Akercocke - Words That Go Unspoken...Deeds That Go Undone

Akercocke’s fourth album was by far their most experimental. Following up the absolutely monstrous and enormous epic that was Leviathan could have been no easy task for these distinguished English gentlemen. In my opinion, Words that go unspoken… is nowhere near as brutal as the exquisite aural punishment of Leviathan, but the band definitely followed through by evolving in incredible leaps into something far more sprawling, technical and genre-bending. Where Leviathan had that the “oomph” factor that is missing from most death metal recordings, Words that go unspoken has a daring sense of adventure and experimentation; it is the sound of a band flexing it’s creative muscles, to be poetic about it.

Things kick off fairly simply; “Verdelet” is Akercocke through and through, with a thrashy pace and double bass, which eventually gives way to clean vocals and excellently composed semi-acoustic guitar sounds. Despite the softer elements, the drums never give out for the duration; David Gray is an animal on the kit. “Seduced” has classic death metal written all over it, and also has one of my favourite Akercocke guitar solos (which is actually one of the simpler and more understated ones the band has ever used). The real fun begins however with track 3, “Shelter from the Sand”. This snarling death metal beast slowly evolves into something altogether more Opeth-y (minus the untold amounts of boredom). I can’t really describe it, but there is a whole world of prog-rock influence here, maybe not so much on the psychedelic side (imagine that? Haha satanic pysch-metal) but definitely on the progressive, “things unfolding at a gradual pace” side of things. I think it was Jason Mendonca himself who once likened the sound on this album to “Morbid Angel and Rush having a fight in a lift”. 

From here on out, things are much tamer than they have been on any previous Akercocke record. Sure, the staple sounds of the band are all here but they are utilised in much more subtle and experimental ways. The title track, and it’s sequel “Intractable”, are two fantastic pieces of musical art that you would never expect from blasphemous, sex-charged death metal swine such as Akercocke. I think this is what I was trying to convey in my opening paragraph; whilst Words….doesn’t necessarily blast your fucking head off, it showcases a maturity in so many ways, that would continue to unfold on the band’s next record (although in not so overtly experimental tones).

All in all this is a fantastic metal record, and I guess if you’re looking for an in-road into Akercocke I would say that this – whilst ironically being their most experimental – is by far their most easily accessible material (I think you wrote this for the Antichrist review too, ya feckin' eejit - Ed, 2019). Antichrist that followed had a much more direct death metal approach, but the genre scope of Words… more than allows a much wider chance for appreciation from fans of other genres. Like most of their records, this was released on Earache Records, and unfortunately only on CD format. I would absolutely love the Akercocke records to be pressed onto vinyl, but I think that sadly there isn’t ever going to be enough demand out there for somebody to take the risk and get the ball rolling (I know Earache certainly won’t, check out this blog post by Dig). Give the entire disc a spin in the link below!