TERMINALIST: MetalSucks Premieres “Estranged Reflection” Video From Danish Hyperthrash Quartet; The Great Acceleration Out Now On Indisciplinarian

July 29, 2021 Infrared Magazine Music News, News, Press Releases Comments Off

photo by Jacob Dinesen

Danish hyperthrash quartet TERMINALIST released their debut album, The Great Acceleration, through Indisciplinarian in May of this year. MetalSucks is now hosting the band’s newest official video for the album, created for the song “Estranged Reflection.”

The Great Acceleration is an ambitious outburst of sci-fi laden aggressive and progressive metal working within the conceptual framework of dromology, a theory of speed as proposed by the French thinker Paul Virilio. Following several singles and official videos surrounding the album’s release, TERMINALIST has once again created a visual companion to their music alongside director Johan Von Bülow, this time as a close up performance video for the album track “Estranged Reflection.”

Lead singer and guitarist Emil Hansen states, “Where the narrative on The Great Acceleration is about venturing further out into space, much like the billionaires of our time, the visuals for the album have taken the opposite direction. We started off in macro perspective on ‘Relentless Alteration,’ descended onto Earth on ‘Terminal Dispatch,’ and now, on ‘Estranged Reflection,’ we conclude the journey in our rehearsal space where the album was written.”

MetalSucks writes, “Danish genre-melders TERMINALIST have a healthy respect for both the new and old, at once paying respect to the forefathers of metal while taking influence from what’s going on around them now. On ‘Estranged Reflection,’ the official video for which we’re pleased to premiere to the world today, the band channels the proggy, jazz-inflected thrash of yesteryear — Voivod and Coroner, most notably — and infuses it with a newer-school approach (ala Skeletonwitch and Revocation). But TERMINALIST are far from mere copy-cats or chameleons: the X-factor is a subtle post-punk influence, and you’ll know it when you hear it.”

Watch TERMINALIST perform “Estranged Reflection” first through MetalSucks now at THIS LOCATION.

Also watch the previously released videos for “Relentless Alteration” HERE and “Terminal Dispatch” HERE.

The Great Acceleration was recorded and produced by Lasse Ballade (Konvent, Alkymist, Deiquisitor, Slægt, Orm) at Ballade Studios in Copenhagen during the summer of 2020, mastered by V. Santura (Triptykon, Dark Fortress) at Woodshed Studio in Germany, and completed with fascinating artwork created by Ryan T. Hancock.

The Great Acceleration is out now on LP limited to 300 copies on Black and 100 copies on Red vinyl, as well as cassette, and digital formats, available at the Indisciplinarian webshop HERE and through all digital providers including Bandcamp HERE.

TERMINALIST has just been confirmed for the prestigious Danish showcase festival SPOT Festival in Aarhus on Sept 17th, as well as a headlining gig at Pumpehuset, Copenhagen on Sept 23rd alongside Danish sludgers Dirt Forge and Dying Hydra. But before hitting the Fall dates, the band will play a free pandemic regulated outdoor show at Byhaven Pumpehuset, Coepnhagen on August 7th alongside tech death act Mother Of All. More shows in both Denmark and abroad are being planned and to be announced in the coming months.

TERMINALIST Live:
8/07/2021 Byhaven Pumpehuset – Copenhagen, DK w/ Mother Of All
9/17/2021 Spot Festival @ Train – Aarhus, DK
9/23/2021 Pumpehuset – Copenhagen, DK w/ Dirt Forge, Dying Hydra

TERMINALIST formed in 2018 and debuted a year later with the EP, Abandon All Liberties, followed in 2020 by the single “Voyagers.” The four-man band harken back to the traditional and technical thrash metal of the late 1980s, bringing it up to date by fusing it with black metal blast beats, death metal growls, and grandiose prog rock concepts. The result is modern in its concoction, yet retro in its appeal; a style the band itself has dubbed hyperthrash.

The world is ruled by speed. Speed which drives history forward in a state of ever-increasing acceleration. Such is the central claim of dromology; a theory of speed originated by French philosopher Paul Virilio (1932-2018). It is on this premise that TERMINALIST bases their conceptual universe. On The Great Acceleration, they bring the dromocratic philosophy together with their own science fiction narratives as they describe a world in crisis and a planet in collapse being abandoned in favor of colonization of space.

TERMINALIST uses the lens of dromology to describe the duality of technology and investigate Virilio’s thesis that the invention of the ship was also the invention of the shipwreck; continuing the thrash metal tradition of political criticism and pessimism about the future. Yet, TERMINALIST fits in among a new generation of metal bands using the genre’s monstrous sounds to illustrate the downfall of modern society in favor of something new and unknown. This is conveyed in a sound which is fast and aggressive, melodic, and dynamic; catchy, yet technical.