Psycroptic
Psycroptic
Inferi, Cognitive, Summoning The Lich
Psycroptic
PSYCROPTIC
Australia is home to innumerable death metal bands. Few make their way beyond these shores, and fewer still garner global respect. Out of those, only one has maintained that position for a full 25 years: Australia’s finest, Tasmania’s pride and joy, PSYCROPTIC.
When the history of technical metal is viewed in years to come, the books will come to show that PSYCROPTIC are responsible for a hefty slice of the genre. The band blasted into the deepest underground in the late 90s, then proceeded to drag the metal scene closer to what they do by sheer attrition. Their music guides you through the densest of riff jungles before bursting into the clear with powerfully rhythmic grooves and blasts, anchored by the profoundly talented Haley brothers.
No band bio is complete without a quote from the band themselves, but this bio will need to remain incomplete. All the members are profoundly humble and simply let the music do all the talking. Guitarist Joe’s esoteric, impenetrable picking style weaves musical hooks that wrap around the listener before pulling back to reveal Dave’s pulsating rhythms. They achieve a level of synchronization only brothers with decades of experience playing together can achieve. There are none tighter. That their telepathic performance is matched by the final lineup of Todd Stern on bass and the charismatic roar of Jason Peppiatt is almost unfair. Like all masters, they make the impossible look impossibly easy.
Most bands take a few albums to find their feet but PSYCROPTIC’s first two releases were underground classics: “The Isle of Disenchantment” (2001 self-released) and “The Scepter of the Ancients” (2003 Unique Leader). Matthew Chalk (vocals) and Cameron Grant (bass) were part of the first squad who joined the Haleys on their quest for perfection. A relentless touring schedule emerged in Australia, including legendary appearances at Canberra’s Metal for the Brain festival. Normally this would be the high point for an Australian metal band. Two albums out, successful shows, who could ask for more?
Tasmania couldn’t contain them and as it turned out, neither could Australia. Their first overseas tour was Europe in 2004. Matthew was replaced on vocals by Jason Peppiatt, and PSYCROPTIC went on to record “Symbols of Failure” (2006 Neurotic). The band expanded their sound with “Ob (Servant)” (2008 Nuclear Blast) bringing in ambience and atmosphere, then “The Inherited Repression” (2012) introducing the powerful neck-cracking grooves that would mark their sound going forward.
It also introduced them to touring the US with their first happening in 2010. This pushed their lust for the road to new levels, smashing audiences and stupefying musicians around the planet. They’re unique among death metal bands in that it’s almost pointless to try and list the festivals and countries they’ve visited, let alone the bands they’ve played with. It can be condensed to “everyone, everywhere”. Official estimates are at thirty countries. Standouts would be their tour of China in 2010, becoming the first Western band to appear in the Inner Mongolian city of Hohhot, and nearly getting caught in a three-day long traffic jam. They were one of the earlier Western bands to hit Indonesia’s now-famousHammersonic Festival in 2013. They did a seven-day tour of India in 2017, roamed South America in 2022, and even managed to break into the US during the height of COVID.
PSYCROPTIC solidified their American relationship by signing to Prosthetic Records in 2014, replacing Cameron on bass with US legend Todd Stern in 2015, then releasing their self-titled album in the same year. At this point something indefinable clicked, and the band unleashed “As The Kingdom Drowns” (2019), a clear step up from their previous work. “Divine Council” (2022) proved that this wasn’t a new level for the band– it’s a new normal.
And there is no slowing down. As of late 2024, PSYCROPTIC are recording a new album and are booked in for a massive US tour in January 2025 with NILE and SIX FEET UNDER. PSYCROPTIC are no longer the local Australian band made good: they are a global powerhouse with a footprint the size of the world, nothing left to prove, and an endless commitment to finding ways to rock you as hard as technically possible.
INFERI
Inferi is an American technical melodic death metal band formed in Nashville, Tennessee, in 2006. They are renowned for fusing aggressive, high-speed technical death metal with epic symphonic elements and complex melodic hooks. The band's name translates to "underworld" or "hell" in Latin and was inspired by the reanimated corpses in the Harry Potter universe.
COGNITIVE
After releasing an EP and full length, COGNITIVE signed to Unique Leader Records in 2016 and released their album Deformity, which showed the bands dedication to their craft within a tale about their home states own legend about the Jersey Devil. Ramping up their tour schedule, the band continued to write and push themselves within the genre with technicality, speed, brutality, and songwriting, which came to shine through even more on the 2018 release Matricide, which displayed more focused effort while increasing speed and technicality even more. The band wasted no time in their touring schedule and hit the road supporting Fit for an Autopsy, Rivers of Nihil, Through the Eyes of the Dead, Vulvodynia, Lorna Shore and others, along with an appearance at Maryland Deathfest. COGNITIVE has become a touring machine with one goal in mind – always move forward.
Now with the release of their new album Malevolent Thoughts of a Hastened Extinction, the band has displayed more diversity and song writing more than ever, and proves yet again they are never scared to explore new concepts musically and explore new territory.
Now signed to Metal Blade Records in 2022, Cognitive is not only touring for their last record, but writing their next slab of brutality.
SUMMONING THE LICH
St Louis, Missouri fantasy-driven technical death metal band SUMMONING THE LICH has announced their sophomore album, Under The Reviled Throne, which is to be released via Prosthetic Records on July 26.
After three years of extensive US touring and shows with the likes of Allageon, Gorod and Inferi among others, as well as headline stints, SUMMONING THE LICH set about bringing Under the Reviled Throne to life. Intended as a death metal equivalent to The Empire Strikes Back in scope, the group set their sights on raising the stakes in both story and songwriting.
SUMMONINGTHELICHtooktheconsidered approach of eschewing superfluous technicality in favor of a leaner and more streamlined focus on song structure. Each of the tracks on Under the Reviled Throne were written with the purpose of guiding the listener through the eponymous Lich’s descent into misanthropy and tyranny, without sacrificing their idiosyncratic sound.
This balancing act of dexterity and structure is exemplified best on cuts like Return to the Soil and lead single, My Horrors Unending. The latter of which succinctly merges SUMMONINGTHELICH’sinclination for extremity and stop and start dynamics with rhythmic pummelling and memorable hooks.
With Arrias under existential threat, Under the Reviled Throne is a dazzlingly ambitious tale of hope and resistance in the form of its protagonist Taane (introduced on previously released album track, The Forest Feasts). Elsewhere, The Carrion Fleet’s narrative of the city of Bastell succumbing to flames at the hands of the Lich’s army ushers in the ominously brooding
Upping the stakes to dizzying heights, SUMMONING THE LICH offers plenty in the way of light among the shadowy figures that lurk within the Lich’s universe of malevolent chaos. All is not lost.