THE BLACK DAHLIA MURDER — Nightbringers (review)

THE BLACK DAHLIA MURDER — Nightbringers album cover

Album · 2017 · Melodic Death Metal

4/5 · 2022-09-10
UMUR

"Nightbringers" is the 8th full-length studio album by US death metal act The Black Dahlia Murder. The album was released through Metal Blade Records in October 2017. It´s the successor to "Abysmal" from 2015. There´s been one lineup change since the predecessor as guitarist Ryan Knight has been replaced by Brandon Ellis. The regular edition of the album features 9 tracks and a playing time of 33:12 minutes, while the limited edition features no less than 5 bonus tracks (among them covers of "This Mortal Coil" by Carcass and "The Swarm" by At The Gates and a full playing time of 49:13 minutes.

It´s no coincidence that The Black Dahlia Murder have chosen to cover the above mentioned artists, as both are obvious influences on the band´s music. When that is said, the original material on "Nightbringers" sound unmistakably like The Black Dahlia Murder. Predominantly fast-paced melodic death metal with horror lyric themes, loads of guitar harmonies, neo-classical inspired guitar solos, a tight and energetic rhythm section driving the music forward in a powerful almost frantic manner, and Trevor Strnad in front, delivering his trademark high pitched screaming vocals, and occasionally deeper death growls. The band work a little more in heavy mid-paced territory these days compared to the early releases, but it´s details, and The Black Dahlia Murder still sound very much like they´ve sounded since day one.

Consistency in quality is always a good thing, and you can put a huge check mark behind that when listening to "Nightbringers" which as a high quality release through and through. I´ve said it before though and I´ll say it again about a The Black Dahlia Murder album, and that is that "Nightbringers" sound a lot like almost any other release by the band, and a little more variation and development of the band´s sound is called for at this point in their career. Releasing what is basically the same album over and over again in a slightly different format, is bound to alienate fans at some point. On the other hand a similar approach worked for Motörhead for several decades, so maybe The Black Dahlia Murder will prove me wrong. The fact that they´ve survived on the scene this long and now release their 8th full-length album almost already do.

"Nightbringers" features a powerful, detailed, and very well sounding production job, and the musicianship is on a high level on all posts. The material are well written, although as always it´s a bit hard to pick highlights. I´ll mention "Kings of the Nightworld" as the most standout track on the album though, as that track is an example of the band trying something a bit different and fully succeeding in doing so. Upon conclusion "Nightbringers" is yet another high quality release in a now long line of high quality releases by The Black Dahlia Murder and a 4 star (80%) rating is fully deserved, despite my reservations regarding variation and development between the band´s releases.