BLOOD INCANTATION is a Death Metal band from Denver, CO. "Timewave Zero" is the group's third full length album, released by Century Media Records on February 25, 2022.

Forget everything you know about BLOOD INCANTATION up until this point, however, because this album sounds nothing like their previous efforts. Gone is the astrologically-inspired, quasi-psychedelic spin on Death Metal that the band was known for on past releases like "Starspawn" and "Hidden History of the Human Race." In its place, BLOOD INCANTATION have come out with a complete surprise: an Ambient Synthwave album. Yes, you read that correctly. The only thing that is even remotely similar to their past works is the fact that Ambient music does tend to remind me of outer space and aliens, so there is that.

This is a very difficult album for me to comment on. I can't really speak to the production value, as there is not much in the way of instrumentation except for synthesizers, but the musical layers certainly seem to blend well together. Obviously, there are no riffs that I can comment on, or vocals, or drums, or even highlights that I can talk about, as the album is only two tracks long. Perhaps this was intentional on the part of the band.

"Io" and "Ea" serve as two distinct pieces of music, evolving slowly throughout their lengthy running times of about 20 minutes each. While "Io" has more of a New Age feel to it, "Ea" evokes memories of classic soundtracks like The Terminator and Bladerunner, especially with its catchy, arpeggiated melody in the beginning. Each piece is broken up into different movements that blend seamlessly into one another, giving them a through-composed feel. Whoever in the band was behind this piece of music was clearly influenced by the works of greats like Brian Eno, Vangelis, and John Carpenter.

Overall, this is not the album that I was expecting from this group, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. Am I a huge fan of Ambient music? Not really. But do I think this is an interesting change of pace for a band like BLOOD INCANTATION that is still somewhat keeping with their overall thematic body of work? Absolutely.