May 1, 2008 - 12:00am
By Naushad Kabir
Arsis have been the darlings of the brutal death metal underground since their dazzling 2004 debut, A Celebration of Guilt, which proved that Americans can incorporate beautiful melodies into a raging tornado of tremolo guitar riffs and blast beats even better than European contemporaries.
Now Arsis has returned for their third album, We are the Nightmare, with a brand new lineup. After the disappointment of the last album, United in Regret, founding member Jim Malone decided to start writing catchy melodies again — Nightmare is definitely a heavy album, but when it’s not busy reaching in and tearing the listener’s spine out of his or her nose, the tear-dropping sense of melody from Celebration returns.