From the Greek black metal bastion of Athens emerge ELEVENTH RAY, with lamentations that have laid in wait for the best part of a decade. “What we were aiming to achieve was the creation of a purely black Magical death/thrash/black metal album without the lyrical satanic naivety of the past. Listening carefully to the album, you will realize that into this blend there is a striking ritualistic element with an ominous vibe and a heavy occult twist. Basically, “Reviving Tehom” is an album I would personally love to listen to but I could not find anywhere.”

The album has nine songs, and “Nightside of Damascus” is first. The opening riffs are simple, based in the open E chord, and the production is a bit on the poor side. The vocals are shouted, and the song fails to make much of an impact. “Ha Illan Ha Hizon TrianAdohl” begins with slower, more calculated tones, and the band is measuring the evil they want to release. But from there, it falls back to a familiar sound in line with the first song. The band is fairly adept at negotiating some pacing shifts however. “Path of the Bellator” is a short, two-minute song that consists of some sort of flute notes…or perhaps recorder. It really doesn’t go anywhere however. “IGUL” has a steadier sound, but the band is still using open E chords as the base for the song.

“Κόκκινη Αποκάλυψη” is another short song, at just over two-minutes. These shorter offerings do provide some balance to the aggressiveness of some of the other songs, they just don’t seem to go anywhere however. “ZODAMRAN NOX” is much deeper and darker, and it seems the band saved some real rage for this song. But once again, it falls back to that familiar sound, although the thumping bass notes at the end are great. “Pan Noctifer” has a steadier pace, and here I get more of the occult twist that the band described in their biography. I much prefer the throaty vocal style to the shouts, but that is just my preference. The title track is the closer, and it falls more in line with the Thrash genre.

Overall, this amalgam of Black/Thrash/Death Metal was at least uncommon in some of its approach, but it mostly relied on riffs that you have heard before, and they didn’t do enough the really elevate their sound.