New Jersey is a state that has come up with more than a few killer metal bands over time, and the latest band to step up from the Garden State metal nursery is Anticosm, here with their third full-length album The Call of the Void…

… And what an album it is. The band draws on all its experience on this record, in the process creating a sound that is easily the most fulfilling they’ve come up with to date in their career. Fusing hoarse, sometimes demonic vocals to a more straightforward blast-furnace metal assault instrumentally is nothing new, for sure, but Anticosm inject a freshness into their sound that sends a jolt through even their most stolid bludgeon riffola; here we have an album that is sometimes – though not often – in danger of descending into the abyss of the ‘meh’ only to be transported to next level after next level, usually by the guitar playing of Mark Siedlecki. His playing on standout cut Fall Asleep is nothing short of incendiary; his fingers fly, the notes flood across the fretboard, sending flickering images across the mind of long-cherished names like Denner, Ross the Boss and Michael Amott at their most lyrical.

But overall Anticosm are all about the primal rather than the cerebral; Somewhere Between The Void is one of the most satisfying death/thrash/black metal bangers I’ve heard all year, the unforgiving rifferama bolstered by some glorious bass from Tom Wilson and a riotous, swinging performance behind the drums by the suitably-monickered Beheader!

The whole is surmounted by a stygian vocal performance from Kirill Kovalevsky, a man definitely in the blackthrash major league and capable of giving the likes of Ben Falgoust a run for their money.

I’d love to see these boys on an NJ double bill with Overkill down here in Texas – on the evidence of this release they’d certainly hold their own with the big boys, and I’ve no hesitation in recommending this ripping noise to you all!

The Call Of The Void is released on August 16th.