Deus Deceptor

Untitled Document Within the last few years I have greatly expanded my interest in Death Metal, Black Metal, Doom Metal, etc. I've always had bands like Kreator, Bathory, Death, Slayer, Venom, Six Feet Under, Celtic Frost, Hellhammer, etc. in my collection. Until only recently have I picked up releases by Evoken, Dimmu Borgir, God Dethroned, Borknagar, Immortal, Therion, Mortician, Vintersorg, etc. just based on listening to CD samplers, local radio shows, downloading samples from the Internet, etc. The point I'm trying to make here is that I feel I have enough knowledge about some of this stuff where I can make an objective opinion. An opinion about an album that seems to have elements of the "been there, done that" formula but is organized in such a way that it may give it somewhat of an identity Nonexist are from Sweden. "Deus Deceptor" is their debut album for Century Media. They are a three-piece band consisting of ex. Arch Enemy vocalist Johan Liiva, Johan Reinholdz (Andromeda) on guitar and Matte Modin (Defleshed/Dark Funeral) on drums. The production, which is pretty good, was done by Tommy Tägtgren (Marduk, Electric Hellfire Club, The Foresaken) and recorded in 12 days. If someone were to play me Nonexist's "Deus Deceptor" without telling me the name of the band, I could easily ask them, "Is this Bathory? How about Kreator?". Could it be God Dethroned? That's because from a vocal standpoint, Nonexist's Johan Liiva sounds like a mutt mix of Quorthon from Bathory, Mille Petroza from Kreator and The Serpent King from God Dethroned. The style of the music also sounds a bit like that of Bathory, Kreator and even Testament. The guitar sound, which seems to be tuned a bit flat, could even be compared to the one Six Feet Under used on their "Maximum Violence" release. The guitar solos have that Iron Maiden "Somewhere In Time" sound to them. Nonexist remind me of a baseball pitcher, or even a chameleon. Their song formula is so full of change ups that it's hard to determine what the true color is here. They mix thrash, death and power metal together to form something interesting and somewhat complex. The opening track is an instrumental called "Entrance". It's only a 1:52 seconds and in no way sets the pace or style of the album because it's deceiving; deceiving in that what you expect to follow is not what you hear at first. The song sounds more like a power metal song than that of death or thrash. The guitar leads on this song sound a little like something you'd here off of a Testament album, like "The New Order". "Entrance" leads into "The Devil Incarnate", which starts off with a double bass barrage of drums and a death metal scream. It then slows down and speeds up, and gets into somewhat of a metal groove by the time of the chorus ! The track "Faith" sounds more like a death metal song at first; fast and aggressive like something Dimmu Borgir or God Dethroned would do. Then about halfway through the song, gears shift into more of an Iron Maiden like style of playing and back into the thrash mode. "Ataraxia" and "Nowhere" are guitar instrumentals that sound alot like those of Annihilator's. They are slow paced, mellow electric guitar pieces. Short but sweet. Tracks like "A Halo Askew" and "Idols & Friends" are a bit thrashier with Alex Skolnik like guitar fills. The solos are well structured and interesting in that Johan Reinholdz plays with much feeling on them. Matte Modin is an awesome drummer! He's all over the place on this album. His style and sound is tight, precise, ferocious and driving. For me, "Deus Deceptor" didn't really offer anything that grabbed my attention right after the first few spins. I had to keep playing this CD a number of times to try and remember how even one song went. I must say that this CD is actually starting to grow on me. These characteristics don't make "Deus Deceptor" a bad album, but they can allow this band to get easily lost among the crowd of other numerous Death Metal acts. With a name like Nonexist, I wonder if this band, in due time, will be just that. I wonder if the name Nonexist is an early epitaph to the band's "presence" in the Death Metal world. I hope not for their sake. They have potential!