Though they’re still radiating with tormented psyche via anguished classicist tones Boston, Massachusetts-borne death metal quartet INNUMERABLE FORMS kinda smoke their way through this frustrated, hard-struck third full-length album. As one of few ‘old school’ death/doom metal inspired bands today who not only reflect both sides of the suggested sub-genre fusion but possess enough skill to wield ’em these folks impress with tonal consistency, an ear for huge riffs, and high-grade performances on ‘Pain Effulgence‘. Though the production values and general personae of the band have been retained here they’ve shown us what else they can do with their sound already dialed in, making for an ideal showing of doom inflicted death metal which strikes at an even meaner clip.

Innumerable Forms was a solo side project from Justin DeTore (Dream Unending, Sumerlands, Battle Ruins, et al.) for nearly a decade of development before he’d expanded to a full quintet line-up for a well-regarded debut LP (‘Punishment in Flesh‘, 2018) that’d included folks best known for Power Trip, Genocide Pact, Iron Lung and such. Since I’d already gone into great depth on my review of their second LP (‘Philosophical Collapse‘, 2022) the short version is that the evolution of the band has generally reflected interest in ‘old school’ style death/doom metal with prime interest in both Finnish and U.K. scenes of the late 80’s/early 90’s, points where a band like Depravity (or even Demigod) might meet up with ‘Serenades‘. The big deal on that second album was the impact of traditional doom metal riffcraft upon their increasingly sombre sound, setting the band’s work apart from the sleepier vagaries of similar nowadays acts yet landing closer to the realm of groups like Solothus or even Hooded Menace to some degree. Expect direct iteration and extension of those ideals within ‘Pain Effulgence‘, at least when approaching at face value.

Taste level, an ear for destructive death and unreal doom, alongside meaningful iteration upon their previous work finds Innumerable Forms both fully recognizable and meaner than ever on album number four. In fact the only big changes here are practically unnoticeable, such as guitarist Chris Ulsh also performing bass guitar on the record, as they’ve once again worked with producer Arthur Rizk who has tempered the dynamic of the previous album so that ‘Pain Effulgence‘ is related but not an exact cloneage of the previous LP. Still, this is the same band and you’ll find their style still raises a flag for the 80’s doom metal stoked death metal of the Peaceville three’s primary impact and the horrors of Finnish/North American death metal’s monstrous aura. This time around we can look further beyond the Scandinavian underground for references just as well but, either way you’re getting a polished but authentic adjacency to the band’s 90’s death/doom metal muse once more. No bunk ass experimentation and no overstepping of sub-genre bounds.

A meaner, almost ‘Cause of Death‘ feeling rhythm guitar tone thunders hot across the plains here as dive-bombing leads and a flurry of DeTore‘s roared layers make for an imposing wind-up per opener “Impulse” as the band shreds and lunges into an unreal first statement. Right away you’ll notice the romanticist doomed tonality of the previous record is replaced by cold, granite-slabbed gravitas as their stone-faced n’ readied-up ‘old school’ death metal temperament continues to harden from there. “Indignation” takes the sprawl of the opener and its gusting momentum to a place of graven accost, surreal aggression which poisons the landscape it echoes across. There is yet misery within their volatile weave, as the leads soaring over slower doomed riffs in the final third of the song suggest, yet the tone of ‘Pain Effulgence‘ appears less cathartic and more stone-hewn this time around. If their setlist needed some harder-ass songs I feel like the first couple of songs on Side A are prime blood pushers and a great way to kick off the album.

While those first two songs introduce the timbre and tonal shift of Innumerable Forms‘ churn this time around the deeper-set throngs of riffs and the brain-bending impact of their work doesn’t fully start to fire off until “Blotted Inside” where both ‘old school’ death metal riffcraft and pensive doom arrive in anxious knot, leaning into the drowned ‘Lost Paradise‘-esque segue that characterizes the second half of the song. Both the songcraft and general cadence of the full listen here develop in a hairier, noisier way which feels more directly set upon the riff but the combination of discord and lamentation we found on songs like “Thrall” from the previous LP kick up quick. My favorite song on the album, “Dissonant Drift”, is a spectacle from every angle per its insane lead guitar work, wailing and groaning stuff atop the sauntering gloom and choppier grooves that eventually unfurl. It wasn’t so much that Side A took a couple songs to “wake up” but rather that the real pants-shitting, air guitar worthy stuff starts to ping in mind mid-record for my own taste… but there isn’t a single dud or filler track on this record.

The general impact of Side B matches that of Side A in the sense that a couple of shorter songs brace the listener for two longer, more involved pieces. The band’ve warmed up and though their ideas are straight-forward leads slung here are among the best of the quicker-shot licks. I’d particularly appreciated “Ressentiment” as it invoked a tinge of ‘Lost Paradise‘ influenced stuff most clearly with its rocking leads (around ~1:03 minutes in) while otherwise cutting through quick and easy with a simple, easily read song. The real clobber of ‘Pain Effulgence’ comes at its end point where the title track (“Pain Effulgence”) takes a moment to reach its full stride (see: the riff @ ~2:31 minutes in) but expertly reflects not only traditional doom metal wane but the British side of the Sabbath groove, be it melodic death/doom or trad stuff. There is a real apex found within this song, a destination beyond the steadily ramping affectation that builds across the full listen ’til this point of fully fallen tonality. I hate to make the comparison as it could miss the mark for some but the second of of the song kinda hits like earlier Crowbar at their most poignantly dejected as the riff hangs in the air for a moment or two.

The drums are a dominant force throughout the bulk of ‘Pain Effulgence‘, the opener stomps harder than most outright, but I hadn’t fully keyed into their kick ’til the hulk of closer “Austerity and Attrition” set them more up front for its intro. Echoing the trudge of the title track this song offers a hard-edged, whipped at climb which finds a similar point of plateau in its first third but lingers there quite a bit longer for the sake of ulterior tension. What goes up must come down and at a comparable clip we exit the cemeterial staunch of the mid-song section and rush headlong into the abysm around ~4:28 minutes, exiting at the same speed as we’d started for a dramatic endpoint to a fine album. I’ve primarily walked through the nausea of the last few songs here for the sake of implying that this third LP from the band begins to make a case for its own sound, leaving behind fewer referential markers without culling the morbid and misery bound tonality of their work. The deeper into the tracklist I’d gotten the fewer comparisons there were to reach for despite a pretty classic, un-fucked with sound in hand.

Though I’d praised the previous Innumerable Forms record up and down the hall for its still brutal treatment of melodic death/doom metal adjacent tonality I’m just as impressed here on this follow-up, an album which almost balances things in the other direction as their ratio of pure death metal with doom metal riffs veers in a harder or slightly more straight forward bent. Their discography continues to expand while maintaining a consistent personage and this should impress nowadays for the sake of finding diminishing returns in many similarly styled, quickly iterative acts that’d cropped up beyond the pandemic. Again there isn’t a miss or an inadvisable swing taken here and that fully listenable, repeatable quality presented at a timeless standard is exactly the sort of death metal record I’ll continue to reach for and spin for years. A very high recommendation.

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