Angelmaker / A Night In Texas – Unholy Alliance

Published by PecksMetalPicks on July 14, 2018

Angelmaker and A Night In Texas released a split EP on Halloween of 2016 called ‘Unholy Alliance’ and it was one of the strongest deathcore releases of the year. A Night In Texas does the first three songs and Angelmaker does the second three.

A Night In Texas’ part is pretty good but unsurprisingly Angelmaker’s part is the real highlight. If you listened to this back in 2016 you probably aren’t surprised by deathcore’s current state and the direction it’s headed in. We have evolved past the times of Chelsea Grin making ‘Desolation of Eden’. Having simple, chuggy breakdowns doesn’t cut it anymore. Both of these bands are capable of playing crazy fast while still having heavy breakdowns, and spanning the entire spectrum of high and low vocals.

I’m a little disappointed in A Night In Texas because they had already released “Rotten King” as a single and then reused it for this. Also, the fact that they made “Fuck Your God” so edgy was lame; I’m sort of over the in-your-face anti religion lyrics and I think that phase is dying out so it just seemed like a weak attempt to grab some attention.

Angelmaker on the other hand used this EP to add a few more classics to their discography. It’s interesting because A Night In Texas’ three songs last 11:45 and Angelmaker’s last 15:48 so their part is substantially longer and re-listening to it gets me even more excited for their new album. The dynamic they have between their two screamers is so sick; they have a ton of variety in how they can combine styles and switch off.

Faster, more technical deathcore is the future of the genre, especially as bands continue to mix in slam and death metal. These two bands helped usher in the new era of deathcore, and I’ll be surprised if Angelmaker doesn’t become one of the biggest deathcore bands in the next few years.