The one-man Indonesian death metal band! Empirechrio is just that. THT Productions brings us a 4 song tape by the band that is heavy, brutal and very talented death metal. Actually on the website he calls the music a combination of black and death metal. I can see that the guitars have a very 'bee's in a box' sound to them, and the vocals switch from a nice deep death growl to the squeaking black approach. In all honesty I think the black styled vocals should have been shelved. With the low production of this tape at times it comes off more as quacking than singing, however thankfully the death vocals are used a majority of the time.
The production is definitely low as this was a 4-track recording (not that 4-track can't be done very good, it's just lacking in this case) and despite the tin can sound it's all very clear, not overly muddy like you'd expect. I can even hear distinct bass lines through most of it. The real problem is the extra noise that got left in. Usually you hear this when the music calms down or just as the song is ending the instruments fade out but the recording is still going.
Being a one man project Empirechrio uses a drum machine to fill the time keeping department. You wouldn't need to check the insert to figure this out as you can hear the triggers all over the place. If you're one who can't stand the sound of drum machine steer clear, as for me I'm not bothered by it in the least. The programming was done creatively and it fits the music 100%.
The guitar work is where this album really shines. We travel from fast buzzy double picked black metal pieces to thick pounding death pieces and back again. There is a real nice clean undistorted guitar part in the middle of 'Kekerasan' which really brings the mood of the song down a notch...just long enough to hook you then you're thrust back into the brutality. Very nice. Usually I find with one-man projects the music itself gets repetitious and boring due to the lack of other influence. Well these 4 songs are all very distinct and creative. Jefray has done very well in this area!
As for lyrics the bands official website has only 1 song's lyrics and the insert I have has none. Still the one song, the title track 'End of the World' is very God focused! I can only assume the rest are the same. I'll print the lyrics below.
All in all this is a tape for the true death metal fan, black metal fans who are into some death will enjoy but TRUE black metalers probably won't dig this quite so much. You also have to be able to take the lower quality present here. It's not horrible as some I've heard, and I find this tape very listenable, but some people won't be the same as I.
6/10
