Hey, remember a few months back when I wrote, “The way I figure it, and I’m usually right when it comes to things like this, Thine Eyes Bleed will be your favorite heavy metal band very soon.” Yeah, well, I’m sticking by that statement more than ever, brothers and sisters, because once In the Wake of Separation is released in April, every screamo bitch, emo pussy, hardcore hand job, death metal spook, and ugly underground urchin will be stabbing themselves in the liver with broken pieces of bone just to say that they were there the day the sky turned black and rained blood. Got it? Good.

It’s been a fuckin’ chore waiting for this one, believe me. Recorded over a year ago, In the Wake of Separation has been sitting on the shelf, biding its time like a serial killer stalking its unsuspecting prey. And the more I listen to this album, it occurs to me that we’d all be better off if it stayed there, because no one deserves to be assaulted in such a visceral, chaotic manner. Now, I’m not saying the Canada is the new Scandinavia, but TEB have gone above and beyond the call of heavy metal duty here, easily establishing themselves as the undisputed lords of metal’s new future. If you need references, then the best I can give you is maybe the Carcass-driven track “Without Warning,” the early Soilwork melodic riffage on “And Since Forgotten” and “Innocent Mind,” or the Slayer battle cries of “Corpse You Up” and “Regret Your Fear.” But forget all that. This is uncharted apocalyptic wasteland, full of incalculable changes, spine-splitting breakdowns, rolling thunder, blood-curdling speed, and imminent death. Just take “Cold Victim,” which, to quote myself once more, is “the most intense, brutal, and deathly delicious song I’ve heard in metal music in quite some time.”

This is it. You’ve been warned.