In a hailstorm of unearthly rhythmic volley and thruster-gassed attack Kraków, Poland-based technical death metal duo DORMANT ORDEAL convey themes of existentially distressing conflict amidst broader collapse for this fourth full-length album. A hammer-and-float wail toward total dissolution ‘Tooth and Nail‘ speaks in volatile extremes beyond their alchemical treatment of groove-riddled and sometimes blackened death metal admixture, presenting a dire situation in an affected and often eruptive state. The reality of violence depicted in their movements is not exaggerated but instead an appropriately imposing showing from folks who’d more than likely clawed and gnashed their way toward realizing this demanding, senses-fraying result. For the knowing fandom it’ll serve as secure follow-up to thier previous work, a better understood self via a bout of notable change.

Dormant Ordeal began as a solo tech-death project mid-2005 by way of drummer Radek Kowal who’d performed and rendered everything for a couple of MySpace-era demos. Though neither have been archived an official promotional demo would release in 2009 after the band proper was formed circa 2008. Kowal was then joined by guitarist Maciej Nieścioruk, bassist Kacper Działdowski and vocalist Maciej Proficz (Cursebinder) who’d filled out what I’d consider the Mark II line-up, a setup which would continue on from that point until 2021. We can still get a glimpse of their Decapitated-esque groove metal built tech-death sound on one surviving track from that promo (‘More to Come‘, 2009) but of course all of their work up to that point culminated into their debut LP (‘It Rains, It Pours‘, 2013) an album I’d considered inventive in some ways and generic in others with consideration for Polish death metal style of the previous ten years.

Rather than repeat myself a handful of years later it’d make sense to refer to the second and third paragraphs in my review of Dormant Ordeal‘s third LP (‘The Grand Scheme of Things‘, 2021) wherein I’d detailed their formation and evolution of style via their discography leading up to that album. Keywords were: Decapitated, Ulcerate, and Ingurgitating Oblivion‘s second LP with my closing comment on the LP being: “Dormant Ordeal‘s third record isn’t a break outside the box [but] rather sets itself as a standout surge of pieces within a paradigm that rarely matches high-brained contemplative perspective with notably reactive performative values.” That is to say that on that album they’d found an atmospheric/progressive melt amidst their lightspeed movements and technical death metal trample… plus the lyrics were especially good. That Mark III version of the band was a trio with Nieścioruk handling both guitar and bass duties and now for this follow-up only Nieścioruk and Proficz return as Kowal exited the band circa ~2023.

Dormant Ordeal largely continues by the will and the wits of Nieścioruk who acts as the main composer and curator of ‘Tooth and Nail‘. What this means is a total refinement of the rhythmic body of their craft as a band which is thankfully still rooted in high-expressive death metal but void of the chunking, percussive grooves found on past releases (“Orphans” has a bit of a moment, though.) This eventually manifests as a natural thought beyond ‘The Grand Scheme of Things‘ in terms of surreal atmosphere applied to volatile and energetic modern death metal movements, though much has changed in their rhythmic vision. The tempo map has been prescribed to a session drummer (Chason Westmoreland of Brand of Sacrifice, Cambion and Demon King) who has brought some of his own hyper-active flair to the fills and overall demanding work of this album’s rhythms.

While songcraft from Nieścioruk focuses intently on the interplay and action between the multi-level guitar work and drum patternation, and this is a wild spectacle worthy of the price of entry, it also means the bass guitar and vocals aren’t as much of a priority for Dormant Ordeal‘s most compelling use of hotly flung patternation and strictly chopped through tech-death muse. As opener “Halo of Bones” hits and the guitar’s arabesque melodic warp sparks in mind these considerations don’t feel as immediate, the vocals are imposing in their command and the bass sounds like a bolt gun in the distance as the song rallies through. As the album tarries on through its dread-luminant dramatic voice (“Horse Eater“) the listener should quickly relent to the intended focus of the guitar work and the barrage built around.

The ladder-climbing razor cut step of the main verse riffs which introduce “Orphans” given to blackened death metal swells ultimately caught my neck first, wrenching my brains fully out of skull with the harder hit grooves and brutality of its second half. The pit stirring riff that hits ~3:50 minutes into the song was more-or-less the moment that’d convinced me to take a more serious listen to the details on this record, much in the same way “Bright Constellations” had on ‘The Grand Scheme of Things‘. So, Side A is obviously the big event here even on the first roll through as all of the main preview tracks’ve been pulled from it and it definitely feels like “Solvent” was intended as a grand sprawling mid-album heat to follow up on the early momentum built as well as a point to introduce some post-black/melodic black metal inspired movements to illustrate a dire, surreal mood. I wouldn’t suggest this song necessarily smacks of like, Mgła or something, but rather might indicate some interest in moderne Polish black metal and its increasingly creative variants… if only briefly.

Side B essentially finishes the thought, exploring both the brutality and the wandering hand that’d been the brilliant main feature of Dormant Ordeal‘s previous LP. While it is an unmerciful act that brings back their energetic tech-death hammer on “Dust Crown” this is one of the more coherently presented tracts of violence and respite they’ve managed on ‘Tooth and Nail‘, taking that dramatic anxious tonal stretch which carries throughout the album and finding space for lament beyond ~3:13 minutes or so as the main lead starts to brew and the skies clear very briefly. The shape of the second half is not so different from the first but the action is more compacted, ringing with more readily expressed dread and fewer standout moments for my own taste. With that said “Everything That Isn’t Silence is Trivial” is a grand point of profundity, a proper closing piece which has the sort of larger thesis of ‘Tooth and Nail‘ in its craw alongside some of the more dramatic, ethereal atmospheric movements on the album.

Though I’m not sure I found any particularly deep connection with ‘Tooth and Nail‘ compared to the mind-churning thought applied to their previous album (also, I’ve not read the lyrics) it would be fair to suggest Dormant Ordeal have made a serious leap into their future with this fourth album per an intensely focused hand applied to their overall authorship. At times this yields too singular a thought, an anxious and dramatic tone which characterizes the full listen and overtakes it on the rush through, yet this serves the final pinnacle of the experience (or, of both halves of it) well with intense action within a mostly coherent thread. The containment of this record’s malaise of spirit makes for a downward rocketed feat, a riveting soar toward collapse wherein their embittered capsule grants a refined yet eruptive modern death metal experience well worth dosing on repeatedly. A high recommendation.

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