Haemoth – Kontamination
“Haemoth support all that can contribute to the ruin of the human being, every form of vice, and don’t give a fuck to the means used to reach that point. Any form of vice, destruction and hate have to be preached. Haemoth encourages every act, physical or spiritual which could carry to the decline, blasphemy or pain. To become one with Him, The interior death is inevitable. The weak ones don’t have their place here. May they burn in hell…” Ah yes… good old rhetoric and broken English from black metal bands in their bios, tired and true. Having gazed upon France’s Haemoth’s mission statement before hitting “play”, I couldn’t help but think about how amazingly unoriginal such ideologies are, yet they remain so widely accepted in this genre. Sure… black metal may have stood for such proclamations ever since its explosive resurgence in the early 90’s, but I think that everyone is completely desensitized to the fantastical threats and often-hollow propaganda. Having said that and had a good chuckle after reading such uber serious tidings in the bio, I was off to the thorn fields of French black metal, eager to begin my journey to the musical place where “the interior death is inevitable…” Or whatever that means. “Kontamination” is modern day underground black metal formula 101. Nothing more. Nothing less. Featuring members of Spektr, this band looks to Norway for their dissonant, yet melodic grimness. The music strikes me as very singular, meaning there really isn’t any distinct layers in their music. Just a guitar, drums and bass… Typically all playing the same thing. The riffs though are in a style that I tend to enjoy, where the overall sound and density of the notes being played somehow swirl about to create this abstract form of melancholy. Haemoth takes this element a bit too far however, by pushing an already thick buzz in the guitars and draping what sounds like 1 track dedicated to static noise alone and mixed it into the whole of “Kontamination”. The sound is excessively fuzzy, but it doesn’t detract anything away from the broken glass gargled vokills and the listeners ability to hear all the instruments. In fact, one definite positive to this album is a loud and heavily distorted bass tone that fills in the gaps with a bit of character. You just don’t hear the bass much these days in black metal, so when it rears its gristled head, I tend to take notice and appreciate the effort put forth by the band. Aside from the lack of dimension in the music and an otherwise annoying fuzz in the production, “Kontamination” should appeal to fans of underground black metal since Haemoth do little to move their songwriting out of the unfaltering staples found in this genre for this, the bands 3rd album. -Marty
SOUTHERN LORD
Worm Gear 