QRIXKUOR — Three Devils Dance (review)

QRIXKUOR — Three Devils Dance album cover

EP · 2016 · Death Metal

4.5/5 · 2017-01-01
siLLy puPPy

At long last a secret is revealed. The one i speak of is that which conjures up the perfect soundtrack for a demoniacal betrothal or a Satanic soiree for those sentenced to infinity in Gehenna and Tartarus consequently furloughed for a brief respite from their eternal condemnation if only for a fleeting moment in the vast oceans of time. THREE DEVILS DANCE is the debut release by the London based QRIXKUOR which takes its name from the fictional bird that appears in Kenneth Grant’s novel “Against The Light,” a novel so bizarre and ambiguous that it blurs the lines between light and darkness, evokes the inner magus fantasies of Aleister Crowley and utterly challenges the perceptions of reality itself. And such is the bizarre world of QRIXKUOR that finds a way to summon THREE independent oppositional DEVILS and make them DANCE like no other band rooted in the vast world that death metal has achieved before which successfully blurs the lines of hitherto individual strains of the metal world and consummates their essences into one. Those THREE DEVILS being tech death, funeral doom and dark ambient.

In spite of the fact that THREE DEVILS DANCE is classified as an EP, it nevertheless clocks in at a fairly standard full-length album time of 38 minutes and 22 seconds but considering this is half running time of many modern day CDs, it could simply portend the intent of extremely long full-length albums to come. I hope this is not the case for i find this intense session of only three tracks to be a taxing, emotionally draining and a true chore to be taken in, but i mean that, of course, in a very good way as there is really not a lot that i can compare the sound of QRIXKUOR to directly. Upon the first listen it is apparent that these four guys who simply go by single letters: R (bass), A (guitar, vocals), M (drums), S (guitar) have taken the 21st developments of ever increasing intellectual content and imbued it with larger than life (or perhaps death) technicalities and thus infuses the listener with a heightened sense of multi-dimensional horror that permeates the astral and physical worlds alike.

The true sensation involved with THREE DEVILS DANCE is not that any of the elements are particularly new but rather in how they are combined together to create a more heightened type of effect. As far as the brutal metal aspects are concerned, QRIXKUOR takes the template of blackened war metal bands such as Blasphemy and Teitanblood in terms of sheer intensity but have obviously taken a clue from bands such as Grave Miasma and Portal with their incessantly perverse dissonant death metal riffage and adds layers of hazy distortion where the guitars and bass reverberate into the oblivion of metal miscellany. The production and tuned down parts that sluggishly churn along evoke the chilling dirges of the funeral doom universe and incorporates the nail-biting dread that is ubiquitously distributed throughout Esoteric albums for example. While the death metal frenzies are the basis of the underlying sound of QRIXKHOR, it is the dark ambient intros that utilize top-of-the-line production values to contrast sharply with the heavily down-tuned distortionfest that pummels the senses. QRIXKHOR diligently engages in creating frightful and intimidating atmospheres before they sally forth full steam ahead into the battlefields of brutality and drifting dirges.

The three tracks that compose THREE DEVILS DANCE are complex creations that effectively chill the senses with atmospheric trepidation and lambasting blastbeats laced with technical stringed dissonance that all collude to create an otherworldly effect. Hellish vocals, screeching guitars and disciplined tech death workouts conspire to make this one of my top picks of extreme metal releases for the year as it worships the cults of tenebrosity and complexity. This is only the debut release (barring two demos) from QRIXKUOR so it will be very exciting indeed to hear how they develop their already mature formulation beyond the Portal meets Mitochondrion meets Esoteric debut. The beauty in THREE DEVILS DANCE is not that QRIXKUOR has unleashed any of these elements from the crypts from whence they came but rather in how they incorporate these disparate forces into a clearer vision and harmonizes them into a product unlike any other. I am great hope that greater things are to come.