Living up to their name since the dawn of the scourage which mankind saw fit to crown metalcore, Darkest Hour are a hardcore band who have show no fear in dwelling in the cleft of the horizon that divides humanity's most dismal epoch. If there is one thing they may have done wrong in their entire career, it's having released their ninth album, Godless Prophets & The Migrant Flora a little early. Turns out, the apocalypse wasn't quite ripe in 2017. As we have bore witness to since, the nadir of sanity, civility, and culture needed a few more years to rot on the vine before obtaining their present state of irreversible decay. Although, even when jumping the gun, Darkest Hour still manages to hit the mark. On this prognostic tome of putrescence, Darkest Hour plays a searing hybrid of metalcore and death metal, combining the hellfire leads and pummeling groves of all manner of Scandinavian soul scavengers with a godless howl reminiscent of the gall that rends the spirit of the desiccated and depleted inter-hinterlands of this nation to manifest an even leveling of catastrophic catharsis that transcends our very varying notions of ruthless conduct. Opening with a cut above the rest, "Knife in the Safe Room" is merciless in its rushing display of vengeance, catching you like gouda in a cheese grader and stripping you in ribbons to the marrow to the salivating delight of John Henry's saliva-spraying vocals. The group follows this display of savagery with the righteous salvo, "This is the Truth," which will oppress your carnal caprice with its pensive and foreboding guitar work and lashing waves of guttural howls before liberating your purified essence with an In Flames indebted bridge that will raise your tired bones to the gilded halls of the hereafter. But be forewarned! Whatever salvation you might find in the many tranquility interstitial moments scattered throughout Godless Prophets..., there will always be a vicious corrective turn, redirecting your passage away from the light and back towards a valorization of the group's cupidity for chaos, most notably taking the form of "The Flesh & the Flowers of Death" with it perfectly blackened thrash riffs, and the apocalyptic war cry of "Another Headless Ruler of the Used." At a distance stands a figure, a bleak pillar of judgment wielding a flaming sword. The blade is raised at two minutes to midnight. The final blow shall cleave the sky and let pour out a darkness that even the gods deem blinding- we cower in this vain moment of contemplation before the devouring enclosure of an endless night. No eye can see farther than ours. And none have prayed so uselessly to be plucked out.
