Review: In-Conquered ‘The Golgotha Chronicles’
In-Conquered – The Golgotha Chronicles
Released 2024, Vision of God Records.
And here I was beginning to worry about whether In-Conquered was still going! After
releasing The Wide Path to the Lake of Fire in 2022, In-Conquered sort of fell silent outside of a few hints at new material, and yet here we are with the next slab of blackened brutality from arguably one of the leading lights of the Christian death metal scene today. The solo project of the multi-talented Jordan Varela, a veteran of the death metal scene and a member of several secular death metal acts such as Shuriken Cadaveric Entwinement and Lust of Decay, In-Conquered is one of those bands that has to be heard to be believed. Truly, this is insane stuff.
In-Conquered’s sound is what most describe as blackened death metal, but doesn’t
sound anything like fellow Christian act Bloodwork, nor big secular bands like Belphegor and Behemoth. Instead, In-Conquered’s sound is more what I would call a technical death metal one using low-end death growls, but one that often makes use of black metal-style riffing and occasional keyboard elements that make one think of Sorrowstorm at times.
The Golgotha Chronicles is a five-track concept EP focusing in on the Passion of Jesus Christ as told in the Gospel of St. Luke, but also ends with a passage from the Gospel of St. John and spoken word mini-sermon from Varela himself. The whole concept approach is kind of a signature of In-Conquered, as his prior releases entitled Nor Rivalled, Nor Equalled and The Wide Path to the Lake of Fire were also loosely-organized around conversion and damnation, respectively. Normally, I’m not a concept album kind of guy, as I usually find such things to get to bloated and overdone, focusing too much on narrative over sound. Not so with this release – Varela keeps the running time tight, and the music tighter.
In fact, I would have to say, this could be In-Conquered’s strongest release yet. Varela
hones in on what makes In-Conquered’s music so powerful in the first place – the black metal-esque riffing, the hyperactive drumming, the Dying Fetus-esque guttural vocals, and the overall relentlessness of the music – and amplifies it even more.
Relentless is indeed the key word
here, though The Golgotha Chronicles, unlike his previous two albums, actually gives the listener room to breathe by way of brief readings from Scripture concerning the betrayal, trial, passion and death of Christ. These brief respites only serve to heighten the ferocity of the music to follow them. This is very technical death metal (without verging into Archspire territory), echoing Christian acts like Sympathy and Separatist but emphasizing a more brutal death metal
approach in the vocal department. Those who are fans of secular acts like Nile, Dying Fetus and early Decapitated will find much to enjoy here too.
Varela’s talent is more than apparent on this record, if it wasn’t already fully on display
before. Drum-wise, the production on this EP really emphasizes the militant, machine-gun effect of his precision approach, and allows the drums to hit harder than ever before (listen to “Wolf in the Shepard’s Garden” for an awesome example of this). In fact, I’d say the drumming is almost the highlight of every record this man puts out, sounding like the work of three drummers with the energy capacity of a small nuclear power plant all going at once (in my opinion, he’s the Christian metal scene’s answer to Flo Mounier of Cryptopsy in terms of skill). But no, this is all one guy.
The Golgotha Chronicles doesn’t try to reinvent the wheel or anything, however. If you found yourself a fan of the intense and technical approach of earlier records, you’ll be happy as a pig in mud with this one. The same technical approach and warp-speed intensity of every single instrument remains, but just as The Wide Path to the Lake of Fire thickened the sound a little and gave the riffs a little more heft, The Golgotha Chronicles adds more weight and power to the drums. It’s precisely what was needed, in my view. I get the thinner, black metal elements present in In-Conquered’s material (something that worked quite well on the debut, Nor Rivalled, Nor Conquered), but I still found myself wishing for just a little added oomph to the drum tone that would give it the impact it really needed. The Golgotha Chronicles provides this – and how.
Overall, this is yet more proof as to why In-Conquered is a death metal act to watch.
Jordan Varela’s devotion to his craft shows on every second of this record, and if you’ve ever seen videos of the guy practicing in his home studio, you’ll see how driven he is. The fact that he has even gotten secular attention is even more fantastic – if you want an awesome example of this, check out his interview on the Cali Death Podcast here (it’s long, but still great to watch a Christian metal musician interact with non-Christian metal fans just from a purely evangelistic
viewpoint). If you dig intense death metal with a blackened feel, In-Conquered’s newest bruiser of an EP will deliver.
For Fans Of: Dying Fetus, Nile, Sympathy, Separatist, Decapitated (early)
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