Marking 20 years as a band, Finnish death metal band LETHERIA has finally released their debut full-length, "Death - Principle." When it comes to sound, LETHERIA sound like a blackened AUTOPSY, which can be expected when it comes Finnish Death Metal. LETHERIA are pretty much what CONVULSE or FUNEBRE sounded like back in the day, only with cleaner production and blackened influence. Personally, I've never been a huge fan of the Finnish Death Metal scene. CONVULSE's "World Without God" is an undeniable classic, as is FUNEBRE's "Children of the Scorn." However, other than the first two AMORPHIS albums, those are the only ones I really find myself enjoying. However, LETHERIA's debut album is definitely one that I can say is a personal favorite of Finnish Death Metal.

It's not like this album is anything extraordinary. The riffs are great, but they aren't very original. They're just executed perfectly. The areas that this album excels in are songwriting and execution. Because these two fundamentally crucial aspects of music are represented so well on this album, it makes it sound great, no matter how unoriginal the riffs are. "Pestchrist" is a great example of this because the riffs are chugs and power chords for the most part. Is it original? Absolutely not. Is it effective because of song structure and good musicianship? Absolutely.

Another thing that makes this album stand out is the production. It's much cleaner than its Finnish brothers from decades earlier. I'm not saying I don't like raw production. In fact, I really don't mind raw production. However, this style sounds so much more crisp with good production. "Call the Horns" is a good example of this because of its melody and layers. I'm not saying that you wouldn't be able to hear the melody or depth of the song with poor production; however, it becomes more effective with better production. Speaking of melody, this band has a very interesting sense of it spread throughout their filthy sound. The AUTOPSY influence is obvious, but there are times when I hear AMORPHIS influence. This is present in tracks like "Death Hand Path," "Call the Horns," and "Malaria Magdelena," among others. The melody is epic and possesses emotion very similar to that of "Tales from the Thousand Lakes" by AMORPHIS.

As far as Finnish Death Metal goes, and old school Death Metal in general, this album is actually very good. I was not expecting it to be good, as I find most modern death metal to be boring, but when I noticed that they were formed in 1998, my hopes heightened, and were eventually met.