Since 1997, DESTRUKTOR have been proudly flying the flag for Australian extreme metal. While quite often do their recordings come within large gaps of time – their second album, Opprobrium, was released back in 2015 – these Aussie tyrants have been patiently honing a sound that seethes with the war-metalled fire their homeland's world renowned for, yet over the years finessed with an acute attention to propulsive, immediately memorable songcraft. Black metal, death metal, thrash, "war metal," whatever: DESTRUKTOR are their own paradigm by now, and it is eternal. Such is the case with their long-awaited third album, Indomitable. All-too-perfectly titled, Indomitable sounds like it could've come at any point in DESTRUKTOR's quality-over-quantity career: eight stout tracks of scathing, surging, no-nonsense extreme metal. Indeed, founding vocalist / guitarist Glenn Destrukor and longtime drum-tornado Jared maintain the same, singed-black rage that have made their two full-lengths and two EPs such touchstones of Down Under extremism, but here they are joined by old friend / new addition Chris on bass, who exhibits the best low-end work on any DESTRUKTOR recording and fully complements their characteristic chaos vs. control dynamic. Lean and mean at 34 minutes just like its predecessor, Indomitable continues the band's proverbial sharpening of blades; their fury still walks that fine line between chaos and control - neither too blackened, nor too deathly, nor "thrashing" in any cliche way - but the clear-yet-crushing production (at Melbourne's renowned Toyland Studio) amplifies tenfold their scabrous assault, making it somehow grittier and more gleaming in equal measure. It's impossible not to get inexorably swallowed by the album's slipstream: Indomitable is death in sonic format, bereft of belief, joy, and light. And yet, DESTRUKTOR can still surprise, for Indomitable features the band's darkest and most personal lyrics to date, fully committed to the concept of death in many forms. And, if we are to read into the lyrics of climactic closer "The Path to Lucifer," there's an allusion to returning to dust, but rest easy: after delivering undoubtedly their best work after 30 years of existence - truly, an exception to rule of metal bands wimping out or worsening as the years slog on - DESTRUKOR are in no danger of disbanding anytime soon. Riff after riff, blast after blast, death after death, Indomitable is catchy-yet-unrelenting dark extreme metal for the dark and the darker. DESTRUKTOR are truly eternal.
