Review by Adam M on November 11, 2019.

Relinquished perform progressive metal with a heavy dose of death added in.  The music is varied and features a number of dynamic changes to be as interesting as possible.  It features a nice mix up between complex song structures and more impactful death metal moments.  The combination is certainly intriguing and makes for great background music.  The songs are certainly heavy enough and this is a compelling element to a progressive recording.  The vocals are deep and gurgly and don’t really fit with the music completely, but this doesn’t stop them from being somewhat effective. 

Towards the middle of the disc, the music becomes a little strange and loses its focus from the earlier portions, but it is still impactful stuff.  This should appeal to death metal fans of bands like Gorod as much as progressive metal fans and this is largely because of the singing style used and the amount of blast beats present.  The whole affair is very unique sounding and one of a kind which adds to the list of reasons to check this out.  I wish it were a little more consistent, but the music is still quite appealing regardless.   If there are any flaws with the recording its because the weirdness factor prevents the album from really shining and this brings the grade of the band down slightly. 

Still, there are enough worthwhile aspects to Addictivies (Pt. 1) to make it a definite must check out to fans of progressive music in general.  If the music was streamlined slightly and made more digestible, it would be even more successful, but as it stands there are so many good things present that the bad is overshadowed and the album is allowed to breathe.  The meshing of death metal with progressive metal is done in an interesting and entertaining fashion. 

Rating: 7.3 out of 10