Black Crown Initiate's debut E.P in 2013 - Song of the Crippled Bull - received quite a few rave reviews across the interwebs, and rightly so: a tech-death attack with flurries of melody, progressiveness and most importantly atmosphere. Unafraid to experiment with clean vocals and the softer side of the genre, Black Crown Initiate's sound is a hybrid of Opethian progression, Obscuran experimentation and Pyscroptitian brutality. Their debut album, The Wreckage of Stars, was released a year later in 2014: a similarly unorthodox atmospheric tech-death approach.
My knowledge of the more contemporary clean sounding tech-death isn't as profound as other sub-sub-sub genres of sub-genres, but there is a particular other-worldliness and expansive playfulness that, when done to a high standard, can be incredibly immersive, powerful and awe-inspiring. Black Crown Initiate are one such band who have awe-inspiring moments (others cut from a similar cloth: Psycroptic, Wormed (more brutal), Blotted Science, Pyrrhon) forged from fresh songwriting, interesting progressions and an ability to merge technical proficiency with a more human touch.
They were the first band I ever crowd-funded and when I received my stuff from their home in Pennsylvania, USA to the UK I was greatly satisfied; they are only going to get better and I'm willing to throw my money at them like a tech-death whores whenever new music is announced. Coincidentally, the band have announced on their Facebook page that their new album is full recorded in the studio.
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