When I listen to Brooklyn, New York's TOMBS, the music simply sounds like suffering. It sounds like the music was written out of suffering, sullen people who enjoy creating a groove-ridden catchy song. That is the best I can describe their new EP, "All Empires Fall". After getting much praise for their 2014 record "Savage Gold", the band takes a much more melodic venture back into extreme metal. The synthesizers played by the idiosyncratic backup vocalist Fade Kainer add a dope-sick psychedelia flavor to the devastating guitars and drums.

There are so much catchy riffs on this EP. The most outright prolific of these songs is certainly "Deceiver". This song really captured my attention when I saw TOMBS perform this live last Summer at a music festival (you can actually read about it here). This song is quite powerful and really gets stuck in your head. The way the lyrics are chanted and shrieked simultaneous really gives the chorus a demonic but impressive characteristic.

The other notable tracks, like "V", have the band offer up some music that is more somber. You can note that the clean vocals on this track draw inspiration from bands like BAUHAUS and SISTERS OF MERCY, two bands that are most noteworthy in the Gothic Rock circles. On this song, TOMBS crosses this great divide with between Black Metal and Art Punk, Alternative Rock, and influences far separated from the Extreme Metal sound. The dark, depressing tone like this can also be heard on the slow-tempo track "Last Days of Sunlight", which sounds like the most evil David Bowie song that he never wrote.

But aside from "V", the more straightforward Metal songs like "Deceiver" and "Obsidian", two very crushing and relentless tracks that seem like the style of music I would come to expect from a band like TOMBS. The drumming (from Charlie Schmid) really sound great exactly when they need to. There are many moments on "V" and "Obsidian" where the drums really took these songs to the next, darker, and heavier level. I think the guitars sound good but they are mixed into the tracks in a way that you sort of forget about them over the strange sounds of the synthesizer and the vocals. But the song "Deceiver" wouldn't be as good as it is without these guitars. The Blackened guitar riffs are intermittently dispersed through all of the songs and really carry the bulk of the music.

Although this release was very short, I would say I enjoyed a good majority of what I heard from it. I think the linear feel of the album gets muddled when "Last Days of Sunlight" is placed right in the middle of the record, which is the weakest track of the five. But everything else you will hear on this album is awesome! TOMBS will make you suffer for it!