HADOPELAGYAL is a German black/death metal band that has remained active since 2016. "Nereidean Seismic End" is their first full-length album. It is released on the German label, "Ván Records." This album's production is raw, and the music sounds like it is being recorded underwater or from far away.

The album's first track, "Depravity Will Triumph," starts with nearly pure white noise. There is some tone modulation going on, but it's still static. The first guitar note comes in at one minute and fifteen seconds, which is too late. The raw production is immediately noticeable, as the music sounds muffled and lacks detail. Once the song gets going, there are the requisite blast beats and tremolos of black metal. The tremolos are down-tuned and create an immense wall of sound that not even the vocals can penetrate. The aforementioned vocals are hoarsely delivered. They approach the raspiness associated with black metal but have slightly more texture. Otherwise, the song develops nicely to a trite feedback ending.

The fourth track, "Blades Drawn From The Iron Marrow Of The Sunken Dead," which is an excellent title for a metal song, forgoes an intro and starts out full-force. The song decelerates, then quickly rises to full strength. After some hoarse screaming, the keyboards come in, which don't mesh with the rest of the music, making the song sound awkward. The song ebbs and flows but still manages to sound monotonous. The final third of this song sounds good. There is a slow, doom riff and some groaning vocals. Unfortunately, that doom metal passage is short-lived and cut off by a blast of feedback.

"Pitiless Stars In The Clasp Of Putrefaction" is another song with a cool, evocative opening riff that quickly fades into the murky production. Unfortunately, the brunt of this album consists of down-tuned tremolo picking and basic blast beats. The percussion rises above the noise at times during this track, but those moments are few and far between. The song continues with monotony until the requisite feedback ending.

The album closes with the ambient track, "ἄπειρος καὶ ἐρῆμος ἐστιν ἡ θάλασσα," which is Greek for "The sea is infinite and desolate." This one is nearly six minutes of radio static, thunderous booming, and high-pitched shrieking. Combined with the raw production, it all sounds like music coming from another room. Ambient tracks on metal albums equal filler in my book, and that's exactly what this is.

With "Nereidean Seismic End," HADOPELAGYAL plays music that is heavy on the ambient but low on production. It seems like every time they add in something novel; it gets swallowed by the ever-present wall of noise that makes up the majority of the album. It is doubtful that metal fans who like it raw will find enough captivating material to give this album a second listen.