Viogression - Thaumaturgic Veil

Viogression
Thaumaturgic Veil
Release Date: July 11th, 2025
Label: Independent

I can positively say that I don’t think I’ve ever heard a death metal album have an entire song that references Schrödinger’s Cat as a subject, but here we are. It’s 2025, and Viogression, a Milwaukee, Wisconsin-based five-piece death metal act has done just that on Thaumaturgic Veil, their brand new album. Amidst the references to theoretical science experiments are aggressive songs that evoke 90s death metal stylings while touching on both the tried-and-true and more unusual subject matter of this genre.

If the nineteen-song track listing scares you, fear not: there is a specific structure to Thaumaturgic Veil. Each song is preceded by a soundscape, starting off with more haunting, witch-like sounds (“Enûma Elish Ilü) and ending with moments that feel more like existential crises about our place in the universe and life itself. Both stylings are different, yet they add something unique to the record layout.

Vocalist Brian DeNeffe’s growls are deep and almost indistinguishable at times (for me, necessitating the use of the lyrics that their PR team was kind enough to send over with this album for review). That being said, there is a breadth of vocabulary being used in here that elevates the songs from standard fare about blood and guts to a death metal album with a bit more substance. “Pummeled” feels like the usual genre fare (“Blood pooling/Cranium collapsed/Bones shattered/teeth torn out”), but “Eaten By Flies” uses “ameliorate”, “fecundate”, “obeisance”, and “licentious” all within one verse.

Guitarists Lief Larson and Johnathon Iberra, bassist Jason Hellman, and drummer Erik Schultek drive these songs forward with increasing brutality, while DeNeffe shows off his vocal prowess. In the midst of all the death metal chugging, sweep-picking, tapping, and dive bombs are utilized. It’s brutal yet sophisticated.

Thaumaturgic Veil jumps between songs about blood, death, destruction, and the mysteries of the universe. The album’s closer, “Light Harvester”, seems like it’s using the facade of death metal to touch on the objective truth that we are all slowly fading away as we age (“You are rotting/Slowly being/Eaten away/By your atmosphere”). I could be misinterpreting this. Even so, it begs the question: is the real terror the demons and monsters that we watch in horror movies, or is it the inevitability that, one day, we are all heading towards the same destination, and we don’t know what’s out there?

Viogression has been going since 1988, and this is only their fourth album since releasing their debut, Expound & Exhort, in 1990. While they had a nine-year hiatus after the release of their second album, 1994’s Passage, they have clearly honed in on their craft over the last several decades, leading to a great entry in the death metal sphere. Turn it up loud and freak out about the universe.