heavy metalsaviorskin
04:09 Wednesday, 8 March 2023
Horror Pain Gore Death recording artists SaviorSkin return with more rotting misery to unleash upon mankind. 2023 has been rife with talk of the murder of human creativity by AI-generated music, and for good reason - most of the music on your favorite streaming service is about as compelling as a songless bird. SaviorSkin's forthcoming full-length, Invicta Mori, demonstrates what is possible when human agony and ingenuity manipulate machinery in the darkness.
Invicta Mori dials up the oppressive atmosphere and harshness of SaviorSkin's first two LPs (Remnants Of Broken Idols and Omnipotence Of The Absolute), but for the first time features live (undead) drums on several songs, such as the instant earworm "Lost In Prayer." SaviorSkin have always used machine elements to obscure the humanity of the musicians, but this time around it is easy to picture bloody phlegm on the pop filter while listening to brooding opener "Iconoclast" and even easier to imagine beckoning razor blades and shattered wine bottles during the meditative "Martyrdom." The creation of the ordeal that is "Burning Eden" required a level of suffering that no machine intelligence will ever experience. Invicta Mori is pitiless and unrelenting but utterly human at the same time, perhaps more than ever before.
Invicta Mori's lead single and closing track, "Sycophant," is easily the most hateful song in SaviorSkin's catalog, and that's saying a lot. The venom in Somnus Mortem's vocal performance is augmented by the presence of none other than Marc Grewe of the seminal death metal band Morgoth. "Sycophant" also brings SaviorSkin's story full-circle:
SaviorSkin was founded in 2018, but their history began in the Philippines, where Somnus Mortem founded the doom-death band Iconoclast in 1993. Morgoth released the criminally underrated Odium the same year. "A lot of people were confused by the industrial elements that Morgoth were experimenting with, but I loved them," says Somnus Mortem. "When Iconoclast became more of a solo project after I moved to the States, I injected some of those cold, machine-like Odium elements into the final incarnation of that band before laying it to rest, and that obviously became a huge part of SaviorSkin's sound. It still blows my mind that Marc Grewe sings on 'Sycophant,' the most vicious song on Invicta Mori. I devolve back into a death metal-obsessed teenager every time I hear it. I asked Grewe what made him want to work with me, and he just said that he liked what he heard! I can't possibly explain how much this collaboration means to me."
Invicta Mon is out on April 7 on CD and digital. Preorder on Bandcamp.
Tracklisting:
“Iconoclast”
“Judaswhore”
“Lost In Prayer”
“Martyrdom”
“King Misery”
“Away”
“Burning Eden”
“Nowhere”
“Sycophant”
“DoomFather”
“Born Of The Shallow”
“47 Nails”
“Orgasmatron” (live)
“Sycophant”:
