Inveighing Brilliance - Tribal Gaze
Death Metal has long been a genre that has remained on the outer edges of my taste buds when it comes to Metal, not because of a distaste for it, but rather an ignorance and lack of decent exposure to it. I’ve found over time that my interest in Death Metal has pointed me more in the direction of the genre’s multiple offshoots, like Deathcore, Melodic Death Metal, and Tech/Prog Death Metal. Despite this, I still “put my time in” and listened to some of the greats in the genre, like Slayer, Obituary, and Cannibal Corpse, but my listening habits remained rather surface-level. You may be asking yourself why the hell we're starting this review with a preamble about my Death Metal music history, but it’ll become quite clear when you give Tribal Gaze’s Inveighing Brilliance a listen. Inveighing Brilliance is a modern Death Metal record that manages to tap into the raw sound of 80s and 90s Death Metal while being contemporary enough to sound a little more polished and cleaned up for our modern ears. I felt it was important to set the stage before we dive in, as my ability to speak to the Death Metal genre may not be as in-depth or thought-provoking as it can be when I wax poetic about some of the other genres I’m much more familiar with.
As I mentioned, this record really taps into the Death Metal of yore, not trying to reinvent the wheel or incorporate too many other aspects of the million Metal genre spin-offs that have since spawned from the genre. Tribal Gaze plays it straight as if they were a band ripped out of the late 80s/90s, with the production value really being the outlier to the sound, tipping you off that you’re either listening to an old band’s remaster of a beloved record or a newer recording. The only piece of the recording that was slightly abrasive to me was how the cymbals were recorded, which at times sounded too quiet and were pitched a little high (but that’s just me nitpicking). There isn’t one weak member of this band either, with everyone pulling their weight. The drums are thunderous, the vocals are guttural and raw, the guitarists are shredding their asses off, and the bass grooves are deep and fun.
Typically, I like to end my reviews with a breakdown of songs I want to highlight you to listen to and what about them sticks out to me, but this is a rare exception where I’d implore you to just listen to the record front to back and find what speaks to you. One of the toughest things with Death Metal for me is that when you listen to a record, the tracks begin to bleed into one another, making it trickier to discern individual tracks that are standouts. Inveighing Brilliance is unfortunately not an exception to that feeling. Regardless, I had a great time listening to this record, and I feel like fans of Death Metal will certainly have a good time too! Make sure you check it out when it releases on October 17th, 2025, and keep listening to the final track even when you think it’s done, because there is more for your ears to feast on!