Review by UnhinderedbyTalent for Lykathea Aflame - Elvenefris (2000)

This album might just be one of the best death metal albums ever written.  To say that it is a varied and challenging piece of technical, brutal and progressive death metal is perhaps an understatement of gargantuan proportions.  There's no half measures here, if you're going to listen to Elvenefris you're gonna need to give it your absolute attention, otherwise you are going to end up lost as it undulates and surges through over an hour of some of the most well constructed death ever put to record.

Astonishingly, this was the band's only output.  Since Elvenefris the band have been in an unknown state, occasionally surfacing with the promise of new material but never quite getting around to delivering.  Perhaps they are still recovering from making this record?

The band were (are?) a collection of largely unknown artists at the point of the release of this record in 2000.  Their time as Appalling Spawn saw them make one album in 1998, but after some line up changes they became Lykathea Aflame (although rumour has it they are now known as just Lykathé.  Since Elvenefris only drummer Tomáš Corn has worked outside of the group turning up in epic Black Metallers, Cult of Fire.  His performance on this record is notable for its technicality and sheer speed alone.  He almost reaches Mounier like proportions of bashing at times although his drums do sound somewhat tinny in places on the record.  Despite this he is key to driving forward the machine that is Elvenefris over eleven tracks of intricate and arcane music that never stops being entertaining.

The vocals are of the brutal and guttural variety.  Ptoe also brings the odd clean/spoken word vocal in throughout the record and this shows his versatility in creating mystery as well as bestial utterances.  There is also sensible use of keyboards here to boost the atmosphere and create the varied textures of the record.  The band made good use of Ptoe's brother and also Pavel Marcel as session artists to build these atmospheres into the robust structures already being built by the band.

The real triumph on the album though for me is the guitars.  Able to comfortably work with a variety of styles, Ptoe and Martínek combine superbly to make their work the crowning glory of the whole record.  Applying a deft touch where required and just as easily ramping up the raging riffs for the more brutal death metal parts, they show an aptitude for not just metal music but world music also - check out the far eastern sounding passages that are littered throughout the record - that adds real depth to the record.

The album never goes avant-garde like a Dan Swanö record would do, retaining death metal as its core sound throughout and for this reason always feels familiar despite its variety and diversity.