Deafening Sound

Black Metal has never been a genre I've felt too compelled to follow, except when keyboards are involved. Something about synthesizers and keyboards tend to make a bland metal offering worth checking out. I love layers, I suppose. So it's very rare when a band says "For Fans of Dimmu Borgir and Emperor" that I feel the need to listen to it. I usually just shake my head and move on to the next album. Unless of course, the packaging makes me think twice. I'll be honest, the album artwork for The Breathing Process's new release, "In Waking: Divinity" is the main reason I felt I should give it a listen. And I'm glad I did. From the album's opening instrumental all the way through to the climactic album closer, The Treasonist, The Breathing Process blasts through powerful, intense music and doesn't look back. The vocals are ridiculous and intense, the guitars are memorable, something I can't say for most bands in this genre. Standout tracks like Somnium, The Treasonist and Dear Antigone make the second half of the record the most memorable and almost make you want to skip through the instrumentals just to get to them, but this is an album that comes as a whole package...not something to be skipped through to pick and choose, but an album that should be swallowed en masse. Besides, there are a ton of little gems strewn throughout this recording. I can't stress enough just how great the vocals are on this disc. John Lafreniere's growls are almost unhuman. In terms of memorable extreme metal vocalists I would put it in line with Mikael Akerfeldt of Opeth, or Marcus Biscoff of Heaven Shall Burn.