Azooma – A Hymn Of The Vicious Monster (Review)

Azooma are from Iran and play Death Metal.

A nice acoustic intro starts us off, shortly followed by the opening track Self-Infected. It’s immediately apparent that the band can play well, and also that the type of Death Metal they play is non-standard.

Azooma play Progressive Death Metal with Technical Death Metal clearly playing a role, but rather than the schizophrenic complex-for-the-sake-of-it route that a lot of Technical Death Metal goes down, Azooma have chosen the arguably more interesting Progressive Death Metal route. This means more coherent song structures and more emphasis on the song itself and its accompanying feelings and moods. With this in mind A Hymn Of The Vicious Monster is a roaring success.

Think old-Opeth if they were more Death Metal. Think Gorguts and Death mixed together in a Progressive Metal melange. Tasty.

As mentioned; the musicianship is top-notch, which even includes a noticeable bass. The band proficiently play Death Metal, Progressive Metal, acoustics, Jazz-style interludes, and essentially everything else with pure class.

The vocals are deep and satisfying and the band even find space in their expansive songs to include a couple of low-key cleans that enhance proceedings on a couple of occasions.

A strong sound and production rounds of the package and Azooma have a winner on their hands here.

This is a supremely impressive release and one that you should definitely get if you’re even remotely interesting in challenging, stand-out music.