Emptiness - Error [2012]

This Belgian four-piece has been around since 1998, and since then they’ve released three albums with the addition of “Error”, which is to be released through Dark Descent Records in May of 2012. With “Error” they’ve delved into a much-too-treaded path that has been visited by numerous bands in the past, in which they believe that by repetition and simplistic arrays of notes they should be deemed artistic and/or thoughtful. That’s not a criticism, but rather, an observation, and it forces their music into a far more atmosphere-driven arena than their previous efforts. Brewing lots of heavy grooves and simplistic tremolo riffs, there are some evident similarities with the latest Enthroned album, two members of which also reside in Emptiness. That is to say, they have a corpulent guitar tone and heavy riffs, but unlike Enthroned, Emptiness typically tread along slower tempos and simpler arrangements/structures.

An ambient introduction in “Deafer” kicks off the album, and with that, a procession of warlike drums and incredibly groove-influenced riffs that ensue soon after. An admitted seamless transition between different segments in the song progresses the music forward smoothly, the guitars mellow (i.e. not very fast) and heavy under the deep growl of the vocalist. An almost jazzy influence can be heard throughout some of the even more mellow parts of songs, such as in the middle of the title track, and lots of atmospheric riffs play a key role in the style that they’ve snatched with this record. Usually these atmospheric riffs are played by tremolo riffs, and almost always accompanied by heavy chugging that, quite frankly, tires the listener. Other influences crop themselves up occasionally, such as a dissonant inclination with the guitars, especially with higher notes, but they never stray far from the groove-laden mid-paced riffs. Unfortunately, lots of superfluous elements are inducted as well, making for an elongated listen when in fact they could’ve made it much shorter. (An example, the track “Nothing”, which, coincidentally, does nothing).

The drums tend to make heavy use of toms and very snail-paced beats, never playing blast beats and sometimes using double bass; proving once more that Emptiness didn’t focus on speed and aggressiveness with this album. Typical characteristics of black/death metal (namely war metal) aren’t very prominent in “Error”, a dearth of chaotic and relentless blast beats burdening the music beneath the weight of the guitars, and it is quite obvious that Emptiness have strayed into a different style of black/death. Here they seem to be treading water half of the time, grooving with the guitars the rest of the time. To be honest, I’ve my doubts of the actual black/death ‘metalness’ of this album, as most of the time they seem to be performing grooves or chugs, and scarcely do they actually focus on the speed and brutality that’s often associated with said genre. All of the instruments do, however, have a certain correlation with each other; nevertheless, I found little else of note to be found on “Error”. Recommended for fans of groove metal, not black/death.

65/100

-SmithMetal84