Obscura Go Old-School Melodeath on New Song, “When Stars Collide”

Obscura’s trademark brand of melodic tech-death is a direct descendent of the Swedish melodic death metal that began bubbling up in the ’90s, their sound owing as much to At the Gates, Dark Tranquillity and early In Flames as Death, Dissection and, like, Cynic and some other proggy bands.

But I can’t ever recall them kicking it back to the old school as blatantly as on “When Stars Collide,” the band’s latest single. The main riff’s a straight-up ripper that could’ve come off records by any of those first three bands I mentioned above, and what’s more there’s a clean-sung chorus with heavy echoes of Soilwork’s Björn “Speed” Strid [Post-publication update: it IS Björn himself! My ears did not deceive me. -Ed.]. This being Obscura, the tune is naturally extremely catchy. And there’s a scorching guitar solo as the icing on the cake. Win/win all around! I wouldn’t expect this from Obscura going forward but it’s a fun one-off diversion.

Listen to “When Stars Collide” below. It follows previous singles “Devoured Usurper,” “A Valediction” and “Solaris.” New album A Valediction comes out November 19.