Death metal is good.  Death metal is life.  Death metal lifts us up where we belong.  All you need is death metal.  It’s a tried and true formula that needs no secret sauce to let it shine, but sometimes when you think outside of the box and the limitations of the form, death metal goes from good to life changing.  A little sprinkle of prog, a little touch of tech, just a blackened kiss, and you take something that is reliable but predictable and you turn it on its head and show the world just what it can be.  Toronto’s Gutvoid aim to do just that with their much anticipated sophomore release Liminal Shrines.

The quartet have only been releasing music since 2019, but Liminal Shrines is their fourth overall release and second full-length album, courtesy of Profound Lore Records.  The aim of the band is to blend meat-and-potatoes death metal with progressive songwriting and virtuosity, with straight ahead rock and heavy metal adding some extra mustard on top.  Arguably not a groundbreaking formula, but one that, when done well, can really make the end result sing and stand out from the pack.  The goal on this album over the last one is to focus on elaborate songwriting with a deeper emphasis on their technical prowess while still retaining the caveman brutality, cosmic horror atmosphere and, perhaps most importantly, the intentionality to all the parts of these admittedly complex songs.  

What I will say right off the bat is that the death metal on Liminal Shrines is as good as death metal gets.  When Gutvoid launches into the nasty, chuggy riff to open basically any of the six tracks on this album, it makes me, well, void my guts.  Their command of a good riff and a good, solid foundation for everything that comes next is superb, and they are able to seemingly effortlessly thread that elusive (liminal, perhaps?) space that is a modern take on the worship of the ancestors.  Tracks like “Umbriel’s Door” and “Spell Reliquary” open with such a bang that I find myself having a hard time believing that Gutvoid are this new on the scene.  While the core of Liminal Shrines is the kind of stupid-ass caveman shit that makes me forget how to do basic math, the real spice that they throw on their are the little moments of soaring progressive lead work, or welcome shifts in dynamics, tempo and feel, or jarring dissonance to counter a subtle melody that just passed by. 

Gutvoid don’t overdo anything on Liminal Shrines, but these moments really do serve to elevate the songs above rote repetition of what already works.  The guitar solos are actually fantastic and varied, showcasing both wild technical abandon as well as a deft sense of how to craft a memorable phrase across the fretboard.  Honestly, if I could knock Liminal Shrines for anything, it’s that I kinda wish that they overdid something!  They do a fantastic job of blending these weird little moments into the blanket fort of death metal, and I kinda wish they had gone even more weird with it and let that stuff pop more.  I don’t want to say it’s underutilized, because it’s not, but if there’s a direction for them to go in in the future, I think leaning into this part of their dynamic is what is really going to separate them from the chaff.

Liminal Shrines is actually one half of a two part suite of albums, the sister piece of which is basically being recorded as we speak, so if you thought Gutvoid were going to rest on their laurels, you done thought wrong.  Perhaps I’ll get my wish and the next one will be bonkers weird!  Honestly, I can’t wait, because the future looks pretty bright for these guys.  In the meantime, give Liminal Shrines a spin or two and see if it doesn’t tickle you like it does for me.

-Ian

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Liminal Shrines is out March 20 on Profound Lore Records.  For more information on Gutvoid, visit their Facebook page.