Beyond Grace – Welcome to the New Dark Ages, Part 1 (Review)

This is the latest EP from Beyond Grace, a death metal band from the UK.

I always enjoy catching up with Beyond Grace, and have watched their development closely over the years. From the early promise of 2014’s Monstrous, to the debut roar of 2017’s Seekers, to 2021’s crowning achievement so far Our Kingdom Undone, Beyond Grace’s upward trajectory has been a satisfying and rewarding one.

This 20-minute EP contains four tracks; three originals and a Peter Gabriel cover.

Opener The Burning Season is a powerhouse of modern death metal, and demonstrates a band that are not content to rest on their laurels. It’s a lesson in groovy heaviness and controlled intensity that falls somewhere between Decapitated, Allegaeon, Black Crown Initiate, and Obscura. It’s one of the strongest songs the band have penned. It also reveals the expanding talents of the band’s vocal delivery. The lead growls and screams sound more brutal than ever, and we also get treated to some good clean singing too.

Buyer’s Remorse is up next, and has an enhanced progressive/technical feel. The band continue to showcase their ability to combine depth of delivery with quality songcraft. It’s furious and boasts some lethal guitars. Yep, this is the stuff. Combining death metal aggression with progressive intricacy is not easy, but it sounds like it is here. It’s actually superior to The Burning Season I feel, which is a testament to the band’s high levels of consistency and skill.

The last new original song is Misinfodemic, which is an abrasive and harsh slice of barbed extremity. It’s the shortest here, but packed with malevolent death metal and raw emotive heaviness. It features the most traditional death metal content out of the three, yet is still wrapped up in Beyond Grace’s contemporary delivery. It’s basically yet another killer track; a well-rounded beast of a song. After spending time with all three of these, it’s actually quite hard to call a favourite.

The EP closes with a cover of Peter Gabriel’s Here Comes the Flood. I don’t know the original, but it gives the band a good excuse to stamp their own considerable identity on another’s song and make it their own. As a track in its own right, it’s a solid, menacing slab of progressive death metal.

Well, it seems that for Beyond Grace it is only onwards and upwards to greater things. If this EP is indicative of where they are heading, then Our Kingdom Undone is not the loftiest height that they will scale.

Top work from Beyond Grace. Don’t miss this.