Review by Norbert on January 18, 2026.

It starts innocently enough. Even when the undistorted guitar's sprawling chords seamlessly transform into the initial powerful riff—quite slow, marching, majestic, a perfect "starter" for a concert, and a moment later the first gargantuan growl appears—all of this plays out within the bounds of death metal norms. But already around the hundredth second of 'Arrival'—the opening track on "Entity," the second album by the American band Nucleus (not to be confused with the 1970s jazz-fusion band from the UK)—things start happening. Unconventional. OK, one dissonance, another, and soon a whole festival of dissonances, strange sounds, and harmonies—well, there have been, and still are, many death metal bands dotted with such "embellishments." But when the accumulation of these twisted notes reaches such a level that one gets the impression that at least some of the instruments are in the wrong key, or are out of tune, or that each musician is simply playing a different piece, the question may arise: Is there really a method to this madness?

You might say – but that's already been done. And in a better way. Thirty years ago, Antti Boman and his band Demilich, hailing from Kuopio, Finland, treated heavy metal fans not only to compelling song titles like 'The Planet That Once Used To Absorb Flesh In Order To Achieve Divinity And Immortality (Suffocated To The Flesh That It Desired...)" but also to fractured, unsettling, twisted guitar structures that churned the bubble more effectively than their country's export, "Finlandia" (necessarily chilled!). After Demilich's sudden departure, their twisted version of death metal was successfully continued by the Canadians Gorguts. To this day, Demilich's "Nesphite" and Gorguts' "Obscura" remain milestones of avant-garde death metal. Is it possible to create something new, something better, in this specific, hermetic, and unpopular field? Probably not, but we can try again, a little differently.

The Chicago quartet, operating under the name Nucleus since 2012, completed their homework on the content of "Nesphite" and "Obscura" with flying colors, and also devoted themselves to studying the work of American death metal classics Atheist, Morbid Angel, and Nocturnus. From the latter, they borrowed not only the cosmic atmosphere of their music and lyrics but also the artwork for their album, which is so strikingly similar to that adorning Nocturnus's second album, "Thresholds." Occasionally, "Entity" features inclusions inspired by more conventional death-doom metal sounds from the likes of Incantation, Bolt Thrower, and Asphyx. Labeling Nucleus's work as "Demilich/Gorguts/Nocturnus Worship" or calling it a death metal reconstruction group, however, would be unfair to the Chicago band. The influences of the aforementioned classics collide on "Entity" like atoms, creating the molecules that constitute Nucleus' sound, their own (nomen omen) "entity."

The Nucleus crew gravitates within their own microcosm, atonal, dissonant guitar projectiles ricochet off the ship's forward-moving musical corps, harmonics sometimes seem to fire at each other from opposite sides of the soundscape, solos tear the vessel's hull to pieces while the rhythm section maintains a steady course, piloting the ship through sonic meanders and unusual structures until full control is regained. And although the band sometimes seems to drift in different directions—as if tugged and pulled in a cosmic game of tug-of-war between sinister, alien forces—the drums hold everything in check, ensuring that this chaotic structure doesn't crumble into interplanetary dust. It's a demanding yet fascinating journey.

Nucleus released "Entity" in 2019. I eagerly await the continuation of their cosmic epic.

Rating: 8.5 out of 10

Review by Krys on April 30, 2019.

Following 2016 meteoric journey around the galaxy on Sentient, space conquerors Nucleus are back from the outer limits with their second full length Entity. Obvious comparisons were drawn to Demilich, Timeghoul and the likes at the time of the debut but 3 years later Nucleus goes deeper into a black hole and soars beyond its debut improving all aspects of their craft.

Entity plays with dissonant harmonics, time signatures and twists conventions of your typical death metal record yet still remains very sound as a whole. Subject yourself to special relativity experiment and you'll see that time slows down when 40 minutes of record duration feels like hours of interstellar travel. For as many weird and eerie cacophonous parts there is equal amount of quality grooves, it's just with their unconventional sense of timing and harmony you never know when the ship will swirl off its course. As example, after probing, poking and unpleasant drilling in very disturbing opening piece 'Arrival', title track 'Entity' comes with classic straight up death metal vibe which lasts for a whole 20 seconds and just when you start bouncing your head it takes a disturbing twist into Prong-like waco territory, long enough for you to say 'what the fuck', to take yet another turn and go into blast beat show with sick solo over miasmatic riffs. What seems like very vicious and condensed structure flows openly due to skilled transitions and flawless execution. In the middle of this space trip, instrumental 'Approach' quiets the asteroid storm with addition of keyboards and 'real' harmonies that made me hit replay button just to make sure I'm still listening to same band. The ethereal atmosphere is enhanced by occasional shift to neutral when Nucleus really slow things down to let listener enjoy the view and immerse into guttural barks from Dave Muntean. Production, which was one of the weaknesses of their first record, was corrected by mudding the mix with emphasis on the lower end and tasteful amount of reverb that in effect constructed spacier sound and let those unearthly harmonies breath making all 8 tracks ring as a cohesive unit.

Nucleus 'Entity' takes a while to get into and to discover all of its intricacies but once you fully immerse, you won't notice single eerie stroke but discern complete landscape of this adventurous excursion.

Rating: 8.5 out of 10