MÆNTRA "Kundalini"

    For anyone looking for a brutal release that explores human consciousness and looks to transcend the mental barriers of human existence, I believe MÆNTRA has you covered with the release of their debut full-length album, “Kundalini.” The band explores the musical boundaries of death metal and industrial metal, while also incorporating a plethora of other mesmerizing sounds to guide you on this one of a kind extreme sounding spiritual journey. 

    The band consists of drummer Adam Houmam (Cartilage, Ghoul, Ion, Terrorizer L.A.), guitarist/vocalist Rudy Pina, bassist/vocalist Paul Ryan (Origin) and keyboardist Martin Boynton (Short Fuse). The album is rather fascinating with each track on the album exploring one of the seven chakras. One would not typically connect extreme sounding brutality with euphoric enlightenment, but I do believe that is what makes this album so unique. Also, the musicianship really stood out when I first started listening to the album, and I find that the band composes their arrangements with tremendous precision. The album flows with a tremendous synergy which helps bring together all these different sounds and compositions. 

    To begin the first track off of the album, “Muladhara,” the band provides these calming atmospheric noises that eventually get completely decimated by intense blast beats and mind crushing riffs. Throughout the song there are a lot of dynamic arraignments along with very frantic sounding industrial elements in the background. At first I was a bit taken back, but eventually I started to become more and more intrigued as the music evolved. 

    On the second track, “Svadhisthana,” the band continues to traverse across these unconventional musical landscapes, while at the same time creating a monumental avalanche of inhuman distorted sounding entropy. The band’s approach does have you questioning the direction of the music at times, however the unpredictable nature of the band’s arrangements definitely has you engaged and drifting through this unpredictable void of mind altering chaos. The brutal complex technical rhythms on songs like, “Manipura” and “Vishuddha,” sounds almost otherworldly, which actually perfectly compliments the haunting celestial keyboard parts.

    Overall, I cannot find too much to complain about this album and I believe that MÆNTRA is an extremely talented up and coming band. The caliber of musicianship along with the album’s production quality sounded very impressive compared to a fair amount of modern death metal bands that I have come across. Unlike some extreme metal artists that have this tendency to hastily throw a pile of messy sounding arrangements together, MÆNTRA really understands who to make everything sound tight and flow from beginning to end. If you want an extreme metal experience to open your mind to achieve inner enlightenment, then this album is definitely worth checking out. 

Check out the song "Svadhisthana" below : 

Link to the band's Bandcamp:

https://maentr3.bandcamp.com/track/svadhisthana

Link to the band's Facebook:

https://www.facebook.com/maentr3

The Language of Thunder : A Benefit for Tornado Victims of Southern Kentucky

    This past December severe storms devastated certain parts of the United States with Kentucky being hit the hardest. Snow Wolf Records and Unsavory Records have joined forces to create a compilation album featuring thirteen metal bands from Kentucky as a way to raise money for those who were impacted by the tornado. 

    I truly believe that this compilation is a great way to help an important cause, while also providing an opportunity to promote some extremely talented local metal bands that care about their communities. Some of the tracks on the compilation are previously unreleased songs and demos, which I find will give listeners a perfect glimpse into what these bands are capable of offering. Some of the bands on this compilation I have heard of before since Snow Wolf Records has sent me promos in the past, but for the most part this would be my first time hearing a lot of these bands. 

    Also to point out, there is a fair amount of diversity when pertaining to the representation of the various metal subgenres, so I find that metal fans will be able to hear an abundance of musical creativity throughout the album. If you are a fan of bloodthirsty raw black metal, sickening old school death metal and even just solid classic heavy metal music, then this album will have you covered. Hell, you even have an act like Pulse diNura which dives into this heart pounding hallucinogenic blackened electronic industrial sounding world with the song, “Drinking Tyrants’ Blood from a Paper Cup (Pardon the Fangs)." 

    I did notice that the album showcases a fair amount of black metal bands, although I cannot complain given the auspiciously sinister sounding quality of the recordings. To start, the band Brood in Black (Not to be confused with the wrestling faction known as The Brood) contributed an inhumanly vicious track called, “Vampyric Lust.” The song conveyed a massive amount raw sounding dark energy, which reminded me a lot of Satanic Warmaster by creating a very haunting and abysmal atmosphere. Fornicus, Bihargam and Starer, all bands that I have encountered before listening to this compilation, each contributed spectacular sounding songs. Starer’s track, “The Flickering,” is a breath taking piece of atmospheric black metal music highly worth checking out along with the band’s previous releases. Another band that caught my attention was, Black Knife, a very no-nonsense unapologetic sounding black metal artist which contributed a short yet blistering piece of corpse ripping music titled, “Satan’s Wolves.” 

    Two bands that I felt stood out from the rest of the crowd were Blood Curse and Thumos. Blood Curse is a band that I definitely want to hear more of going forward as the band has a very strong classic NWOBH sound that reminded me of certain iconic metal bands such as Witchfinder General, Satan and Angel Witch. The catchy guitar riffs and feverish lead guitar parts really hook the listener from the beginning of the song until the end. In the case of Thumos, I believe listeners who appreciate instrumental progressive metal will really find the band's song, “Mysterium Cosmographicum,” extremely fascinating. The band pulls you in a variety of directions with these vibrant sounding dynamic compositions, thus creating a very atypical musical landscape.

    Overall, “The Language of Thunder,” is an album highly worth checking out and each band is unbelievably talented. I wish I could have gone through each track and given more detail, but I hope to maybe cover some of these artists in the future, as the amount of extreme metal talent is undeniable. Snow Wolf Records and Unsavory Records did an exceptional job putting together this compilation to help an important cause, so I have a tremendous amount of respect for both labels. Unlike when those douchebag celebrities got together and did a rotten cover of John Lennon’s, “Imagine,” the artists featured on this compilation actually provided killer sounding music for a good cause that did not make you want to vomit. 

Link Below to the Compilation via Snow Wolf Records: 

https://snowwolfrecords.bandcamp.com/album/the-language-of-thunder

Entire Track Listing Below: 

1. Stonecutters - Creatio Ex Nihil  

2. Starer - The Flickering 

3. Black Knife - Satan's Wolves 

4. Fire Messiah - Stars of the Maniac Revival 

5. Blood Curse - Destitute  

6. Thumos - Mysterium Cosmographicum 

7. Moonknight - Weakhearted 

8. Ad Infinitum - Submerge 

9. Bihargam - Anti-Angel (demo) 

10. Brood in Black - Vampyric Lust 

11. Fornicus - One Mass Grave  

12. El Astronauta - Give Up the Ghost 

13. Pulsa diNura - Drinking Tyrants' Blood from a Paper Cup (Pardon the Fangs Remix) 

Glyph "Remind Us of the Sun"

    Emerging from some frozen dominion surround by infinite darkness, Glyph has finally decided to unleash their debut full-length album upon the metal world. “Remind Us of the Sun,” is a raw black metal release that journeys into insidious sounding musical realms shrouded in a suffocating mist of distorted chaos. 

    Not much is known about this artist, which I find adds to the album’s mystique and establishes this haunting presence which can be felt throughout the release. I’ve reviewed a couple Glyph demos before receiving this promo, however this full-length album seems to build off of the previous releases in terms of recording quality and overall production. The riffs on this album are extremely chaotic sounding and go against what one might expect from a typical black metal band by experimenting with different tempos and creating very unorthodox sounding atmospheres.

    The album’s opening track, “Of the Cinders,” begins with a very hypnotic sounding composition which transitions into a more blizzard like black metal approach. This artist is extremely open to altering tempos and messing around with dissonant chord progressions. As much as I enjoy the dynamic style at times, there are moments on this album where I felt a bit overwhelmed as though the direction of the music was going off of the path, but for the most part the music grasps you with a wicked sounding confidence. Tracks like, “Lost Beyond Time” and “Who Lies Dormant,” are a couple of songs that really stood out when listening to the album, especially when pertaining to the music’s overall malevolent sounding tone. Although the production quality on this album might not meet the standards of some black metal purists, I personally felt as though Glyph captures the dark and ominous energy quite well. 

    Towards the end of the album I felt as though the arrangements continued to provide that classic raw black metal sound, as well as the atmospheres expanding into directions that bring hope for more exploration on future releases. The song that stole the show for me was, “Relics of the Precursors,” which I thought was a manifestation of classic sounding black metal with some subtle touches of atmospheric black metal elements as well. Glyph’s ability to record harsh compositions with some slight catchy and mesmerizing atmospheric elements is what I believe will allow this artist to really standout amongst the other modern black metal artists. 

    “Remind Us of the Sun,” is an album that does stay true to what black metal fans have come to expect from artists who play this style of music, however, I find when listening closely that Glyph has a tremendous amount of potential that will hopefully be utilized on future releases. I look forward to what Glyph has to offer in the future, although I highly recommend people check out, "Remind Us of the Sun," as this type of music definitely captures the unforgiving and sinister essence of black metal. 

Link to Glyph Bandcamp (Album comes out February 18th, 2022) :

https://keeperoftheglyph.bandcamp.com/album/remind-us-of-the-sun