Photo by Melissa Petisa
Over the course of their first two albums, Cosmovore and Providence, ULTHAR carved out a unique niche on the spectrum of underground metal, forging a grotesquely elegant hybrid of technical death metal alchemy and black metal’s stinging blizzard winds, all with the acerbic color of the absurdist’s brush. Nearly three years on from Providence, a burst of deadly creativity has resulted in TWO new albums, to be released simultaneously on February 17th via 20 Buck Spin.
Anthronomicon embodies the continued progression of ULTHAR’s mastery over its art – always evolving, refining, and pushing forward. From the opening blasts and twisting mania of “Cephalophore,”” ULTHAR baffles with angular warped riffage, dipping in and out of various dimensional spheres. Off-kilter, multi-directional turns veer swiftly and violently as though about to come apart at the seams only to reshape again and again into ever more monumental forms. Each of Anthronomicon’s eight tracks represent a fractious piece of a larger puzzle, each a maze unto itself that when taken together allows one to traverse this inverted surrealist conundrum.
Where its sister album Anthronomicon presents an eight-piece puzzle of labyrinthine tumult, Helionomicon takes those elements and creates two towering twenty-minute monoliths of radiant avant-garde immensity. Each track, appropriately titled “Helionomicon” and “Anthronomicon,” transports the listener on a vast journey of psycho-cerebral spectacle where hitherto unimagined landscapes take shape and strange intangible structures pierce the disintegrating firmament. Despite the substantial length of these two tracks, it’s never a tedious ride; each visits countless new vistas and perspectives across time. In essence Helionomicon becomes a synthesis of all ULTHAR’s recorded output to this point across two climactic, ambitious epics.
In advance of the releases, today ULTHAR unveils first single, “Astranumeral Octave Chants,” the fifth track off Anthronomicon.
Stream “Astranumeral Octave Chants” at THIS LOCATION.
Having reached albums three and four concurrently, and having many other bands and albums under their collective belts, the three seasoned players that comprise ULTHAR have not been content to play things straightforward, to be just another death metal band among thousands. Rather the band continuously seeks and executes with more compulsive complexity, more nuance and in pursuit of a persistent ascension to a transcendent and incongruous world beyond the mundane; a place of euphoric exultation and bewildering awe.
Anthronomicon and Helionomicon were each recorded in April 2022 at Developing Nations in Baltimore, Maryland by Kevin Bernsten and mastered at Signaturetone in Minneapolis, Minnesota by Adam Tucker. Each album cover is half of a larger original piece created for ULTHAR by Ian Miller (Stormkeep, Bolt Thrower, Games Workshop). Additional artwork was created by Steve Peacock. Fans of Atrocity, Absu, Enslaved, Gorguts, Demilich, Krallice, Deathspell Omega, Voidceremony, Tomb Mold, Suffering Hour, and the like, pay heed.
Anthronomicon and Helionomicon will be released on CD, LP, and digital formats. Find physical preorders at THIS LOCATION. Find digital preorders for Anthronomicon HERE and Helionomicon HERE.
Anthronomicon Track Listing:
1. Cephalophore
2. Fractional Fortresses
3. Saccades
4. Flesh Propulsion
5. Astranumeral Octave Chants
6. Coagulation of Forms
7. Larynx Plateau
8. Cultus Quadrivium
Helionomicon Track Listing:
1. Helionomicon
2. Anthronomicon
ULTHAR:
Steve Peacock – bass/vocals
Shelby Lermo – guitars /vocals
Justin Ennis – drums
Anthronomicon cover
Helionomicon cover
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