MORDBRAND: "Kolumbarium"

My last encounter with Mordbrand was another EP, Necropsychotic, which was a rather usual feast on Swedish underground elements and which, admittedly, I've pretty much forgotten by now. But something lured me to see what they are to offer on a seven inch record since I'm a big lover of the format: you've got nothing but ten minutes or so to convince and that's it. No time for slacking or anything of that sort. Kick ass and leave.

And what would be more fitting for the format than crunching, devastating, reeking death metal. I don't think much has changed since Necropsychotic but it's not like I'd expect much innovation from this market: what we've got is monstrously pummelling drums (from various sorts of blasts to the d beats), downtuned string menace and hellish uttering. What makes the A side track "Consume Them" so good is the amount of dynamics they've managed to cram into the six minutes. There are varying tempos and some bright lead melodies, a breakdown with some ominous whispering, some doomish elements, and whatnot. With these features this is pretty easily the best track from the subgenre I've heard in a while – the last topper was probably from The Chills by Horrendous.

The B side hell roams under the moniker "Let Them Slumber" and what surprises me the most here is that it's no one else than Nox from Craft fame visiting here. You can tell it from the riffs already: the malicious, groovy shit that begins from 1:40 or so is pure and sole Craft: you've got the riffs, the beats, the vocals, the solos! So how exactly does their black metal work within Mordbrand's death? Well, this proves it works just admirably. In short, Kolumbarium did what I was looking for it to do: provide some very effective and demolishing old school death metal. Nothing from the subgenre really really bowls me over I'm afraid, but this is as great as it gets, I think, and I enjoy it to a great extent.

4 / 5

MORDBRAND: "Necropsychotic"

September 2011 marks the release of at least two EPs in the vein of Swedish old school death metal through two relatively big underground labels, the first being the CD version of Cryptborn’s Into the Grasp of the Starving Dead via Dark Descent Records, and the other being Mordbrand’s Necropsychotic via Deathgasm. Unlike the former, Mordbrand actually hails from the land of this legendary sound, but it doesn’t show in the result: I’d say this loses by little to the recent Cryptborn attack.

Unlike many in this certain business, Mordbrand does not have a thick, buzzing guitar sound: this is a more regular, breathing death (and perhaps slightly black) metal tone. A good dose of solos are added on top of the crumbling riffs, backed by a lot of d-beats. Vocal delivery is in the very common style, meaning low-pitched growls, and tempo is kept at moderate levels. So now you know what the package of Necropsychotic offers, and if you’re not up for another ride in early 90s’ nostalgia, you should be reading a totally different review by now.

There’s a few spots in which the band does stand out a little, and it’s in the guitar work that every now and then features some distortionless, ominous pluckings, and the third track ”Skärseld (Return to the Unholy)” dares to flirt with melodic ideas quite unheard of in Swedish DM underground. ”The Wall of Flesh” and ”Deliverance” belong to this category as well, featuring a tad more melody than we are accustomed to hear.

In the end, I don’t however think these little variations make Necropsychotic an otherworldly record. Even if the songs tend to vary a bit more than, say, the ones on the recent Cryptborn, the atmosphere isn’t on the same level of filthiness. The production here sounds quite safe and warm (if so can be said of an underground death metal release...) that is pretty far from a reeking, putrid soundscape. A decent effort that unfortunately pales in comparison to many others in the field right now.

2.5 / 5

ABOMINANT: "Where Demons Dwell"

Year after year and an album after another, Abominant has been cranking up new material since mid 90s and never reaching big fame. This is understandable in the context that the band most certainly aren’t innovating anything new, but on the other hand their newest output Where Demons Dwell has remained rather steadily in my player for a long time already, meaning that in spite of all the similarities to other bands, Abominant’s ninth full-length is a great listen.

I’m not an encyclopedia when it comes to death metal - a genre where only a few bands truly interest me - but Where Demons Dwell reminds me of a couple of other American death metal churners, namely Ares Kingdom and Arghoslent in the sense that instead of mere blasting, the band in question knows how to incorporate some melody into the music as well. Don’t get me wrong, Abominant sounds authentically evil and heavy, but melody is carefully used in a few places such as on epic solos and, for instance, on the vaguely melancholic and black metalish (think of Weapon) chord progressions of ”The Wolves of Hate”. Another place where the black metal flirt can be heard is on the discordant, Watain esque guitar picking intro of ”After the Fallout”

This kind of variation throughout the otherwise old school 40 minutes is what makes Where Demons Dwell rise higher than many other death metal contenders of today in my books. There’s a few weaker tracks in the whole though, the last two in particular, that perhaps repeat the previous ones too much, but there’s absolutely nothing on the album that I wouldn’t enjoy at least to some extent, hence ensuring its place among my currently favourite death metal albums. Production-wise, the record isn’t either dirty nor polished, balancing fittingly somewhere between, and the instrumentation is handled professionally (bonus points for the steady yet monstrous drumming) and the growls - nothing too guttural - are delivered with power. All this makes a recommendable piece of death metal, and it won’t be long until I’ll look into their back catalogue.

3.5 / 5