Jupiter, the red giant, the largest planet in our solar system, has about 318 times the mass of the Earth. Any band monnikered after this gaseous Goliath has something to live up to then in terms of heaviness. Such his the case for the Brazilian foursome Jupiterian. This outfit from Sao Paulo plays a particularly vitriolic type of funeral doom that is not only superheavy, but also dares to leave orbit in violent, flaring outbursts, not unlike Evoken or Disembowelment.

‘Protosapien’ is their third full-length after the debut ‘Aphotic’ and the sophomore ‘Terraforming’, which had earned them a slot on last year’s prestigious Netherlands Deathfest in Tilburg. We’ve gotten used to Transcending Obscurity’s beautiful packaging and this record is no exception. The cover artwork is simply stunning and the label has gone out of its way again to come up with some really cool boxed editions. The prize winner this time, for me at least, is the cassette box version.

My first acquaintance with this band was when they opened for a tour package together with the likes of Father Befouled, Encoffination and Krypts in the Magasin 4 in Brussels. This band totally blew me away. Four hooded figures entered a stage drenched in fog like they had just been hanging out with Sunn O))). The sound they wrenched from their guitars was one of the heaviest produced that evening and that was saying something considering the company they were keeping.

The new album picks up from that impression. On the intro ‘Homecoming’ you slowly approach Jupiter as its unfathomable size looms up before you, enveloping you completely and making it undeniably evident just how fragile and insignificant a tiny dot you are in comparison.

Your vessel shakes in all its hinges as it enters ‘Mere Humans’, an outer atmosphere of tremolo picked guitars that makes way to a slow, driving, hypnotic riff that pulls you downward to the lower spheres of ‘Voidborn’. This is a droning maelstrom of misery that spirals towards a blast beat blizzard. The shaky spacecraft has barely weathered this storm when it enters ‘Capricorn’, a dense layer of doom that challenges the structural integrity of your hull to its maximum.

‘Starless’. The comforting view of the stars in open space are nothing now but a distant dream. All you see around you is an endless ocean of swirling guitars whose sheer weight presses down on you harder and harder.
By now, it is clear that this descent was a one way ticket. Jupiterian’s gravity has an iron hold on you that leaves no possibility for escape. The crushing tones of ‘Earthling Bloodline’ finally take your ship over the limit, pressure alerts go off, the hull cracks. A buzzing ring in your ears is the last you hear before every molecule of your being is squeezed together. Leaving nothing.

Release Date: September 11th, 2020
Label: Transcending Obscurity Records
Tracklist:

1. Homecoming
2. Mere Humans
3. Voidborn
4. Capricorn
5. Starless
6. Earthline Bloodline