AKELDAMA

"Akeldama" is the debut full-length studio album by US, California based technical/progressive death metal act The Faceless. The album was released through Sumerian Records in November 2006. The Faceless was formed in 2004 and was at that point a four-piece without a permanent drummer. The drumming on the album is therefore handled by no less than four different session drummers. All skilled performers, who deliver fast precision playing, suiting the band´s demanding music perfectly.

Stylistically the material on the 8 track, 33:18 minutes long album is technical/progressive death metal with the occasional nod towards deathcore and more than a few parts which can be labelled melodeath. When the latter parts occur I´m reminded of an artist like The Black Dahlia Murder, but that is only a part of the band´s sound, and the music on "Akeldama" is generally a much more varied size.

The album opens with "An Autopsy", and it´s one of those tracks that´ll blow most listeners away. Jaw-dropping techncial playing, compositional diversity, and just loads of power and aggression. Pretty soon The Faceless introduce a little clean singing, deathcore breakdowns, and progressive structures and adventurous ideas, which ultimately make "Akeldama" a little more than your standard technical/progressive death metal release. The vocals vary between deep growling and higher pitched screaming (and as mentioned above the occasional clean vocal part).

"Akeldama" features a clear, powerful, and detailed sound production, which suits the material perfectly. So upon conclusion "Akeldama" is a high quality debut album by The Faceless. Some of the excursions into progressive territories make the overall flow of the album slightly inconsistent, but overall it´s a pretty impressive first release by the band and a 3.5 - 4 star (75%) rating is deserved.

I think If you are a Big Death Metal Fan this is an Essential Album. Its very clean, crisp, hardcore, brutal, technical death metal and it is definitely worth checking out. You may be a prog snob, but If you are a musician or can respect insane great technically complex instrumentation i'd definitely check this out.

I first found this band while listening to pandora.com the radio station, and I made a station called Necrophagist radio the band, and it played similar artists to Necrophagist and they Played Some Meshuggah and The Faceless and others and when I heard the Faceless I instantly bookmarked the song because it was so rhythmic and interesting. There songs still play on my radio stations from Pandora and I really like the musicians. The drumming is insanely fast and the guitar is blistering, and they have some really great ideas and you can tell they've been working really hard. Check EM OUT!!!!!!!!!!