Album Review: "Pitch Black" by Rifftera

Pitch Black

Today we have Rifftera's debut album on Inverse Records.

Anyone who says all music sucks, well, it's time to tell them to just pay attention to the world around them. Yes the world has changed.

Yes, you can't turn on KSHE 95 in St. Louis (the oldest FM rock station) without hearing precisely the same songs they were playing in 2008, 2002, and 1996, but if you do some looking, there's some great music still be to had and here's a new band for you.

What's great about their name is that you know precisely what they're all about straightaway. It's also nice that they didn't try to come up with the most offensively metal name they can think of. I can name too many bands like that.

It's easily discernible that we're talking about a damned heavy band right here that's going to be full of overdriven guitars in the vein of Metallica and Pantera, but wait, there's more!

Rifftera

Being Finnish... it would be hard for them to be straight thrash metal.

There's some death metal and, naturally, some black metal thrown in for good measure.

This is yet another band that proves the whole is always greater than the sum of its parts.

Vocally, there's no black metal screeching, which is great for me. Especially because overall the music doesn't call for it.

Between grunts, yells, growls, and anthem singing, Rifftera tells you everything they can think of. The vocals, like the rest of the album, are very diverse.

Let's talk about those riffs. Rifftera lives up to their name in oh so many ways. Riffing, melody interludes, overarching solos full of emotion, and some of the best guitar tones I've heard in many a day.

Then there's that black metal influence...the otherworldly keyboards just overneath...not quite under, not quite over, and not quite even with...the rest of the music. They give Rifftera a very unique sound in a me too world.

The drumming is crisp, intuitive, and on point from start to finish. It surprised me to find that Rifftera didn't have a drummer for this album, but hired a session man to do the work.

They should hire him. It was fantastic.

This is an album full of peaks, valleys, and divergent sounds. It sounds like nothing else while retaining a strong familiarity.

Release: 8/28/15
Genre: Death Metal
Label: Inverse Records
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