The Firstborn started out under the name Firstborn Evil in 1995. A well-received demo was released in 1996 and two years later, the debut album “Rebirth Of Evil” saw the light of day.
According to their biography the musical direction they took back then was a somewhat cliché death and black metal combination but I cannot comment on that because I haven’t heard those albums.

Their second album, entitled “From The Past, Yet To Come” (2000) already revealed a new direction and the name was changed to The Firstborn to reflect this. Then the band ceased all live activities to focus solely on writing their masterpiece. It took them four years but in the beginning of 2004 the recordings of what would become “The Unclenching Of Fists” finally began. A whole year later the album was finally ready to be released through ProCon, a side label of Portuguese Equilibrium Music.

“The Unclenching Of Fists” is a concept album based upon the Tibetan Book of the Dead, The Bardo Thödol, and is “a journey towards Enlightenment, beyond Space, Time and Flesh.”
The Firstborn took extreme metal in general as a base for their compositions and added layers of samples, percussion and Eastern melodies to it, resulting in a pretty original mixture of styles.

If you were to describe them to a friend you could say that if they take into mind Emperor, Nile and (for those who know them) Melechesh it would be in that direction but with a lot more melody and ethnic influences.
The individual tracks are multilayered and reveal tiny details after each listening session so it stays interesting even after playing the album a dozen of times. Bruno Fernandes is responsible for all vocals and he can do anything. Grunts, creams, clean signing, he does it all and he takes the music to an even higher level. Rolando Baros, who also plays in the best-known Portuguese death metal band Sacred Sin, expertly handled the session drums and all percussion and cymbals were done by him as well.

The production is very good considering the fact that so many layers of sound were put on top of each other. The album sounds clear and warm and leaves nothing to be desired I think.
To cut it short: if you are an open-minded metal fan with an interest in Eastern music you should check out “The Unclenching Of Fists”