Krallice

The debut by avant black metal supergroup Krallice (which features guitarists Mick Barr of Orthrelm, Octis, and the Flying Luttenbachers alongside Colin Marston of Behold…the Arctopus, Dysrhythmia, and Gorguts) is a six-song, hourlong marathon of blastbeats, intertwining guitar lines, and hoarse screams. It's also an album full of high-speed shifts and sudden left turns, as guitar solos erupt out of the riff-storm like a demonic dolphin leaping from a lake of lava, or the band suddenly halts what had seemed like frantic, headlong momentum to begin playing an entirely different riff. The trance-inducing effects of later albums are largely absent here; on this disc, Krallice are all about displays of virtuosity that recall John McLaughlin more than Mayhem. They're operating more in line with conventional metal rules than they would on any subsequent release, but it's still every bit as thrilling as Dimensional Bleedthrough or Diotima.