[Reaper16]

23.) Absu - Abzu


Texas’ Absu are versatile masters of extreme metal. They can play pretty much anything, and on Abzu they play a blend of black metal and thrash metal that would sound a lot like Hades Archer (#26 on my list) except they replace the heavy dose of Bathory with technical death metal. This album is ****ing bananas. These drums seamlessly alternate between blastbeats and very complex, technical drum riffing. The guitars build up to an absolutely frantic pace and the whole thing gets so fast and so complex that it threatens to drive itself over a cliff. But Absu have been around for a while, and they know what to do from a songwriting standpoint to keep themselves in check. It’s a controlled chaos, and it pays dividends when you trust the band to keep everything on the rails, so to speak. Every time I listen to this album I just have an uncontrollable grin on my face.