Adzes – Inver [Album Review]

Inver sounds overly familiar; you will find yourself feeling like you are listing to something done by countless bands already, which might sounds like a criticism if it wasn’t for how well it all gels.

Finding yourself one minute being swept away by the reverb heavy, atmospheric guitars swirling around your ears to a lovely, chunky bass riffing away the next, Adzes have a balance that can reach out to scratch a wide range of personal musical itches. At times Inver sounds like a Deftones album gone awry, Today Is They Day attempting to make moody pop, and even old favourites of the site, Every Stranger Looks Like You.

It is difficult to pick out a standout track purely for how easy it is to become lost in the flow. The title track offers a shorter breather where the most contrasting elements are given space to shine, followed by Capitaleschaton which could arguably be the most palatable taster.

Deep into an age of “what even are genres anymore?”, this is certainly an album that responds to that question by naturally fitting into so many labels, successfully avoiding that awkward clash that sounded like a good idea on paper. But the minefield of falling into the niche, acquired tastes of Doom/Sludge music have somehow been avoided, evident by the 50 minute runtime not feeling like a slog to get through.

Somehow Adzes have scraped across so many styles of the Death Metalish Droney Doom delivered here, and intricately paced the flow in a way that makes for an compelling listen. It is difficult to tell if Inver is an experiment gone well or if this is just Adzes doing their own thing, au naturale if you like. And personally I couldn’t ever ask for anything more of a band.

Some listeners may lose the album into an abrasive room ambience, but let’s face it, if you’re here that probably won’t be the case. Well, if you’ve made it this far without slamming your finger on the back key (or the mobile phone equivalent, they’re all swipey swipey these days) you’ll both get along just fine.

Jake Hancke – 18/09/2023

Inver is available to pre-order on CD from Philip K. Discs

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