Artist: Pentacrostic
Country: Brazil
Label: Nuclear War Now! Productions
Formats: LP
Year: 2025
While Pentacrostic’s debut album, ‘The Pain Tears’ from 1992, is generally regarded as the band’s finest hour – even a bit of a cult album in the Brazilian Extreme Metal scene, I have always felt that their sophomore on a musical level had a bit more to offer. Of course, this is mainly motivated by personal taste and frames of reference, but regardless of any of that, ‘The Pain Tears’ is by far a more primitive affair. The Death/Doom Metal presented on that debut album certainly has its charm and listening to that album today it is clear that it wears its legacy with pride, but it was definitely not on par with the European doomy Death Metal bands at the time.
‘De Profundis’ is basically built upon the same foundation as its predecessor, but the combination of a major line-up shuffle and a few years more of experience definitely paid off. While not even sounding half as heavy as ‘The Pain Tears’, the beauty of ‘De Profundis’ lies in the more advanced song writing as well as a profound creative disposition. The main riffing is pretty much the same, but with choosing another tuning the band found their connection with many of their European colleagues, yet it is the innovative use of keyboards, well-composed lead guitars, acoustics and overall refreshing frivolities that makes ‘De Profundis’ still stand tall today.
While “frivolities” and keyboards might scare off a lot of people, no-one holding the Death/Doom Metal genre dear should really be afraid. The thorough melodicism and even folky bits and pieces in the leads go very well with the heavy riffs, hoarse grunts and even blast beats. In fact, the band combines a lot elements that harkens back to the classic foundations of the Death/Doom Metal genre, but also reflect the mid 90’s in a splendid way. Not infrequently it leans heavily in the direction of the more open-minded doomy bands of that era, think Phlebotomized or bands from the Holy Records stable of the mid-90’s. There’s even a touch of Edge Of Sanity and Desultory here and there.
Towards the end of the album a bit more standard Death Metal creeps into the mix, but it is a surprisingly consistent record that offers much for those who share my knack for a bit of unorthodox or audacious Death/Doom Metal. So, while ‘The Pain Tears’ (and even the older demos) several reissues on various formats, ‘De Profundis’ only had one reissue on CD in 2018. So with Nuclear War Now! Productions stepping in, that gap is finally filled: a digital version was released at the end of 2024 and a long overdue vinyl edition is expected to arrive around February or March of this year. It was about time this album was restored to its rightful glory.
