NYN is a one-man progressive death metal project that has apparently finally pieced together a touring band this year. As a long time reader of Heavy Blog I’d followed Nyn’s earlier releases starting with their cover of In Flames “Jotun”, which was horrendous. The noisy “-core” influenced extreme and sometimes melodic death metal of early Nyn was amateurish and soon gave way to their 2014 debut. ‘Eventuality’ was djenty, wild, and had a weirdly shrieking vocal performance that occasionally recalled the cringe-worthy antics of early-00’s Dani Filth. I’m a shameless defender of crazy vocals, I mean I love Hellwitch more than most bands… The occasional Beavis vocals didn’t upset me at the time, it was more the programmed, cheap sound of the record that bugged me. The tone of it verged on the pomp and ugliness of something Brendan Small might do. Take that comparison as an insult if you will, I will point out that he’s also covered a Lamb of God song… ugh. But there was a lot to like about ‘Eventuality’ and I think ‘Entropy: Of Chaos and Salt’ offers a remedy to any issues with their debut record.

Noyan has taken influences from oriental and Arabic melodic traditions and made the Devin Townsend equivalent of something like Neuraxis ah via Nile. The riffs are playful and played at almost comical levels of speed but for whatever reason when I leave it playing it becomes entrancing and enjoyable. Heavier experimentation with keyboards and high speed drumming have lead to the perfect storm of late 90’s symphonic metal extravagance and early 00’s pre-djent/deathcore explosion technical death metal brutality. It is fidgety, vibrant, and features deeply layered performances that seem impossible to recreate outside of the studio. ‘The Apory of Existence’ is some kind of wild, beachy cyclone of extremity as it turns on a dime between Emperor synth, surf guitar, and ska riffs between brutal blasting and honking keyboard fury. It perfectly exemplifies the excessive nature of NYN and how refreshingly over the top metal can be in 2017.

NYN is fucking ridiculous in execution but written to be engaging enough to still hold value. You’re not just getting guitar runs and random synth tangents as the songs hold structure and highlight points of interest with greater maturity than any previous recording. As the record progresses so too does the music become more progressive, featuring cleanly howled vocals and the odd vocoder stuff you’d recognize from Cynic ‘Focus’. ‘Entropy…’ is definitely a product meant for forward-thinking extreme metal advocates who want something next-level beyond the now stagnating world of technical death metal and all of the Alchemist style experimentation and body horror strangeness made for a captivating listen.

Psychotic. 3.75/5.0