review by: Matt Smith

Heaven Shall Burn is hard to put your finger on. It's hard to tell exactly from where they draw their influences, and their sound is something unique. The vocals have more hardcore/punk influence than anything else, with so much force it sounds like every word takes a new breath of air just to get out. Unlike the vocals, the guitars sound more like black metal than anything else to me. Fast-picking drawn-out melodies the way they do makes me think of Impaled Nazarene or Marduk more than any hardcore band. But they change to more of a crunchy, death-metal sound. They go back and forth and in-between, and keep the music really interesting.

The drums are something different, too. Sometimes they're completely relentless, hitting as fast as possible in true black metal style, but sometimes they slow down to a rock-sounding beat before speeding up again and adding a couple of short but remarkable fills. But each song and style change flows seamlessly into the next, with excellent production that makes Asunder fit together and move along without error.

Heaven Shall Burn infuses each song with harsh emotion and severity, but still manage to fit in an acoustic guitar in places. I'm convinced that they could have played any metal style they wanted successfully, but no one genre was good enough. I'm thankful they opted to create such an imaginative new style, instead. Asunder is one of the most impressive releases I've heard in a long time.