You got to hand it to Willowtip: they know how to pick their bands. Chances are most people are just now hearing about Neuraxis, despite Trilateral Progression being their fourth full length release. Now, if you were smart, chances are you already went to Willowtip and bought the compilation release Truth | Imagery | Passage that contained all their past releases in one nicely priced 2-disc set. Upon placing those two discs into your cd player you get assaulted by a phenomenal blend of death/grind that is half technical and ironically half melodic, blending the best of At the Gates and more technical acts like Cephalic Carnage and Cryptopsy. As tired of an example as it is, it’s amazingly accurate for those past releases by Neuraxis. Outside of a few gripes, the song writing was amazing and the synergy was pulled off with finesse.

So, the obvious question is can Neuraxis repeat the magic here on Trilateral Progression? Imagine your best sexual experience. Now imagine your favorite sexual fantasy. Now combine the two (and if your fantasy was your best experience, fuck you. To aid the demonstration though, just imagine it multiple times over). That doesn’t even come close to Trilateral Progression. This album doesn’t top one of their past releases, it doesn’t top two. It tops every single motherfucking song these fuckheads have ever made so far. And not marginally, either. Dear God no. This album tops every previous Neuraxis release by leagues.

The drums are punishing and unrelenting, grabbing the listener by the balls, knocking out his legs and pushing him to the ground, and then sticking the drums’ metaphorical dick into his ass to fuck him 10 ways to Sunday. The guitars are blaringly fast, technical, but never boring. For every second that that the fret board is being traversed there’s 10 seconds of memorable solos and melodic riffing that switches just as easily to insanely brutal complexity. And the song writing is impeccable, never a boring moment. Not to mention that vocalist Ian Campbell brings his whole game to the performance; he’s definitely one of death metal’s more underrated vocalists. He’s versatile, brutal, yet amazingly coherent and well-structured.

Honestly, there is nothing about this release that any of the past albums can compete with. Fuck, there’s similarly very few death metal releases coming out this year that can compare, too. Outside of Cephalic Carnage’s and Immolation’s own releases (and maybe a few other bands) I honestly can’t think of any new death metal or grind albums this year that can match the sheer fuckton intensity and awesome prowess that is Trilateral Progression.

The only gripe I can find is the queer effect that the cd randomly has trouble playing certain tracks despite being clean as a whistle (and even stranger is the tracks with the difficulty jump around randomly: one minute "Thought Adjuster" has trouble playing but on a second play-through it plays fine yet "The Apex" has problems where it originally played fine. Happens in several cd players, too). But that’s a hardware problem, nothing having to do with the album’s music itself. If you call yourself a fan of grind and death metal (be it technical, brutal, or melodic) and you don’t not own Trilateral Progression you may be certifiably retarded.

Written By: Necro-tron