Album Review: Stortregn – Impermanence (The Artisan Era)

Active since 2006, the Geneva-Switzerland-based act Stortregn has released four albums and an EP to date which has garnered worldwide praise. Now, Stortregn will release their fifth full-length, Impermanence on March 12th 2021 via The Artisan Era.

Stortregn comments:

With a downpour of eight cosmic tracks, crafted with stellar riffs, thundering blast beats, and violence, we are ready to unleash our 5th studio album “Impermanence” onto the world! We’ve put our souls into this craft, exploring a wide range of musical influences and themes, all interconnected to create a paradigm of epicness. With this album, we managed to merge the contemporary tech-death sound and ideas with our older influences. “Impermanence” isn’t just a new studio album: it’s a face-melting sonic eruption! The storm is coming, you have been warned…

An extreme metal album with cosmic intentions, Stortregn draws heavily from the well of tech-death. However, it’s a more extreme listen with touches of blackened noise to add a richer and less complex sound. Oh, it’s still brimming with wild technicalities but it’s less showy and more focused. Though, when they let rip, it’s akin to a serrated knife being run over bone.

Ferocious and destructive, the harshness of the percussion and scathing vocals are complimented by a constant wild flurry of guitars. A battling bout of viciousness versus rhythmic metal grooves and ballsy bursts of no-nonsense heaviness. It creates a bloodthirst where all you want to see are the fighting elements tear each other part in a sickeningly gory way.

That’s if the initial shot into the stratosphere hasn’t let you adrift. Something quite likely as the tether that holds, the brutality, is stretched and stretched. Not quite to breaking point but enough that it starts to feel a bit looser as things go on.

With next to no let-up throughout (aside from tempo shifts and occasional touches of melody), it is a mind-melting listen. Leaving things in a tender and bruised state. It is bloody enjoyable though.

Stortregn – Impermanence Full Track Listing:

1. Ghosts of the Past
2. Moon, Sun, Stars
3. Cosmos Eater
4. Impermanence
5. Grand Nexion Abyss
6. Multilayered Chaos
7. Timeless Splendor
8. Nénie

Links

Bandcamp | Merch | Website | Facebook | The Artisan Era