Cross the Styx

Most old school death metal fans will know the importance of the Dutch scene. The Netherlands spawned several 'big' names like Pestilence, Gorefest and Asphyx, as well as underground acts like Sempiternal Deathreign and God Dethroned. The scene never had a singular 'sound' to compete with Florida or Stockholm, but the quality was high. Sinister were near the top of this particular pile and "Cross the Styx" is their first and best album. It is blistering, punishing and suffocating. This record boils the essence of Florida death metal in a cauldron, and spices it up with some European occult darkness.

The main similarities are with American death metal acts. The torsion of Morbid Angel and Possessed is one influence (e.g., the old school technicality of "Putrefying Remains"). The brute force of Massacre is another (such as the mid-paced sections of "Sacramental Carnage"). Still, the best comparison is Deicide. This record sits between the first two Deicide albums, both chronologically and stylistically. It has the catchy, muscular sound of that band’s debut (e.g., the riffing in "Perpetual Damnation"), and the extremity that would soon appear on "Legion" (an inferior album to this one).

That said, this still sounds like a European death metal album. It shares similarities with other dark death metal bands from the era, particularly (early) Necrophobic. Songs like "Doomed" and "Epoch of Denial" have those rolling, marching riffs that are surprisingly rare in death metal. The production, handled by the guys from Atrocity, is thick and infernal. This makes "Cross the Styx" more intense than American equivalents (like "Imperial Doom" or "Ritual of Infinity"). This production is perfect for Sinister. The instruments sound clear, but each is secondary to the overall atmospheric fog. It gives the album a sweltering, furnace-like feel that is unlike anything else I've heard.

The album’s greatest strength is in how it switches between different speeds. Equal precedence is given to fast, medium and slow; an under-appreciated trait of elite old school death metal. This means there is the right balance between groove and blasting, which brings out the best in both. This is some of the most purposeful blasting I’ve ever heard on a death metal record. Sinister uses blasts to release tension and energy, allowing the songs to reach further levels of cathartic rage. I cannot think of another album that blasts for such an expressive, emotive purpose. Few death metal bands sound as angry and explosive as Sinister do here.

This is a cult classic for death metal veterans who enjoy finding the subtle differences between bands. It isn’t necessarily a record I would recommend to death metal neophytes. It has a couple of inconsequential flaws; the intro and outro are pointless, the soloing technique won’t please guitar purists. It also lacks a standout track that would provide an anchor for immediate recognition (for example, a “Chopped in Half”, an “Out of the Body” or a “Chapel of Ghouls”). I like this one a lot though. Sinister never matched this primal energy again. Their second and third albums are decent, with better musicianship, but they lack the white-hot intensity found here.

Holland’s Sinister hardly need an introduction from myself; along with Pestilence, Asphyx, and Gorefest they make up the backbone of the Netherlands section of any serious death metallers record collection. Although less idiosyncratic than their fellow countrymen, their first clutch of releases did tap into – and improve upon – a much loved variant of death metal that most directly grew out of thrash. Their debut LP ‘Cross the Styx’ (1992) sits somewhere between the elegant pummelling of Vader and the complex yet brutal jigsaw that is Deicide’s ‘Legion’.

Frantic riffs fly by at a rate too fast for the ear to fully digest. Just as we have become accustomed to one idea the music races on. Although none of the time signatures are particularly complex, the tempo changes many times within a track, and often before the listener is ready for it. This gives the music a brutal playfulness lacking in more intricate works. The sharp guitar tone, which is reminiscent of Asphyx circa ‘The Rack’, aids this. There are also some punk riffs thrown into the slower passage with a hint of a major key here and there. This further adds to the subversion-through-brutality that is Sinister at this time. Playing atonally before dropping a major chord within such hard and fast music lends a feeling of triumph to the cacophony.

For that reason Sinister act as a kind of bridge between the Morrisound and Sunlight schools of death metal. This is essentially the playful yet beefed up thrash of the Tampa sound with some more primitive and punky Swedish riffs chucked in for good measure. Atonality rules, aside from some of the lead guitar work scattered throughout the album; leant more impact by the fact that they are so sporadic amongst the abundance of powerchords. But musical ancestry aside, it’s the unadulterated energy and dynamism of this music that is its real calling card. It may be strong in the arm and thick in the head when compared to some releases of this era, but sometimes one simply cannot beat some well executed primal aggression for hitting the spot.

Based on today’s standards this release may come across as a little bland. But it exemplifies an important and reliable way of crafting death metal that is just a cut above the fodder. Sinister, rather than subverting the energy and aggression typical of death metal, embraced it head on and enhanced its potentials for euphoria with the subtle blending of upbeat punk riffs within their otherwise brutal framework.

Originally published at Hate Meditations

Oh, how metal always keeps the greatest achievements locked away in a chest hidden under the crawlspace of a pale, nerdy European guy's bungalow. Much like the thrash opus of thrash opuses, By Inheritance, this is an album I have the limited pressing my Metal Mind of, and most other people have never heard of it. Also, I find myself asking after each listen, why the fuck didn't anyone ever recommend this to me? Cannibal Corpse are known far and wide for putting out the same song over and over again, yet these guys are completely ignored!?

Sad, but true. Well, at least my ears have been graced with this masterpiece. This thing fucking reinvented death metal to me and I mean that. If Gorguts got me into death metal and Death showed me how death metal can be manipulated into a broader field of creativity, then Sinister took a 5 ton warhammer made of death metal and bashed my skull in (and I feel much better having experienced it, oddly enough). The title of this review is merely as good a description I can give as to what this album does to me. Literally, my first listen in my car, I kept looking down at the CD player with my mouth wide open as to how fucking sweet and heavy the music was. It's as if each song knows exactly when I'm about to get tired of a riff, and it knows exactly the most perfect subsequent riff to keep my mind in a state of bewildered enjoyment.

This is everything I ever wanted (and didn't know I wanted) in a death metal album. The intro has an awesome ominous feel as you hear tortured screams in the distance and chains rattle (I always picture a Satanic rollercoaster). Then a very simple synth melody builds up to a sudden ending before the buzzing guitars come in with the opener, Perennial Mourning. From this point on I can't really explain just how fucking awesome it is. Every single song is perfect and distinguishable, and in an album of this type of speed and heaviness, distinguishability is rare. Everything is so chaotic and insane, I just get lost in it. There's like a dozen riffs a song and they all are freaking ridiculous. Ron (as he is simply called in the booklet, his last name is van der Polder or something like that) wrote every song and plays the guitar and bass here, and how he had so much going on in each song with such quality on each track is amazing.

And Aad Kloosterhergenmcdergenyurgenwad's drumming is intense, frantic, and varied. I can just focus on him throughout the album and be completely giddy, and I’m not one to fawn over drumming, but this guy is seriously talented and very impressive. But most importantly, he fucking destroys your senses. His chaotic display meshes perfectly with the manic riffage going on and is an integral part of the formula here. One of the finest drum displays I've heard.

Mike von Mastrigt's vocals are on the surface pretty standard, but if you focus on him a bit more you'll find that his very guttural vocals are actually pretty clear, lending most of the songs' lyrics to be comprehensible. I actually sing along with some of the songs, and in death metal I very rarely do that. Fucking awesome is all I have to say.

In the end, if you like extreme metal, this is a must. If you can find it for a decent price, get it. It is the embodiment of insanity in music. For abusing my brain and senses, Cross the Styx gets the big 100, or a five out of five.
Highlights:
Doomed
Epoch of Denial
Compulsory Resignation
Corridors to the Abyss
Perennial Mourning
And all the others!

Here's an album I have so many great memories with, that I still feel it's one of my all time favorites and also it's actually one of the first death metal full lengths that I've heard in my life. I had a tape version of it years ago (when I was 12 or something, in about 1992!) and it was a masterpiece in my opinion. Nowadays I own a vinyl and this music still shreds me to dust. "Cross the Styx" is one of the best death metal albums in the history and one which doesn't get old at all. To some point it reminds me Vader's "The Ultimate Incantation" - not only musically, but also because I think both bands' debuts are the best albums in their long discographies, rivaled only by "Hate" on Sinister's side and "De Profundis" on Vader's. Never again neither Vader or Sinister managed to capture that dark and sinister (hehe) feeling ever again and never again the song writing was so magnificent and the riffs so slaughtering. To me, these two LPs are milestones of European death metal.

Already the opening intro of "Cross the Styx" (composed by Atrocity's Alex Krull) brings chills. This is one of the most creepy and dark intros I've heard in my life, one which you'll never forget, even years later you'll still be able to recognize it and make the quick connection with "Cross the Styx". And the music on this album was I think a little bit ahead of its time. There weren't that many bands - in Europe especially - at the time that were playing such ruthless, brutal and at the same time technical death metal. Sinister had technical riffs like Slayer (yeah!!!), was fast and brutal like Monstrosity and Malevolent Creation and had the satanic atmosphere and some riffs that were also reminding me the debut LPs of Deicide and Vader. Put all these influences together and you'll see that even nowadays such a deadly mixture is an ultimate winner. This album is simply fuckin AWESOME! No single song or riff here is out of place, there's nothing on "Cross the Styx" I wouldn't like, each track is like a torture from the Cenobites - skinning you alive with the razor sharp riffs, crushing your bones with the drums and accompanying these tortures with excellent, vicious screams of the vocalist. And Mike van Mastrigt is the best vocalist Sinister ever had. This guy was fantastic and it's a real shame he's not in the band anymore.

The songwriting on "Cross the Styx" is absolutely outstanding. If you listen to such songs as "Doomed" you'll know it's not the average, easily forgettable death metal. This song itself deserves to be praised as one of the best death metal anthems ever, its opening riffing is just excellent, a wonderful introduction to the strongest song on the album, which later turns into much faster riffing slaughter. But as I already said, every track on "Cross the Styx" is strong. "Spiritual Immolation", "Cross the Styx", "Corridors to the Abyss", "Epoch of Denial", "Compulsory Resignation"...Whatever you'll pick up, it's going to massacre you with a tornado of tormenting riffs, many of which are so incredibly fast and vicious that you'll feel an ecstasy when your head fill be chopped off during the maniacal headbanging. And the atmosphere on the album is truly obscure and creepy.

I can't imagine a death metal freak, who doesn't know "Cross the Styx". If you haven't got this album in your collection, then you missed one of the best European death metal LPs in the history. I can definitely advise you to get it on vinyl or first press CD, as the reprint (on digipack with "Diabolical Summoning" second album) looks just bad and cheap. So, join the torment!

Sinister's debut album, "Cross The Styx", is a seminal death metal album. It is just one of those albums that I myself find the most enjoyment out of. This is the type of death metal that is played at high tempos and is just riff after riff of crushing death metal.

The album starts off with a classically-themed introduction track which leads into the first song on the album. "Perennial Mourning" has all the elements that make this album: extremely heavy, thrash influenced death metal riffing, intricate rhythms, furious blast beat sections, and the serviceable, wild guitar solos of Andre Tolhuizen and Ron val der Polder.

The production of the album is that perfect middle ground. Not too raw but not overly polished, allowing the album to maintain its evil feel, but also lets the listener hear the articulate riff work in detail. The band manages to stay true to its influences whilst also putting its own little spin on things. We also hear the works of Morbid Angel's "Altars of Madness", Possessed's "Seven Churches", and Morbid Saint's "Spectrum of Death"; you can hear the influence but it is not total worship.

The highlight of the album for me has to be "Compulsory Resignation" which is just a riff fest for the ages. High speed riffing demanding a headbang. The groove of the riffs are so amazing. A lot of the time the band is playing in 6/8 timing which is what makes this album at times. The way the riffs are constructed on the album in general is unreal. The drumming is also beyond excellent, always providing very heavy accents at the end of riffs that add to the heaviness. The bass is not that loud in the mix, but that is the least of your worries.

Other highlights include "Doomed", "Cross The Styx" and "Corridors To The Abyss", but the album is consistent and no song really falls to kick your ass. Each song flows extremely well and does not sound like a band that have just tried to cram as many riffs as possible into a song for the sake of it.

Overall, this is an amazing death metal album and deserves a spot on your shelf. The album is so much better than a lot of the largely overrated early American death metal scene. Get it and get ready to headbang.

Sinister's first two albums are must-haves for any death metal freak. They provide perfect music for headbanging and actually wrote really intelligent music early on in their career.
The main influence I can pick up on with this album is Possessed. This is especially evident in the use of choppy riffs (see the first riff off of the title track, it sounds quite similar to "Seven Churches") and semi-thrash riffs, albeit on here they are played at lightening speed. You'll notice a lot of blasting parts that seem almost like grindcore, but they always bring back a catchier riff so you don't get bored out of your mind. The solos are not thought-out masterpieces, but frantic explosions of notes.
Vocals are a definate strength on here. Mike was a very strong element in Sinister, and I don't think they've put out albums as strong as the stuff Mike did with them (except Bastard Saints, but I heard that it blows goats, so I never bothered picking it up). He's got a really deep and strong growl, and constantly spews out lyrics about the occult. I really wish they would have kept up with this on later releases.
Mercyless, Pestilence, and Death took the Possessed influence in their own ways, and so does Sinister. Whereas those bands went sort of progressive, each in respective degrees of greatness (Pestilence and Death) or suckitude (listen to the latest mall-core offering of Mercyless), Sinister enjoyed the full on mayhem of those crazy riffs and evil feelings.
This is better than ANYTHING Vader has ever put out, and is easily on par with Morbid Angel. Heavy. Twisted. Blasting.