It was safe to say that nobody knew what to expect in anticipation of the third full-length album from Denver’s Blood Incantation. Despite forming in 2011, Blood Incantation first broke onto the scene in 2016 with their first full-length release Starspawn. Their thick, heavy, raw, and space-age style sound and lyrics made them a strong death metal band with an edge that made them unique and appealing to their listeners. They continued pushing the envelope with their second full-length album, 2019’s Hidden History of the Human Race, by diving deeper into their sci-fi and alien theme, introducing more synthesizers and sound samples with their usual distorted and heavy death-metal style.

In anticipation of Blood Incantation’s third full-length release, 2022’s Timewave Zero, fans were expecting more hard-hitting, edgy, brutal, alien death metal only to be met with just over an hour of ambient psychedelic synth-based instrumental music. No drums, bass, heavy guitars, or guttural vocals to be heard. This was not what fans expected, some fearing that Blood Incantation had permanently switched to this niche synth music. It was safe to say that after Timewave Zero, nobody knew what to expect from their fourth full-length album, released this past October. 

Although they did return to a more death metal central sound, Absolute Elsewhere further demonstrated Blood Incantation’s ability to grow and progress as a band album by album. Elsewhere is an album full of all the best parts of death metal: heavily distorted guitars, booming bass, blast beat double kick drum fills, and low guttural vocals; but it is also filled with ambient synthesizers and melodic guitar solos in sections of songs which sound as though they could have been sampled from a 70’s Pink Floyd track. Now you would think that blending brutal, progressive death metal and ambient, melodic synthesizer music would be hard but it seems that Blood Incantation has a unique ability. Every section of every song blends and compliments each other seamlessly and paints the picture of a cosmic journey. Listening to this album isn’t something that can be done in the background—it should be treated like watching a movie. The flow from chugging guitars, to spacey synthesizers, to bluesy solos all come together to paint a greater intergalactic picture, a story that spans over millennia. Blood Incantation’s out-of-the-box style, lyrically and musically within the death metal genre, makes them one of the household names in modern metal.

But I am not the only one who has praised Blood Incantation and Absolute Elsewhere. This album has been making waves all throughout the metal community. Not only is it demonstrating how outside-the-box death metal can be successful in a genre full of bands trying to sound like they’re from the nineties, but is demonstrates how fans of metal (who are generally seen as not being fond of change) can really enjoy something new and exciting when it’s done well. After Absolute Elsewhere was released, Blood Incantation hit the Billboard charts. They were No. 59 in the Billboard Artist 100 chart, No. 11 in Top Album Sales, and No. 4 in Indie Album Sales.  Absolute Elsewhere has been crowned as the metal album of the year by Metal Hammer and Metal Injection, two of the biggest rock and metal newsfeed outlets that exist. The praise and attention Absolute Elsewhere has brought Blood Incantation will make it a historical album in death metal and will help to cement Blood Incantation’s place in death metal history.