Defilers of the Light

by Darkened

EDGED CIRCLE PRODUCTIONS are extremely pleased to announce the coming of the third full-length album of the Swedish/Canadian quintet DARKENED. The band which already consisted of members from bands like Excruciate, A Canorous Quintet and Carbonized, are now also strengthened with the massive drumming capacity of Perra Karlsson, well known for his work with Destroyer 666, Suffer and live with Benediction among others, as a new permanent member.

Picking up where 2022´s The Black Winter left us hungry for more and even pointing further back in time. To a darker time. A time when death metal ruled supreme, and the head that didn´t bang was in dire threat of being banged without any compassion whatsoever. Yet Darkened is not in any way just a backwards looking troupe of historians. They are explorers as well – diving into and expanding the future of death metal.

If there ever was a better way to describe a band´s sonic impression through a character from the well-known board game Warhammer; Defiler fits Darkened perfectly: Defilers are towering daemon engines that stomp across the battlefield on piston-driven legs. No foe is safe from a Defiler.

Darkened – Defilers of the light makes classic death metal relevant and exciting again. The catchiness of the hooks and the clinical precision of the riffs combined with the extreme heaviness is hard, if not impossible to sideline. Topping that with an extremely good mixing and mastering at the hands of Lawrence Mackrory, we might have a new death metal classic in our hands- or at least in our ears.

Gord Olson: Vocals
Hempa Brynolfsson: Guitars
Linus Nirbrant: Guitars
Tobias Cristiansson: Bass
Perra Karlsson: Drums

Mixing and mastering: Lawrence Mackrory
Cover artwork: Juanjo Castellano

Pro printed tape. Limited to 100 copies.

Digipak CD. Edition of 500

Jewelcase CD

Black vinyl.

White vinyl. Limited to 100 copies. Available for our Bandcamp VIP members.

Swirl vinyl. Limited to 150

Test pressing (Rejected). Edition of 10. Available for our Bandcamp VIP members.

Test pressing (approved). Edition of 10. Available for our Bandcamp VIP members.

  • "(...) mark my word when I say that it is so potent, hellishly entrancing, and dangerously effective that its perceived lack of originality is of absolutely no relevance or importance in the overall perspective. A magnificent slab of unfiltered darkness."
    RAMzine
  • "Darkened is a prime example of death metal done right, a seldom seen nowadays (...)"
    8.9/10 - Metal Bite
  • "Thoughts that come to mind for ‘Defilers of the Light’ are something of a crisp and precise representation with a darkly ladened essence of aggression and death that takes you through a twisted mental labyrinth of a melancholic nature. You can’t go wrong with that."
    https://www.vm-underground.com/
  • "Defilers Of The Light is by far the band's best effort to date, presenting mature and masterfully performed death metal that's so damn fun to listen to. Thus, I dare say that Darkened are one of if not the best death metal band there is right now."
    metalstorm.net
  • "Darkened are not merely a band stuck in the past, these merchants of death, also deal their brutality through exciting flurries of modern ideals. Big hooks, clinical precision and extreme heaviness presented with excellent production, tightly woven into forty-three minutes of engaging and battering death metal."
    4/5 - metalepidemic.com
  • "Overall, the album is a melting pot of all the facets that I love about this genre. A masterpiece + for me. I don't even have to think long about giving it 10 out of 10 Hellfire points."
    10/10 - Hellfire Magazine
Origin: Sweden / Canada / Formed in: 2018 / Genre: Death Metal

MORE ABOUT DARKENED