Infernal

Infernal sounds like a band pulling in several directions and discovering that the tension is useful. Edge of Sanity had already moved beyond straightforward Swedish death metal by this point, and the album treats heaviness as one tool among several rather than the entire job description. The result is less seamless than the records surrounding it, but often more immediate.

Infernal is uneven by design, but its best moments turn that instability into real momentum.

“Hell Is Where the Heart Is” opens with the right kind of certainty: direct riffing, a hard rhythmic spine and enough melodic movement to stop the song becoming blunt-force nostalgia. “The Bleakness of It All” and “Damned by the Damned” keep that pressure intact, with drums and guitars working as actual arrangements rather than a pile of competent parts. The production is dry enough to preserve attack, although the mix can make some transitions feel more abrupt than dramatic.

That abruptness defines the album. Cleaner passages, progressive structures and death-metal sections do not always flow naturally into one another. Sometimes the joins are visible. That is not automatically a flaw, but the middle of the record occasionally feels assembled rather than developed. “Forever Together Forever” stretches its ideas with more patience, while “Losing Myself” gives the melodic side of the band room to breathe without sanding away the heavier edges.

The closing run is strongest when it avoids overexplaining itself. “Inferno” and “Burn the Sun” move with purpose, using contrast instead of treating contrast as the point. The riffs remain memorable, the performances stay controlled and the album never collapses into progressive decoration.

Infernal is not Edge of Sanity at their most unified. It is Edge of Sanity testing how much instability their songwriting can hold. A few sections buckle under that weight, but most of the record turns friction into character. It deserves an eight because its flaws are audible, yet so is the ambition behind them—and the songs still hit.