Well, Endless is not one of those records. In fact, I don't have enough fingers to point at everything that's wrong with it.
Ov Sulfur is a band formed in 2020 by ex-Suffokate frontman Ricky Hoover. Ov Sulfur is also a band that very clearly wants to be a lot of things all at once on their sophomore release. The result is a potluck party of borrowed elements and half-baked ideas: symphonic bits and bobs, blackened window dressing, melodicism, metalcore bounce, radio-ready choruses, and just enough deathcore to justify the band logo. None of it is outright incompetent, though. It's just stitched together so unnaturally it turns into a Frankenstein-like elephant standing awkwardly in the room.
You don't need to be a weatherman to know which way the wind blows here. We're looking at a band that seems to have lost the vibe they were aiming for somewhere along the way. Worse, you've almost certainly heard all of this before. Probably done by bands so far out of Ov Sulfur's league they're not even playing the same game anymore.
To the surprise of absolutely nobody, the compulsive need for clean vocals is where the wheels really start flying off. The cleans are crammed with an unhealhy obsession into nearly every song, often feeling wildly out of place. This couldn't possily get any worse.
But wait, it gets worse. Turns out rock bottom still has several more basements to go, because then the ballads arrive. Clean-vocal ballads. In deathcore. Reaching tits-on-a-fish levels of unnecessary.
Credit where it's due: the second half of the record is admittedly better. Guest appearances from Ingested, Carcosa, and Distant do some heavy lifting, and for brief moments the band sounds sharp, even threatening. Right before spoiling it all by throwing in another ballad.
Endless isn't a total loss and definitely has its enjoyable moments. If you're a fan of Dimmu Borgir, Fleshgod Apocalypse or Cradle Of Filth and looking for something new, or got into deathcore about half an hour ago and want a gentle, hand-holding dip into the genre, this is the kiddie pool that might hit the spot. Me personally, I'd rather let a disgruntled Wolverine handle my prostate exams from now on than sit through songs like "Forlorn", "Wither" and "Endless//Loveless" ever again.
