Nyn is a technical death metal project with a now solid history. Entropy: Of Chaos and Salt is the project’s third release and sophomore full-length album. This time around, Noyan Tokgözoğlu sought the talents of Tom Geldschläger, also known as Fountainhead, and Jimmy Pitts, of the Pitts Minnemann Project fame (among others). While I was no fan of Nyn’s first two releases, this one is different. Through the years, musicianship improved greatly, and so did composition and production skills. First of all, the bass and guitar parts on Entropy are some of the wildest available in the tech-death world. So much so that listening to it in full is quite demanding. Everything hits you all at once and each track continually evolves and morphs throughout its short lifespan. The inclusion of Jimmy and Tom is a good move, and elevates the level of musicianship to even higher levels. On the other hand, it would have been probably wiser – or, at least, more effective – to recruit a drummer than two melodic instruments. The melodic section is indeed very thick and heavily layered already, but the programmed drums on record feel cheap and their use is detrimental to the listening experience. Another point of critique is the vocals. I’ve never really liked Noyan’s singing style, which seems to hybridize death metal, eighties’ thrash, and power metal. Fortunately, they are here more tolerable than on previous albums, but whether it is because of the overall increase in quality or of an improvement of his singing skills I couldn’t tell. At the end of the day, if programmed drums don’t bother you that much, Nyn’s Entropy: Of Chaos and Salt is a mind-melting technical death metal opus, given you get used to Noyan’s peculiar vocal style. Hopefully, the future will make Nyn a full-fledged band with a full-time drummer, and then I won’t have to complain as much!
Disclaimer: Noyan is a friend and a colleague, and I have personally talked with Tom and Jimmy many times. I tried to review their project’s latest album neutrally and in an unbiased manner, but I still might have been subconsciously biased one way or another. For transparency reasons, I need to divulge this.
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