weird

From Alice Cooper’s face paint and Iron Maiden’s elaborate stage sets to Watain’s demon-summoning rituals and Ghost’s hooded robes, heavy metal has always had a close relationship with “performance.” Substance comes first, without a doubt, but performance ain’t far behind. Dimmu Borgir dress up like Satanic carnival barkers. Glen Benton branded an upside-down crucifix into his forehead. Robb Flynn had that Insane Clown Posse hair during The Burning Red days. Simply put, the spectacle of creating extreme music seems to be one of its most potent aspects, and countless bands have used it to their advantage.

Obake’s self-titled debut is a worthy soundtrack to finishing off a nightcap on such evenings when you’re expecting some gnarly spectral giant to visit mid-dream and inform you in disembodied tones of some uncomfortable truths, or deliver a prophecy on your soon-to-be-doomed future. Sure, when the opening riff to “Human Genome Project” kicks in, Obake…