I’m sure most people reading have experienced that exchange where a friend, colleague, or family member, having caught wind of one’s enjoyment of heavy music asks incredulously, “how do you listen to that?!” It’s an interesting insight into the strange phenomenon of artistic taste,1 how a complex and disharmonic combination of notes and time signatures can be “just noise” to one pair of ears and a thrilling musical experience to another. It therefore amuses me that I can sit here and talk about Burning Palace, who craft progressive, technical, dissonant death metal that’s brutal, loud and restlessly dynamic. But, who pitch it perfectly in that golden zone of melodicism and lethality. Because—as is no surprise to us here, but likely baffles outside observers—there is a great deal of nuance between ineffectual disorganization and potent convolution.
Elegy falls into that specifically American brand of techy, dissonant death metal whose brutality is more corollary than intention. That which is thoughtful, and unexplainably “happy”-sounding despite its surface-level hostility. Jaunty, acerbic, riffs, imagined by an Artificial Brain, clamber to the fore out of formations where the same guitar lines melt into an indistinct yet driving ebb and flow. Sunless, paradoxically major scales spring up out of dissonance and the Afterbirth of inter-assault meandering, to which the occasional lapses into resonant, mournful melodies create gorgeous contrasts. But Burning Palace aren’t copycats, and Elegy actually demonstrates a transition from the grindier brutal death metal of Hollow into this more precise—but absolutely no less heavy—interpretation. As an example of technical sophistication meeting simple enjoyability, the record stands as perfect proof of the aesthetic value of supposedly impenetrable music.
What strikes particularly strongly about Elegy is the expertly deft way Burning Palace poised violence, intricacy, and beauty to craft it. Though occupying a category that in many senses eschews the adjective “catchy,” it has led to some frustration in my time with it, due to the fact that I’m unable to adequately sing, hum, or otherwise externalize its songs that have lodged themselves in my brain, thanks to their emphasis on riffs and time signatures that my unschooled vocal chords cannot copy. Ludicrous and ludicrously fun scale ascents, tempo switches, and rhythmic interplays abound (“Traversing the Black Arc,” “Awakening Extinction (Eternal Eclipse),” and clever dynamism and selective ambience make certain riffs stand out dramatically (“Birthing Uncertainty,” “Sunken Veil”). Burning Palace take the broadly progressive approach to songwriting via tangents and explorations of themes, but always reprise the key elements of those themes through escalation (“Traversing the Black Arc”), or evolution (“Birthing Uncertainty”), or just a snappy, definitive conclusion (“Awakening Extinction…”). Melody is, importantly, never actually absent, and the genuine beauty of the explicit refrains that slink in as a lone guitar takes centre-stage (“Malignant Dogma,” “Suspended in Emptiness,” “Sunken Veil”) are just the pinnacle of the shifting interplay that undergirds them, arising naturally and not as mere contrast to some ugly, dissonant mass.
There is nothing specifically within Elegy that one could single out as lesser in quality; the record is remarkably consistent, and if anything, Burning Palace save some of the best for its latter end (“Sunken Veil” is probably my personal favorite, and it comes second-to-last). There is a vague sensation that tracks share a little too much in common, but I’ve found that the more time spent in their company, the more personality each of them shows. But even if they do tend to melt a little into the realm of indistinguishability, the quality is invariably high, so I, for one, don’t really care—what does it matter, when you’ll be spinning it repeatedly in full anyway? That inkling of indistinctness runs the opposite direction and speaks somewhat to Elegy’s flow, as many songs pick up a similar riff or percussive pattern to that which closed their predecessor (“Malignant Dogma”).
Burning Palace might not be the average person’s idea of a great musical time, but it’s mine, and likely many of yours too. Elegy demonstrates the breadth of dissonance and complexity in extreme metal in its thoughtful yet exuberant form. Not cerebral, but clever, and never neglecting to dazzle with superb musicianship as worthy of the adjective “gnarly” as “technical.” Burning Palace have made subtly complex and repeatedly rewarding compositions, full of energy and ardor, and that you actually want to listen to, not just because you feel smart doing so. Those who can’t appreciate the style truly are missing out.
Rating: Very Good
DR: 6 | Format Reviewed: wav
Label: Total Dissonance Worship
Websites: Bandcamp | Facebook
Releases Worldwide: March 14th, 2025
The post Burning Palace – Elegy Review appeared first on Angry Metal Guy.
