Usud – As Old As The Hills (Geenger Records)

It took almost a decade for Usud to publish their third album symbolically called As Old As The Hills. Thankfully, Geenger Records took an initiative and promoted this material on all streaming services and social networks, so a wider audience can enjoy in this ridiculously brilliant material. The whole recording, producing and mastering process took a huge amount of time, but everything is happening with a certain reason. Guitars and bass are recorded during 2011, then reamped in 2014. Drum tracks and vocals have been recorded sometime in 2012. using spaces like a garage as a recording room. Finally, recordings are mixed and mastered by Ivan Jakić at Kut Sobe in 2019, so we can enjoy in some quality music today. The music is suitable for these modern times. The band is embracing both old and new schools of melodic death metal full with blackened riffs, but there’s a lot more beneath the layers of pure quality noise. Usud is dealing with a lot of atmospheric moments in their music in such a simultaneous, but not in simplified form. These atmospheres are adding much darker vibe to already depressive riffing, but the rhythm section is still delivering that recognizable Swedish melodic death metal sound depleted with some of the elements of sludge and modern metal. Still, the band is keeping their music interesting during the whole album, no matter if we are speaking about doom metal moments in their music or raging, almost maniacal blastbeats. Imagine everything I’ve mentioned above then add a huge slab of melancholic post metal arrangements used as one of the hidden weapons of this band, so not only Usud is dealing with already technically demanding music, but they’re resolving everything in even smaller clusters of darkness which are coming to the listeners like a calm before the storm. Be prepared for this material and listen to it with full attention, because As Old As The Hills is an album for serious listeners who are truly deep into metal music.