The new Danish thrash band Mordax’s debut full-length, Violence
Fraud Treachery, came unannounced to me and it wasn’t an unpleasant little surprise.
It is a breed of thrash metal and melodic death remarkably similar to benchmark
group The Haunted, but it perhaps pays a bit more homage to Metallica than that
band, taking the song “Contrapasso” as an example. Mordax rely on catchy thrash
breakdowns; old school riffs with a more clinical modern edge, and present a
pleasingly easy-to-listen-to set of numbers based on this principle. Indeed we’re
given little else apart from a few well-played acoustic segments. Dan Swano is
producing (suitably) so the sounds are all tight as hell. I would criticize the
vocals for being the kind of standard crap heard in melodeath and metalcore
these days, but one has to admit the riffing is pretty badboy for most of the
album. The remainder of the album is made of cast-away riffs, though in Mordax’s
case, these are relatively few. The rest of the metal world however is a
different story. I don’t know if record companies put pressure on bands to
create albums of greater length, but I really feel that many bands of certain
styles (namely thrash, death, and black metal) should not be worried about
length or how epic their albums are, but instead strip them back to only the
most vehement riffing and concentrate what metal is really about: raw, dark,
powerful intensity. There is often no need for filler or second-rate material.
There is often no need for your album to blast on for a full hour. Shoot short
and fast but shoot to kill. And *cough* Mordax are not an exemplary culprit of
this, so let’s conclude the review…
Mordax sound young and fresh and they sound like they’re
enjoying themselves very importantly, yet it remains to be seen whether or not
they will climb the ranks and actually break any ground in the future. They do
however seem to be very skilled musicians with a real talent for writing heavy
thrash riffs, so I hope the best for their future. I suspect they will make a
name for themselves, because VFT is just a very, very listenable
forty-five minute chunk out of your day.
In summary: Mordax present a slightly generic yet effective
and extremely accessible thrash/melodeath combo. Recommended for fans of The
Haunted, Black Breath etc.
Standout tracks: “Silhouette of God”, “Treachery”
Score: 7.0
No comments:
Post a Comment