Tomb Mold - The Enduring Spirit (2023)^{Release ID: 47351}

I really enjoyed Tomb Mold's previous album, 2019's Planetary Clairvoyance. TM have evolved their sound even further since that album, branching out in a more technical and progressive direction, even dabbling with the ever more fashionable sorties into jazz metal territory. Whilst I understand and respect the band's desire to evolve and challenge themselves in both songwriting and technical expertise, it doesn't necessarily mean that I am fully on board with it. I have never made any secret of my lack of enthusiasm for the more technical style of metal and as for jazz, it generally has very little to do with me and is something I tend to keep at arms length. That said, the basis of TM's sound is very much in line with my preference for old-school, cavernous death metal and as such enables me to give them the benefit of the doubt. As I am exposed to repeated runthroughs, The Enduring Spirit is beginning to win me over, using the OSDM sound as a handhold I am finally coming to grips with Tomb Mold's continuing refinement of their direction.

In truth most of the evolution on the album is not as jarring as I first thought and is limited to some technical flourishes in the riffing and overall guitar work with the songwriting moving in a more progressive direction rather than a technical one, the band never going full-on Gorguts, which I am thankful for. Will of Whispers is the track I struggle with the most as the smooth jazz-like tone it employs in places is so at odds with the band's death metal roots and my own personal preferences, especially when the growling vocals are performed over the jazz sections (from around the four-minute mark), that it just sounds "wrong" to my ears. More generally, though, the technicality adds some spice to the riffing and battery that is the band's core sound, the technical aspect of the riffing on Fate's Tangled Thread, for example, gives an extra kick to what is actually already a bit of a killer and the more expansive and adventurous soloing in the latter half of the track is most definitely a cool direction to take it in. Tomb Mold almost seem like what would have happened if Autopsy had followed Death's career trajectory.

I think that for me the major takeaway from The Enduring Spirit is that this is not an album that deserves a rush judgement, it reveals more with every listen and I am definitely thawing to what I think the band is trying to achieve here. Most importantly, it still retains the ability to kick ass, no matter what it's technical or progressive intentions and that will always carry a metal album a long way with me.

When I discovered Tomb Mold back in 2018, it was only the beginning of my discovery of old school death metal. And while I still think that Planetary Clairvoyance is a very good piece of music, it has lot a lot of favour with me in the years since. And you can probably guess at this point as to why that is: 20 Buck Spin. On the laundry lists of albums to drop in the OSDM style out of that record label, a large portion of them are very familiar and don't have nearly enough to separate them. 

However, alongside the recent VoidCeremony album earlier this year, Tomb Mold have gone hard into the progressive songwriting techniques. And this change in style has resulted in The Enduring Spirit, which gives the band a more unique sound, but unfortunately falters in places that have come to be expected in progressive metal in the present.

For Tomb Mold, their cosmic concepts to previous albums has carried over into The Enduring Spirit, and now you can hear the spatial elements, not just in the words, but also the instrumentals themselves. As "Will of Whispers" and "Servants of Possibility" both have clean guitar leads with reverb interspersed amongst the pummeling death metal. I also noticed that Tomb Mold have many more technical passages on display with its heavy use of the blast beat. I figured that these two styles would be at odds with one another and that did turn out to be the case; one moment you're being drifted away by lovely atmospheric passages, only to be bombarded with blast beats, unintelligible lyrics, and blistering guitar solo. 

On its own, this is an issue that persists throughout progressive music; where individual songs feel like two (or more) isolated ideas forced together in order to boost up those song lengths. It does not happen too often on The Enduring Spirit, but it is noticeable, especially on the album closer, "The Enduring Spirit of Calamity". The song begins as any other Tomb Mold song on the album does, before slowing down into a post-metal instrumental with a guitar solo lead instead of a vocal motif. On their own, they don't seem like bad ideas, but when hammered together, they don't feel complimentary. And serving as the albums eleven (11) minute closer kind of feels like a disappointment. Otherwise, the remaining six (6) tracks can be hit or miss, but Tomb Mold show some restraint by not allotting more time to these ideas than they would on previous albums. The record does flow smoothly and Tomb Mold do not feel as if they are running out of gas by the time "The Enduring Sprit of Calamity" arrives.

This change of direction for Tomb Mold comes with its fair share of positives, but also some net negatives as well. While the album is more diverse and unique in comparison to the wide array of OSDM acts I've heard in recent years (most of them on the 20 Buck Spin label), it also has to play into some very tired progressive metal tropes that I am not a fan of to begin with. I can see those who are more familiar with Tomb Mold's older style of death metal really enjoying this, but those looking to approach this from a purely progressive angle might find it more frustrating.

Best Songs: The Perfect Memory (Phantasm of Aura), Will of Whispers, Servants of Possibility, Fate's Tangled Thread