To take the subject of darkness into consideration is to think about the very fabric that makes up a vast swathe of extreme metal. It’s something that many have sought to imbue their sounds with to varying degrees of success many times over with the decades of material showing us that many can tap into it, but incredibly few are able to truly embody darkness as a concept and beyond. The underground has always been home to bastions of such madness with there occasionally being bands that rise from the nothingness to show us what they’re made of. With their debut EP, Infernalivm does just that to spectacular effect.

While intensity can easily be the name of the game in many instances, there’s nothing that can compare when a band brings that to the table with themes, presence, and intricacy to match the potential madness. That’s something that many aren’t able to bring together even after years of attempting to do so, yet it’s within just four tracks that Infernalivm rises from the writhing flames to show us not just that they can be the ones to defy the odds, but really show us what it means to be devilish in nature without question, compromise, or mercy. A supreme work of maddening death metal that’s as straightforward in its murderous intent as it is winding in its hauntingly dense songwriting, “Conquering the Most High” is high-order blasphemy of a kind we don’t often see from death metal of this ilk with it often times residing in the realms of black metal, but it’s clear from just a few minutes of this absolute monstrosity that this is not death metal uninspired by other genres. Rather, pulling from multiple cauldrons of darkness to make for a wild, swirling mass of pure hate and defilement, “Conquering the Most High” takes on a form that is simply gargantuan in nature and murderous in its intent! It could have been downright effortless for Inferanlivm to make a more straightofrward delivery of what many think of Hell and its many horrors, but here we see an act that seeks to delivery what such a plane of torment can really be. Immeasurably dense and unyielding in its sadistic search for souls drowning in their own blood as the skies darken from their very presence, Infernalivm certainly stands out from the crowd in more ways than one.

There are many different paths that Infernalivm could have chosen for its first EP with there being all sorts of different pitfalls and traps that are to be found by those that cannot properly handle intensity of this particular variety, but it’s through a clear understanding of the material at hand and having an obvious reverence for all things that dwell in the deepest pits of the most fiery of Hells that we get a performance that the underground was truly made for but seldom witness.

“Conquering the Most High” releases on November 29th via Sentient Ruin Laboratories!

LISTEN to an advanced track from “Conquering the Most High” on Bandcamp here.

LIKE Infernalivm on Facebook here.