Formed in 2014, CYNABARE URNE are a power-trio hailing from Finland. Despite being a new formation, the members of CYNABARE URNE possess a wealth of experience in the metal underground, across a wide variety of extreme styles, and with that experience dating back to even the mid '90s. The band made their recorded debut in the summer of 2016 with the two-song Fire the Torches EP, which HELTER SKELTER released on 10" vinyl and cassette tape formats later that year. A short but no-less-auspicious debut, the EP was aptly titled, displaying a sulfurous sort of death metal that was indeed fiery in intent and execution. In early 2018, CYNABARE URNE kept that momentum going with a four-song EP, In the Cremation Ground, which HELTER SKELTER released across a variety of formats over that year. Darker and deadlier, In the Cremation Ground put the band's name on the international metal map, heightening anticipation for the inevitable full-length. At last, it is here, bearing the ominous title Obsidian Daggers and Cinnabar Skulls. Much like debut albums should, Obsidian Daggers and Cinnabar Skulls encapsulates CYNABARE URNE's past whilst pointing the way for their future, displaying the band's best qualities and, in turn, revealing new (and darker, deadlier) truths. Right from the opening notes, the album exudes that miles-wide sense of space the band created early on...and then they proceed to CRUSH the listener with malevolent Metal of Death steeped in the ancients and with a miasmic sense of melody. Moving at many speeds, mesmerizing at every one, always flowing and always filthily, CYNABARE URNE's attack is neither strictly old-school nor new-school; stylistic nods span Sadistic Intent to Necros Christos, classic Grave to recent Dead Congregation, early Vader to later Repugnant, and plenty of other points in between. In a word: timeless. Thusly armed, the trio exhibit a masterful grasp of songcraft, imbuing their ever-twisting creations with dynamics and nuance as bountifully as they do genuine evil and menace. Likewise, the ever-pervasive sense of ritualism elevates these 10 tracks to more than just "death metal songs," like shadowy transmissions from the beyond made flesh and then harnessed with no small amount of magick. Even the production itself, both palpably physical and eerily atmospheric, becomes a ghastly, gestating-ichorously thing, wrapping its Lovecraftian tendrils around the listener and never letting go... Darkness. Doom. DEATH. Graced with suitably horrific cover artwork courtesy of Ville Salonen, CYNABARE URNE's Obsidian Daggers and Cinnabar Skulls is bound to be THE death metal debut album of the year!
