Innovative avant-garde trio Imperial Triumphant are back, and once again the sprawling metropolis of New York City provides the backdrop. Showing the opulence, greed and decadence of the rich and shameless as a stark contrast to the grime and squalor of the less privileged is something the band already has down to a fine art but sixth full-length studio release Goldstar (Century Media Records) manages to refine it even further.
Experimental blackened jazz death metal can be a little daunting for more casual listeners so Goldstar slices off any excess fat, most tracks only lasting around five minutes and just one exceeding seven. Maintaining the intensity while reducing the exposure ensures the Imperial experience is not diminished in any way, but merely refined and concentrated into something different and just as challenging.
The nightmare fuel of “Eye of Mars” opens proceedings, frontman Zachary Ezrin generating inhuman guttural roars and scorching riffs while bassist Steve Blanco produces some particularly strange basslines as the song builds towards its apocalyptic finale. “Gomorrah Nouveaux” follows, combining North African Gnawa drums with strident and typically off-kilter melodies.
A paean to classic New York architecture, “Lexington Delirium” features Meshuggah drummer Tomas Haake and opens with distinctly non-Imperial Triumphant country guitar before shapeshifting into slow discordant strumming, frantic riffs and some phenomenal drumming from Kenny Grohowski.
Combining melody with crushing angular atonality, “Hotel Sphinx” includes heavy nods to movie director Stanley Kubrick, the main riff basically a reworking of Henry Purcell‘s “Funeral of Queen Mary” from 1971 film A Clockwork Orange. Featuring a guest appearance from regular contributor Yoshiko Ohara of Bloody Panda “NEWYORKCITY” is a cacophonous forty seconds of grindcore Dadaism while the title track confuses the listener even further by appearing to be a 1950s advertising jingle for cigarettes.
The jarring stop-start of “Rot Moderne” is followed by church bells, traffic, and Brazilian Maracatu on the multi-tentacled insanity of “Pleasuredome.” a track that not only features some of the funkiest of funky basslines and the voice of Tomas Haake but also boasts a performance from former Slayer sticksman Dave Lombardo. “Industry of Misery” closes the record in a suitably baffling style by moving from airy, jazzy chords and piano keys into atonal brutality, distorted non-chords and in-between notes, a very nearly conventional guitar solo, and background voices.
Recorded in just five days, Goldstar is Imperial Triumphant’s most instant and evocative work to date. Bridging the avant-garde to a more conformist sound without compromising their individuality, everything from the virtuoso performances to the hefty production is sublime.
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10 / 10
GARY ALCOCK
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