RIVERS OF NIHIL
“WHERE OWLS KNOW MY NAME”
Album Review by Dark Juan

10/10

Rivers Of Nihil are:

Jake Dieffenbach – Vocals
Brody Uttley – Guitar
Jon Topore- Guitar
Adam Biggs – Bass/Vocals
Jared Klein- Drums

Good evening, people who pay scant attention to my ramblings and are only interested in whether or not a record is worth their money. Rivers Of Nihil are from Reading, Pennsylvania. Judging by the ferocity of some of the music on here, it’s a gateway to Hell. Saying that, they look like a cheerful bunch of chaps on their photos. Let us plunge right into the horrors that await us. Abandon hope, all ye who enter here…

Where Owls Know My Name. Quite simply an amazing name for a record, and has already won the guys bonus points for mentioning owls, because owls are groovy. Even though their brains are smaller than their eyes and you can rather disturbingly see the backs of their eyeballs when you look in their ears. Disturbing. Opening track Cancer/Moonspeak hints at more than a touch of Swans-esque drone before taking a hard left turn into some exquisite death double bass drumming and the open throated roar of vocalist Jake Dieffenbach (I’m sorry mate, but with a name like that you REALLY should be being the goaltender for the Toronto Maple Leafs ice hockey team or something!) on track two, The Silent Life. It took me by surprise, and after I’d stopped my eyes reverberating around my head I got a grip of myself and began to actually listen. It’s a real melting pot of genres, this….. I’d have to call it Prog Death and this is no bad thing. It’s fresh and exciting and just the shot in the arm that an increasingly moribund genre needs. It’s by turns insanely beautiful, fucking lethal, brutally uncompromising and absolutely compelling. There’s touches of so many things here, like saxophone reminding me of Empty Bed, Empty Heart by Gary Numan, bits of Coheed and Cambria at their proggiest, lovely ethereal acoustic passages, Dillinger Escape Plan jazzy bits, there’s even 90s Industrial in there and pop keyboards and thrash and  black metal screaming and speed and drumming like a Maxim machine gun and then solid, heavy, obsidian black metal. The kind of metal, that if it was a killer, would have been caught because it’s draped in your entrails and squeezing your heart like a stress ball. Whilst wandering down the high street, muttering to itself about how its toy had stopped screaming. In broad daylight on a Tuesday.

I love this record. It’s the most inventive and exciting thing in years and these guys deserve to be huge. Every single song brings something new to metal and that’s a rare thing these days. It’s an endless delight to be surprised and challenged by a band, especially in these days of formulaic, identikit metal. Good grief, there’s even a little English folky bit just come up on Sudden Change which has just totally reminded me of the utterly wonderful Blood Ceremony. Interestingly, for such a heavy band, the sax led Gary Numan influence keeps creeping in…. and then instead of double bass drumming and roaring, we are treated to be a bit of industrial grind on Terrestria III: Wither. KMFDM and Treponem Pal spring to mind. And then we are away to pastures new…. every tune a new adventure. This time it might be black metal keyboard atmosphere. Or a banjo. One thing I can guarantee is absolutely magnificent musicianship from the entire band at all times. This is one of the tightest records I have ever heard. It’s a perfectly engineered death machine, coming at you at maximum speed, smoke pouring from the exhausts, engine screaming murder while it spits explosives and hot lead and the blades attached to its wheels flail ever closer to YOU, transfixed in the infra red beam of its searchlights…

I’m running out of superlatives. This record really is THAT good, in my opinion. And as I am employed to tell you my opinion, my opinion matters. If you don’t buy this record and make these guys huge, I am personally going to hunt your down and murder you with a rusty spoon. Each and every single one of you, you heathen scum.

I can’t believe I am going to do this. It’s full marks. This is my version of perfection. I can’t find anything wrong with it. The production job is magnificent, the musicianship extraordinary, the arrangements compelling and the lyrics interesting. Goaltender Jake’s vocals are perfect for the music even though he should be taking part in the Stanley Cup Finals with the Calgary Flames….

Final thoughts – Opeth. Rivers Of Nihil are a bit like Opeth, but heavier and less opulent and more eclectic. It’s the nearest comparison I can come up with. My brain has been reduced to its component atoms. In fact, on the Dark Juan Battle Jacket, Rivers Of Nihil would fit neatly between Opeth, Morbid Angel and Coheed and Cambria.

I have no more words.

The Patented Dark Juan Blood Splat Rating System has just undergone shock and awe and is suffering from PMSD (Post Metal Sadness Disorder) and gives Rivers Of Nihil an utterly awestruck 10/10. That’s not an amount of blood found by authorities, that’s fucking Armageddon.

Tracklist:

Cancer/Moonspeak
The Silent Life
A Home
Old Nothing
Subtle Change (Including The Forest Of Transition)
Terrestria III: Wither
Hollow
Death Is Real
Where Owls Know My Name
Capricorn/Agoratopia

https://www.facebook.com/riversofnihil/

This review is the property of Dark Juan and Metal Gods TV. It is strictly prohibited to copy any part of this review, unless you have all of the parties’ permission, or are the band/record label/PR company in question. Failure to adhere to these instructions will be considered as Plagiarism and you will be reported to the appropriate authorities.

---