Consumed by unspeakable maw and genetically conjoined into an immense, stellarly set monstrosity this third full-length album from Portland, Oregon-based progressive death metal quartet ÆNIGMATUM appears as if crafted from countless undulating thoughts, a massive mosaic sentience now entering its third-stage actualization. Here the journey rather than the destination excites as ‘Infinitude’s Passage‘ presents top-tier meditation upon progressive but never dryly performative death metal, a feat which forces the mind to flex in response to its thousand-armed, high-density action. Forlorn yet exploratory in vision the band’s authorship only gains ground here in terms of presenting an aggressive, riff-forward form of high-brained yet melodic mastery.

Ænigmatum formed back in 2017 between folks known for their work in Torture Rack, Mountain Grave, and Blood Freak (among others) aiming to challenge themselves with a more emotive medium where their grandiose visions could best seep through. Their debut LP (‘Ænigmatum‘, 2019) presented a deeply inward-seeking form of death metal, resembling an expansion of The Chasm‘s ‘The Spell of Retribution‘ and its short distance from melodic black/death a la ‘The Somberlain‘. To their own credit they’d brought a brilliant sense of technical finesse to that first album, a product of the musician’s collective skill levels preaching toward expression rather than showmanship.

This ends up being the enduring conundrum of their craft thus far in that Ænigmatum‘s work doesn’t fully commit to melodic death nor tech-death but rather brandishes each within the greater umbrella of progressive death metal. You’ll find this loudest and clearest on their second LP, ‘Deconsecrate‘ (2021), as it’d presented a heightened state of technical/progressive abandon alongside a new threshold of attack which I’d compared to the wallop-and-weave of StarGazer‘s ‘The Scream that Tore the Sky‘ and later Anata in review at the time. I’d nothing but high praise for that record, setting it at #20 on my Top 75 Albums of the Year, and that is good enough reason to be stoked for ‘Infinitude’s Passage‘ full stop.

A half-decade later Ænigmatum are no less of a well-oiled machination of the ever searching mind yet ‘Infinitude’s Passage‘ presents as a frantic brainstorming session, minds alight with cross-streaming intricacies and work characterized by fractally shot gesticulation. The high density authorship of the quartet hasn’t devolved in skill or voice but you will find the same signature sorted out on ‘Ænigmatum‘ approached here outright via opener “Pitiless Mechanism” and “Inseverable” where the virtuosic flourishes of ‘Deconsecrate‘ certainly factor but the trudging seeker driving the band presses on in similarly tense authorship. That is to say that their work is still recognizable as their own despite the abundant, run-on glom presented within first impressions.

Detangling the composer’s hand here is probably the most daunting challenge issued by Ænigmatum to date but here they’ve positioned themselves behind more anxious, readied up sea-change moments overall, favoring winding non-linear sojourn and prog-death surrealism. Each track is self-contained, its own conversational track which supersedes any sort of hook or repetitious recall beyond a few ear grabbing rants, such as the tunneling progressions of late album spark “Nocturne of Ageless Reverie”; The most daunting of the six-song lot is probably “Architects of the Fated” where spoken word in stereo and upward scaling basslines induct the ear into variously battling and grotesquely harmonized guitar performances. It makes sense to push the general ‘pocket’ presented by the first couple of songs on Side A into a sprawling-as-possible framework, only cycling back (~4:51 minutes in) for the sake of re-rooting their starting point. The non-linear feeling of ‘Infinitude’s Passage‘ and the vexing flow through it all is one of its most compelling features.

Side B isn’t vastly different as Ænigmatum are generally on a tear front-to-back with this third album but I’d highlight “A Tarnished Nexus” as one of my favorite pieces on ‘Infinitude’s Passage‘ where the mid-to-late 90’s Schuldiner-esque wrangling of its first half particularly stood out. Otherwise the aforementioned “Nocturne of Ageless Reverie” and its thrashing, aggressive trod could be considered the peaking high of the full arc, heading in the direction of the extended largely instrumental closer. A forlorn tone builds across those three final songs lending the full listen a dramatic, slightly less harried second act; The greater feeling presented by the full listen took a while to sink in on my part, finding Side A restless and existentially questioning outright, suitable for the trek taken, whereas the second half appeared to be the fallout in response. This is made slightly more confounding by increasingly abstract lyrics feeling like they were taken from Asimov style world building, eh, in a good way.

In line with the best of aggressive prog-death authorship the thousand tendril flexing writhe of ‘Infinitude’s Passage‘ escapes any sort of obviate clarity or minimalism as a point of personage, creating a vortex of springing basslines and dizzying swaths of erratic riffcraft to a thrilling state of disarray. From tunneling sorcery to neck-wrenching breakthroughs set to interrupt Ænigmatum prompt the mind to flex in chase after their fleet-handed illustrative style, a sound well-suited beside cover artwork from Daniel Hermosilla, and toward an otherworldly pool of vexing surrealism. Becoming entrenched in this album, sorting through its dense yet wildly flowing foray was a big part of its experiential value on my part. No doubt scouring through its not-so obvious lyricism helped to create a sense of the search for meaning in chaotic existence too, and this’d only compounded over the course of countless listens. A very high recommendation.

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