Bordeaux France’s Ad Patres returns with the third full-length Unbreathable. I reviewed their last record A Brief Introduction to Human Experiments back in 2019. Ad Patres brings an excellent combination of technicality, musicianship, and brutality. There is no shortage of any of these items with this record.

Things get kicked off with an eighty-second intro before the first song, “The Dream Chaser” kicks in. Off the bat I hear a combination of bands like Psycroptic, Decapitated and Suffocation. Axel Doussad’s vocals are insanely sick and the guitar work of Oliver Bousquet and Sylvestre Alexandre is groovy as hell. The drum work of Alsvid is on fire throughout the entire album. “Versus” reminds me of Decapitated Winds of Creation mixed with Cryptopsy Whisper Supremacy.

“Deserter” is my favorite tune on Unbreathable and it reminds me a bit of Necrophagist with extra groove. Having been around since 2008 these guys have all the polish of a band that has been around for a while. The album continues to flow well from start to finish. Most of the tracks are between three to five minutes in length.

“Exodus” continues like most of Unbreathable. This is one of the first tracks on the album with guitar solos. After this one, there is another instrumental break called “Interlude.”   I would describe it as like Deeds of Flesh with science fiction type sounds for around a minute.

“Chapter X” continues to demonstrate their mix of catchy riffs, melody, and harmony. Some of the best lead work on the album is on this one. “The Medium” opens with some harmonized octaves a bit like Morbid Angel or Hate Eternal. I love the outro of this. “Rebellion Grief” continues like most of the album. You can hear the growth in song writing from the last album.

“Deus Deceptor” finishes what is one of the best death metal albums of the year. There are no bad tracks on here. The album is going to wind up towards the top of my 2024 list. I cannot stop headbanging to this.

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