#firesinthedistance — Public Fediverse posts

To You, Author of My Fade by Fires in the Distance on Apple Music https://song.link/https://music.apple.com/us/album/to-you-author-of-my-fade/1886727001?i=1886727005
#FiresInTheDistance #Metal #Music #AppleMusic

To You, Author of My Fade by Fires in the Distance on Apple Music https://song.link/https://music.apple.com/us/album/to-you-author-of-my-fade/1886727001?i=1886727005
#FiresInTheDistance #Metal #Music #AppleMusic

To You, Author of My Fade by Fires in the Distance on Apple Music https://song.link/https://music.apple.com/us/album/to-you-author-of-my-fade/1886727001?i=1886727005
#FiresInTheDistance #Metal #Music #AppleMusic

To You, Author of My Fade by Fires in the Distance on Apple Music https://song.link/https://music.apple.com/us/album/to-you-author-of-my-fade/1886727001?i=1886727005
#FiresInTheDistance #Metal #Music #AppleMusic

To You, Author of My Fade by Fires in the Distance on Apple Music https://song.link/https://music.apple.com/us/album/to-you-author-of-my-fade/1886727001?i=1886727005
#FiresInTheDistance #Metal #Music #AppleMusic

For a band you’ve most likely not heard of before, Shabti sports a remarkably intriguing pedigree (at least for my tastes). You see, Shabti is comprised of members from Falls of Rauros, Obsidian Tongue, Fires in the Distance, and even live Panopticon performers. These aforementioned names will likely ignite the interest of fellow atmo-black lovers as they did to me. Instead, annihilate those puny expectations, for Shabti is actually an amalgamation of proggy, techy, blackened death, much to my surprise. Surprise, but not chagrin – the pre-release single “Rise of the Shabti” got me sufficiently excited, and I trust the weathered musicians of Shabti to deliver something great on the enigmatically titled Haze, Cacophony, and White Light.

Shabti wastes no time playing their hand, coming out the gates of “Ambrosia and Lambs Blood” sprinting at full speed. It’s immediately clear that Haze, Cacophony, and White Light leans eagerly into its prog aspects, often reminding me of Neuraxis in a way I genuinely struggle to justify. Riffs barrel on by, connected by endless, labyrinthine little guitar and drum fills. Shabti likes to teeter their music right on the edge of weird, with slippery compositions and a flirtatious attitude towards dissonance, though I’d say it never quite takes the full plunge. Furthermore, the album just sounds excellent; the performances are snappy all across the board, and the sound mixing is crisp and clear. I particularly enjoy the sound of the guitars; they have a swinging weight heard especially well in the riffs of “Rise of the Shabti.” By all measures, the sonic ingredients of a good album are here.

Sadly, it never quite comes together into a memorable, exciting album. The song structure is loose in a way that there’s never really a satisfying build or climax, and few riffs ever stand out in my memory for longer than a song’s duration. Outside of the noteworthy, pleasant gallop in the latter half of “Blood for a Blessing,” if you threw me anywhere between the opening “Ambrosia and Lambs Blood” and “Haze, Cacophony, and White Light,” I don’t think I could identify which song it was. The funny thing is that very little stands out as actually bad; it’s just that nothing ever quite coalesces. In a vacuum, I can appreciate the guitar work in “Ambrosia and Lambs Blood,” and I appreciate the harmonic play that closes the title track, but there ever remains little identifiable direction or momentum. Well, in that regard it’s worth mentioning the nearly 10-minute “A Weary Creation”; it’s notably more structured and loops back into its earlier ideas, but there’s not enough strong material to justify the runtime, and the song approaches being unpleasant.

Still, there are some exceptions. The penultimate “Sojourner” is pretty solid, with some stronger melodic focus, and the closer “Rise of the Shabti” is easily the album’s best. It employs refreshingly chunky riff-work without sacrificing the structural weirdness, and is always the song I’m most excited for. I’ll remind you that “Rise of the Shabti” is what got me so excited for the album in the first place, and I do wish Shabti leaned just a little more in that direction for their next album. The strong final stretch ensures the album never ends on a truly sour note, and to the album’s credit, Haze, Cacophony, and White Light clocks in at just around a clean 40 minutes.

Haze, Cacophony, and White Light is complex, undeniably so. But even as the winding path the album takes became clear across my usual slew of endless replays, the album refused to click. It’s eccentric enough to avoid actual boredom, but too aimless to inspire excitement. It’s clear that there’s a ton of solid ideas behind Shabti that work well enough in a vacuum, but just never quite seem to congeal together in the right way. Nevertheless, Shabti are no hacks, and if my words have made you curious, then I do encourage you to check it out at least.

Rating: 2.5/5.0
DR: 8 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps
Label: Contemn Light
Websites: facebook | bandcamp
Releases Worldwide: August 21st, 2026

Blind Equation – A Funeral in Purgatory Review

By Kenstrosity

When I reach for something blindly, I hope for the best. As it pertains to the acquisition of promo, I calculate my chances of enjoying whatever I select as little as possible. Impulse reigns supreme, instinct takes precedence, gut feelings have the final say. This process ultimately led me to Chicago, Illinois’ Blind Equation. Originally launched as a chiptune-heavy cybergrind project, mastermind and main songwriter James McHenry steadily integrated other influences that distinguish this material from that of the greater subset. With A Funeral in Purgatory, written in the midst of great anguish and struggle on McHenry’s side, Blind Equation create their heaviest, most brutal, and yet most vulnerable and earnest work to date.

Resembling acts like DEATHTRIPPA, Blind Equation’s current iteration diversifies its palette with elements of goth and emo, death and doom, synthwave, and melodic black metal. To these ears, those attributes recall everything from AFI, Fires in the Distance, Silhouette, Gunship, and Labyrinthus Stellarum. Depressive tones and desperate wails reminiscent of Ghost Bath or Acathexis also meld beautifully with a hopeful atmospheric counterpoint—a reflection of McHenry’s use of songwriting as a mechanism for catharsis and healing during his darkest moments during A Funeral in Purgatory’s development. Brutal outbursts reminiscent of Anaal Nathrakh or Igorrr, and the occasional deathcore gravity blast, provide an additional dynamic that brings immense metallic heft to an affair that, to my knowledge, doesn’t utilize a single guitar. Unified, these myriad characteristics coalesce into something stylistically unique, instrumentally fascinating, and emotionally compelling.

More importantly, A Funeral in Purgatory is an absolute joy to experience. With contrasting numbers as divergent as my personal favorites, the blisteringly fast and exuberant “Flashback (ft. Strawberry Hospital)” and beautiful death doom closer “Incomplete,” you might expect A Funeral in Purgatory to be disjointed and haphazard. But the opposite is true. Blind Equation’s masterful, meticulous detailing brings unity and adhesion to the record, such that when I hear the eviscerating brutality of “… in Purgatory” juxtaposed against the vibrant gallop of “Flashback,” or the goth-soaked “Nothing” against the metalcore-breakcore mashup “it feels like the end (ft. JOHNNASCUS),” it feels natural and invigorating. An increased presence of slower, more dramatic passages in “A Funeral… ” and “Relinquished Dreams” allows Blind Equation’s heart-wrenching roars and introspective tones to shine through as the brilliant light of higher-pitched synths and chips fade, enhancing what are already compelling songs by creating deeper valleys and taller peaks. Ultimately, this approach to songwriting permitted me very little opportunity to correctly predict what happened next, while still capturing my attention so completely that with each new song I was ready, almost desperate, for the next twist to whip me into another dimension.

However, not all dimensions are created equal, and there are a couple here that don’t quite reach the same echelon as Blind Equation’s best. First and foremost are the interludes, “⁺‧₊˚ ཐི⋆✟⋆ཋྀ ˚₊‧⁺” and “still.” Musically, they are pretty and offer plenty of emotion, but don’t add enough to the storytelling to feel essential to the overall experience. I could argue the former brings novelty to the split title tracks “A Funeral… ” and “… in Purgatory,” but the requisite connective tissue is flimsy all the same. In a similar manner, “mourn” is somewhat lackluster compared to its album mates. This could be an unfortunate circumstance brought about by its barebones instrumentation, which is a stark departure from everything presented over the previous seven tracks. It could also be that its core ideas feel a touch underdeveloped by comparison. Either way, it represents one of A Funeral in Purgatory’s minor weak points. While in no way a detractor on their own merit, Blind Equation’s AFI-esque clean vocals, which only feature in the first three tracks, would bring even greater cohesion to the whole if they featured more consistently throughout.

It goes without saying that I didn’t expect what Blind Equation delivered, nor did I expect to like it this much. At the same time, I really shouldn’t be surprised at all, considering nearly all of my favorite records this year have been wild and unorthodox. A Funeral in Purgatory represents another entry in that varied category, of which there is no doubt. But it’s also one of the most fun and engaging electronic music releases I’ve encountered this year. So if you don’t mind your metal chipped to oblivion, laced with ecstasy, dressed in all black, with a raven perched on its shoulder, then A Funeral in Purgatory might just be your poison.

Rating: Very Good!
DR: 8 | Format Reviewed: 256 kbps mp3
Label: Prosthetic Records
Websites: blindequation.bandcamp.com/album | facebook.com/blindequation
Releases Worldwide: July 18th, 2025

#2025 #35 #AFuneralInPurgatory #AFI #AmericanMetal #AnaalNathrakh #BlindEquation #Breakcore #Chiptune #Cybergrind #DeathMetal #DEATHTRIPPA #DoomMetal #DrumAndBass #ElectronicMetal #FiresInTheDistance #GothicMetal #Grind #Grindcore #Gunship #Igorrr #JOHNNASCUS #Jul25 #LabyrinthusStellarum #MelodicBlackMetal #Metalcore #ProstheticRecords #Review #Reviews #Silhouette #StrawberryHospital