It's the latest album from these Californian technical death metallers who first wowed me with their debut Fear of Reality Exceeds Fantasy in 2008; once again, the band blasts off into the far reaches of insanely complex prog-death that finds itself obsessed with crazy time signatures, ridiculously heavy riffs, bowel-rupturing vocals, lots of flashy, fusiony bass guitar, and, of course, a shitload of obsessive conspiracy theorizing about humanity being controlled by a secretive underground race of reptilian humanoids. I have to admit, Embryonic Devourment's infatuation with the strange theories of David Icke just makes their weird conceptual death metal that much more fascinating to me, but even without all of the lyrics about alien reptiles controlling the destiny of the human race, this is intense shit. The album opens with an actual sample of Icke, then rips into the shredding complexity of "Militarized Reptoids" which rains down wild sweep arpeggios down on the listener as the band surges through one convoluted arrangement after another, spitting out chaotic, crushing riffs and dissonant soloing; I'm shaking my head half the time trying to sort out what I just heard. One of my favorite things about Embryonic Devourment is their tendency to weave lots of jazz fusion influenced parts into their death metal. It's not like Athiest or Pestilence, as these guys are much more harsh and labyrinthine in their approach, but that fusion element is definitely there, situated amid passages of awesome crushing chug. The songs are loaded with over-the-top shredding that's laced with pockets of stunning melodic majesty, enough that fans of bands like Behold The Arctopus, Indricothere or Spastic Ink could possibly get into this; and the awesome drumming is delivered with machine-like precision, flying through constant hairpin turns and time signature changes. They save one of the best for last with the closer "Perceiving The Multidimensional", ending the album with a blast of brutal jagged tech-death that transforms into a spaced out prog metal jam. Killer!

And the album art is terrific, with an illustrated cover that features shape shifting/fused skeletal forms, fanged reptilian monstrosities and exploding galaxies. Comes in a six panel full color digipack. Highly recommended for fans of extreme brutal prog death, Ulcerate, Gorguts, Origin, and Cephalic Carnage.