1653 - Hate Alchemy of Blood 2013

With their debut release on Napalm Records, Poland's death metal machine Hate unleash 'Solarflesh' on the death metal scene. The corpse-painted death metallers with the newer shines of black metal glean influenced by modern Satyricon offer up a more refined – and perhaps even more crushing – take on a sound that the band have been developing since (at least) 2003’s Awakening Of The Liar, a hybrid of black atmospherics and brutal death metal aggression. Barbed and bristling with razor-sharp hooks, “Alchemy Of Blood” develops from a neck-snapping, stuttering opening into a more demonic, haunting piece of tense melody and sudden, stabbing heaviness, whose torrent of rabid, guttural vocals is offset by the machine-like precision of the slicing guitar riffs and hammering drum work.