De Profundis – The Emptiness Within (2012)

With nine tracks of super catchy melodic Metal, De Profundis brings us their third full-length offering “The Emptiness Within”. Combining excellent Melodic passages with Progressive elements and a hefty dosage of powerful riffing, this release has a vibe similar to the Melodic DM wave that came out of Finland in the late 90’s and early 2000’s. Don’t get us wrong, “The Emptiness Within” does feature a good amount of aggressiveness, but it is all surrounded by excellent melodic elements.

“Delirum” opens the riffing marathon with very well defined and melodic guitars, a sound that reminded us of earlier Eternal Tears of Sorrow, and similar acts. The growls are spot on and the overall mixture of melodic guitars, pummeling drums and guitar solos is just outstanding. The guitar work courtesy of Soikot Sengupta and Roman Subbotin is very well crafted and entertaining, particularly in the dreamy ‘instrumental’ passages.

With a pulsating bass guitar line, “Silent Gods” delivers another riffing onslaught and some excellent melodic passages. This track is one of our favorites due to the excellent melodic edge to it. The band’s creativity does not seem to stop and with tracks like “This Wretched Plague”, “Twisted Landscapes”, “Release”, and “Dead Inside” they keep delivers solid riffing and very well structured tracks that will make you want to start headbanging immediately.

Our favorite track of this release has to be the short but sweet “Parallel Existence”. After the relaxing intro passes, the riffing is at its best and the drumming nicely complements such a well-crafted piece. Being an instrumental, the weeping guitar solos are top notch and even the bass guitar solo just feels right in this song. Closing with the last crushing blow titled “Unbroken (A Morbid Embrace)”, the whole ETOS similarities surface back with a very well executed track that balances fast brutal sections and lush melodic sections with some atmospheric keyboards.

In general we are surprised at the great quality that “The Emptiness Within” brings. The songs are very well crafted, and bring back that old feeling of Melodic Death Metal that was big in Finland (and Europe) at the end of the 90’s, early 2000’s. With strong vocals, a pummeling bass guitar, super tight drumming and majestic guitar work, this release will be staying on our constant rotation for months to come.

Release: May 7th, 2012

Country: UK