New music from Hadal Maw brings anticipation and trepidation into your orbit – Oblique Order.

The band came together about ten years ago in Melbourne, Australia. Their music is a savage blend of technical death metal with strong dissonant elements. They have released two full-length albums, Senium (2014) and Olm (2017), and most recently the EP Charlatan in 2018. The newest album, Oblique Order, is set to come out on the last gasp of 2021 and delivers four breathtakingly immersive songs.

“Fetishize Consumption” has a discordant, sore opening followed by ravaging vocals and percussion. The soaring eeriness of the quieter harmony lines is disturbing in the context of the other musical elements and serves to set you on edge and start you tipping. The intention of the song couldn’t be clearer.

“Oblique Order” is a ticking bomb with a monstrous bass line and hissing, endangering vocals. Fear is leveraged with certainty and intentional chaos to create an overwhelming aural experience. “Future Eaters” syncopates its way into your brainstem with limber tendrils where it grows into an immovable entity with dubious but undeniable efficaciousness. Jerk your head all you want and still it sticks.

“Vile Veneration” courses the home stretch, and it is the strangest of the lot in my estimation. The imbalance it provokes is formidable. The sound is built in towering sheets and released in waves that surround and penetrate. There is a light repast at one point but it serves to further impress the feeling of inevitability rather than offer any respite. This music is some of the most resounding death metal I have heard this year. Recommended.

Oblique Order is out on New Year’s Eve through Blighttown Records on CD, vinyl, and digital.

Links.

Website, https://www.hadalmaw.com/

Bandcamp, https://hadalmaw.bandcamp.com/

Facebook, https://www.facebook.com/hadalmaw

Blighttown Records, https://www.blighttownrecords.com/