Album Review – Impending Death by Obliterate (Unique Leader Records)

Canadian deathcore metallers, Obliterate, have released their latest album called Impending Death. When you are called Obliterate and your album, Impending Death, you kind of know what to expect and you would be right.

Obliterate have been releasing small chunks of music steadily since their formation in 2010. Impending Death is only their second full length studio album. Their debut, pleasantly titled The Filth of Humanity was released in 2012 and was followed by a self titled EP in 2014. There were a few singles dropped too, in 2013 and 2015 before this latest release, Impending Death.

Obliterate are a five piece and are all original members from 2010 still in 2018 which is nice, and rare, to see. On vocals we have Rémi Provencher with guitars in the hands of Marcus Adam and Hubert Therrien. The bass is looked after by Pier-Luc Tardif and the drums sit with Pat Woods. Lyrically, the band are said to focus on murder, hate, anti-government and anti-religion.

Impending Death was released on the 18th of May via Unique Leader Records and is a brief 8 tracks or 29 minutes of music. We open up straight away with the title track and the growing sound of an impending storm. When the music kicks in, I am pleasantly surprised to see that there is a ton of rhythm to it. Groove laden drums and bass lines mixed with a chunky riff but with a higher guitar tone in the mix too. The vocals are low toned, brutal and vicious though mix up to a higher screamed style in places. The song is riff heavy and a really strong opener.

A lot of Impending Death is like this actually. Built predominantly around crushing but clever riffs and big blasting drums. Aneurysm has a strong intro with drums and guitars taking turns before settling into a head banging rhythm. It is a really heavy but catchy track and there are moments of glorious guitar melody backing the fury and fire. In Devil’s Care carries on that glorious melodic, but heavy guitar tone by bringing it to the forefront and building a viciously aggressive track around it. Multi toned vocals and crunching blast beats are sure to leave your neck sore.

I, Cerberus has a really exciting riff at the start mixing the deep bass and drum sound off against a high toned lead guitar before the track descends into 3 minutes of punishing brutality. Numbers switches things up by starting with a gentle, but sombre, ringing guitar melody. It builds gently until a thunderous explosion of drums pierces the mood and throws down chaos. The riff keeps a certain groove amongst the ferocity to keep pits swirling and heads nodding. Other switches in style come through in songs like Hellhole which is an instrumental. It is mainly a drawn out high pitch guitar solo but near its end, crashes of drums permeate the melody.

The album closer, Reconquered is a fantastic song and a powerful message to put at the end of an album. One that is sure to have fans, new and old, clamouring for more. A fast twiddling solo kicks us off before a deathly roar introduces the darkness. What follows is a crushing verse or two that are as brutal as anything else on the album. Just when it feels like it has to stop, the guitar solo come sin and uplifts everything with another melody. There is a slow down in the middle with some of the darkest vocals I have heard in a while before it builds back up into out and out force through to fading out at the end.

Impending Death is a damn good album. I was expecting an album full of force and ferocity and you do get that. It just isn’t only that. There are exceptional guitar melodies, intense drum patterns and multi toned roared vocals. It is the powerful, groove laden riffs that stick out for me though. It will be a tough ask to find many better deathcore albums than this coming out this year. A must listen!

Impending Death is available now at all the usual streaming services like Apple Music and Spotify. You can also pick up a copy from Unique Leader here or from the Amazon links below. Finally, you can grab some of Obliterate’s previous releases from their Bandcamp page here. Find out more on the band by visiting and following their Bandcamp page, Facebook or Twitter.

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