Style: progressive black metal, avant-garde metal, dissonant death metal (harsh vocals)
Recommended for fans of: Gorguts, Charles Mingus, Oranssi Pazuzu, Blut Aus Nord, Ulcerate
Country: New York, United States
Release date: 21 March 2025
Imperial Triumphant have artfully captured life in the Big Apple with their music for over a decade now, and their music—like the city itself—is dichotomous, a portrayal of the vileness and luxury of life in the greatest city on earth. The band’s groundbreaking mix of discordant dissonant metal, atonal jazz, and gleaming Art Deco exterior is cerebral: Imperial Triumphant is an acquired taste like black coffee1, grimy but energizing, for the working class and the elites alike. Dating back to my neonatal dissonant metal-loving form in 2020, I knew Imperial Triumphant would be a permanent favorite of mine2. I’ve discussed them endlessly with unwilling friends and family, given them an uber-rare 10/10 for Alphaville3, and even written a thirteen-page term paper on the band and their usage of free jazz in metal as an embodiment of their NYC-centric philosophy.
Goldstar is a conceptual and musical reframing for the New York power trio with an emphasis placed on how the material will sound in a live setting. This materializes as a punchier Imperial Triumphant: tighter song lengths, more cutthroat, riffier. While no stranger to the Almighty Riff on Alphaville and Spirit of Ecstasy, Imperial Triumphant lay down a new barbed focus on guitar parts and punchy rhythms on Goldstar, hitting with the force of King Kong. For example, “Gomorrah Nouveaux” opens with an intricate percussive rhythm courtesy of North African gnawa while Ezrin hypnotically chugs the pattern in disgusted agreement. The track never relents the punishing, Meshuggah-esque march except in a dramatic grand pause around a minute in. Thankfully despite the increased emphasis on staccato, precise guitar parts across Goldstar, Ezrin’s playing still uses atonal jazz technique to dizzying effect—as on the gritty “Rot Moderne” and the slow-burning “Lexington Delirium.” He also opts to play outright melodies more than on previous releases, his parts twice breaking free of the noisy chaos to recognizable tunes: a Handel motif weaves through the main melody of “Hotel Sphinx,” and the closer “Industry of Misery” ends with an extended jam around The Beatles’ heaviest track, “I Want You (She’s so Heavy).”
Recorded in only five days as the final project produced at Colin Marston’s legendary Queens-based Menegroth studio, the frantic, improvisatory moments scattered throughout Goldstar successfully capture the energy of a live performance. The Dada-ist grindcore track “NEWYORKCITY” is a thirty-second burst of sound, embodying the city that never sleeps with studio-adjusted improvised chaos. Sound clips of sirens, spoken word, and the ominous groan of buildings are also mainstays of Goldstar. You’re never left in doubt that you’re still in the city so nice they named it twice while listening to Imperial Triumphant.
Steve Blanco on bass and Kenny Grohowski on drums are a rhythm duo from heaven playing in hell. Long my favorite drummer, Grohowski throws everything at this album from black metal blasts more common than on any previous release to unceasing Meshuggah rhythms, from delicate jazz cymbals to Brazilian Maracatu. He’s got backup from Thomas Haake (Meshuggah) on “Lexington Delirium” and “Pleasuredome” as well as from Dave Lombardo (Slayer) on “Pleasuredome” although neither is a highlight (I reckon no matter who you are it’s gotta be impossible to keep up with Kenny Grohowski). Blanco’s highlight occurs when he takes smooth leads from the jagged playing of Ezrin, such as on “Hotel Sphinx” or on “Lexington Delirium”—you can see him play the latter in the Chrysler Building itself in the music video for the track.
Keeping in theme with this release cycle’s live-performance focus, the trio once again unfurled new masks to up the theatricality—glossy Art Deco pieces at home within the architecture of the Chrysler Building. Yet despite the album title, donning of new golden masks, and finally recording at the Chrysler building like the band had dreamed of for years, Imperial Triumphant have lost some of the gilded luster of previous releases. Opener “Eye of Mars” has the brassy undertones of Vile Luxury’s opener “Swarming Opulence,” but it’s more drowned out by the guitar, losing the urbane impact of the brass. Goldstar lacks Steve Blanco’s regal piano-playing, opting instead for Krallice-y synths, and although they are awesome, they lack the glittery pizazz of high-life in The Capital of the World. In a similar fashion, I wish Goldstar had more of a jazz focus because while the influence is still clear—and this realization of Imperial Triumphant isn’t lacking anything—I struggle to acclimate to the relative lack of jazz. Goldstar doesn’t contain any tracks like the late-era John Coltrane-coded “In the Pleasure of Their Company” from Spirit of Ecstasy or the transcendent freeness of “Chernobyl Blues”—except for the thirty-second unconfined grindcore track, of course.
Tightening up songwriting for a more approachable package—particularly with an emphasis on playing the tracks live—certainly doesn’t guarantee a band is selling out: Pyrrhon and Scarcity both placed highly on my year-end list last year despite a significant boost in their accessibility. Goldstar is still a complex and cultured metal record; Imperial Triumphant’s riffs are stronger than ever before; and at thirty-nine minutes the album is easy to listen to on repeat. So while Goldstar isn’t as transcendent nor stately as the golden packaging would have you think, basking in the filthy riffage and potent songwriting is luxurious in its own way.
Recommended tracks: Gomorrah Nouveaux, Hotel Sphinx, Rot Moderne, Industry of Misery
You may also like: Ashenspire, Pyrrhon, Krallice, A Forest of Stars, Thantifaxath, Dodecahedron, Kostnateni, Sarmat, Scarcity, Voices
Final verdict: 8/10
Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | Official Website | Facebook | Instagram | Metal-Archives page
Label: Century Media Records – Bandcamp | Facebook | Official Website
Imperial Triumpahnt is:
Zachary Ezrin – Vocals, Guitar
Steve Blanco – Bass
Kenny Grohowski – Drums
- Once, Imperial Triumphant released their own blend of coffee as merch (which I did purchase and brew). Isn’t that the coolest merch item ever, though?? ↩︎
- Never mind that there is documented evidence of a younger and stupider version of me in the Angry Metal Guy comments of Alphaville calling the record appreciatable but not enjoyable, an “uncomfortable” experience. The love affair between Imperial Triumphant and me wasn’t immediate. ↩︎
- Strong 9.5 for the followup Spirit of Ecstasy ↩︎
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