More metalcore-esque melodic death metal bands (and, conversely, more melodic death metal-esque metalcore bands) have certainly had their run for the last little while. Groups like The Black Dahlia Murder and As Blood Runs Black have always had a flair for combining the strengths of these two genres into a fittingly brutal package full of high-octane riffs, berserk drumwork, and soaring guitar leads. It’s a style that embodies the ethos of modern metal: genre lines are there to be eschewed and played with so that a band can find the most enticing combinations of elements to work with.
These twin styles of metalcore-influenced melodic death metal and melodic death metal-influenced metalcore definitely deserve their time in the limelight, too. The Black Dahlia Murder has one of the most consistently great discographies in modern metal, and albums from As Blood Runs Black and their ilk are full of high-energy, bouncy, fun tunes.
Enter Arreat Summit: one EP and one full-length deep into their career as a band (not counting their released demo tape), they’ve honed in on this style with an almost surgical level of precision, cutting away at gristle and fat so as to get to the meaty, bloody core of this style.
Combining their melodic death metal and deathcore influences into a combination where both parts live in an entirely equal harmony, Arreat Summit creates a sound in which the best parts of each genre reside comfortably, sometimes on top of each other. The familiar diminished sweeps of deathcore find themselves landing on top of melodeath blast beats, and it’s not uncommon to hear melodic leads over a set of bludgeoning chugs. Deftly weaving both of these genres together into a grim, brutal combination that’s heavy on memorably written parts and head-twisting riffs, this band finds themselves dancing around the intersection of the two styles.
Most bands that attempt this style find themselves leaning towards one genre more than the other, but in this case, the two sounds are merged equally, letting conventions from each overlap each other. It’s an arresting combination because of this, and altogether different than what most bands of this intriguing subgenre do.
Brutal and heavy, yet sharp and impossibly precise, Arreat Summit brings their influences together in a different way than most bands, and it helps them stand out from the crowd quite well. Each track is memorable and different in its melodies and usage of various genre tropes, but they’re all the same in one way: every song is a high-quality stomping ground through which this band displays a level of comfort and ease that flies in the face of how masterfully crafted their music is.
-SH