Netherlands duo Cryptae have returned with a new recording which continues their experimental mixture of black, death and doom metal and this is a review of their 2020 album "Nightmare traversal" which will be released in October by Sentient Ruin Laboratories.
Dark soundscapes start off the album before going into more of a heavier and dissonant musical direction while the vocals also add in a decent amount of guttural death metal growls. When the music speeds up a great amount of blast beats can also be heard along with some distorted sounding melodies also being added into some of the guitar riffing.
Throughout the recording you can also hear a decent mixture of slow, mid paced and fast parts while the music also gets very experimental sounding at times. When tremolo picking is utilized it also brings elements of black metal into the songs along with the slower sections of the songs also showing an influence of doom metal, all of the musical instruments on the recording also have a very powerful sound to them, clean playing can also be heard briefly on the closing track.
On this album Cryptae remains true to the experimental mixture of black, doom and death emtal that they have established on previous releases. The production sounds very dark and lo-fi while the lyrics cover dystopian and horror themes inspired by video games.
In my opinion this is another great sounding recording from Cryptae and if you are a fan of experimental, black, doom and death metal, you should check out this recording. RECOMMENDED TRACKS INCLUDE "Nightmare Traversal" and "Cronos". 8 out of 10.
