Members of German underground black metallers Zorn return under another black banner: Mord (not to be confused with an American band with same name). This is pure Norwegian black metal worship. This is probably where I should stop, because I've never followed that scene closely and can't really judge these newer releases. But this is what I hear.

Starting with sounds of breaking branches, soon ear-splitting music begins. Guitars are able to push through ear-drums. Nothing easy to listen to! Otherwise the sound is very raw, not the rawest out there, but like "let's set up the gear and record it NOW" way. Bass and drums are both audible (well, the drums are buried every now and then to some extent), so this isn't truly chaotic. But those sharp guitars are enough to drive me mad within a few minutes. It sounds like this was recorded live, first shot. There's tiny mistakes in playing all the time. Nothing catastrophic, it's part of this all. Vocals are inhuman, probably distorted a bit and surely reverbing, and add true necro feel. This is synth-free material, by the way. I think there's some changes in guitar sound between songs which isn't a bad thing at all.

As for songs, this isn't too easy. The songs consist of few parts each and usually a part is repeated for quite a long time. Only the fastest song, 'Necrophage', sounds really boring, maybe for the fact that with this sound quality it gets too chaotic. At least the stuff is worth to be repeated for a bigger part. The pace changes from slow, even though not doomy, creeping to blasting madness and the band utilizes tempo changes well enough. The trouble is, that a lot of riffs are familiar, even to the guy like me who do not listen to black metal a lot. Maybe they are just similar, not same as heard before. No other band haunt over Mord like Darkthrone do, at least in my ears.

I can't go too deep, because I got a promo to review. Lyrical themes about death and suicide are the main message, I think. Grim-as-fuck black metal, that happens to sound better in my ears than many legendary names' albums. Not sound-wise, but song-wise. Therefore I advice blackest hordes to try Mord, if you can find it. But I'm not going to guarantee any originality, though.

Rating: 5½ (out of 10) ratings explained

Reviewed by Lane
03/01/2004 22:35