spends ample time showing off the Exordium Mors toolkit. Hayden Hades’ tireless, staccato-snare-happy, and masterful drumming is a major highlight, worthy of Proscriptor himself. On the riff side, rhythm work is often death metal in its stop-start tendencies but blackened in its chill, while at their best the swarming tremolo harmonies call to mind Nightbringer. Add in a dry, squeezed production that is admittedly a mixed bag at times, and the cacophony is complete.
More importantly than the elements, however, is the tendency for things to always be in motion, as exemplified by non-suite track “Abandon All Hope.” It gradually introduces its ideas through calculated transitions, eventually arriving at a wildly fun thrash passage, which then slightly changes itself under one of the album’s very purposeful solo sections. Plus, when vocalist Scourge Witchfucker (validity of this name was unclear at press time) trades in his maniacal rasps for some deeper growls, it really ups the fun factor.
Not everything about The Apotheosis of Death is summertime good feelings, however. This kind of onslaught can be exhausting, and by the time the lengthy “Blade of Brutus” is exhaling its death breaths, the listener may have grown a bit tired of the proceedings. The placement of an outro track after this thusly just feels frivolous. (Side note: the death growl introduction of “Et tu, Brutus” for that song is quite funny in its minor misquote. What is that, Latinglish?)
Small gripes aside, Exordium Mors has delivered a fun, riff-happy, drum-splattered heap of black/thrash that should please the ears of the style’s biggest fans. More than that, the signs of epic ambition evident throughout The Apotheosis of Death means that it should appeal to some of the listeners who have grown tired of the world’s 4,958 D666 clones. We likely haven’t heard the last from these guys, nor the best.
