Jupiterian - Protosapien (2020)^{Release ID: 22971}

Jupiterian is a four-piece behemoth that hails from São Paulo, it members going by the initials R, A, V and P. Protosapien is their third album, following three years after the fairly well received Terraforming. This album feels like such an advance from that still decent record that I can't help feeling that the band members must have encountered a black monolith somewhere down there in Brazil during the last three years!

Protosapien begins with a short intro, Homecoming, a dirge-like fanfare that sounds like it is announcing the arrival of a long-sought but dreaded god-king, which in a way it kind of is. The god-king in question takes the form of a sonic alliance between cavernous death doom and oozing, soul-crushing sludge metal that brooks no opposition to it's unholy assault on the ears, forcing all who hear it to bow down in supplication. Despite being a fairly short album of just over 35 minutes, this feels immense. The music doesn't compromise on it's heaviness yet is surprisingly atmospheric in a way that allows the mind's eye to conjure images of shattered landscapes, smoking ruins and immense, dreadful apparitions. The tectonic riffs will literally shake your walls and Thiago Oliveira's guttural vocals will bring them crashing down as they undermine their very foundations. Despite this intrinsic heaviness and the sludge-drenched slow tempo, there is still a memorable and even kind of melodic quality to the tracks - this is no monotonous trudge through to album's end, in fact Voidborne even contains some blasting that wouldn't be out of place on a black metal album.

2020 has been a damn good year for fans of ominous-sounding doom metal with great albums from the likes of Hell's MSW, Temple of Void and Convocation. Protosapien can rightly take it's place alongside those as one of the best doom-related releases of the year.