Album Review: Machtklang - Machtklang
Reviewed by Eric Clifford
I’m not too proud to admit that I’m a relatively recent convert to the blackened arts. It’s not that I never liked black metal, but it didn’t hook me with the immediacy that death metal did, which always has and likely always will have this animalistic, inexorable magnetism for me. What can I say? I’m a simple guy, I hear blastbeats and gurgles and my lizard brain is immediately up and straining at the leash to bestow grievous harm upon whatever is so unlucky as to share the surrounding 5 square miles with me. Before I know it, I’m back in the padded cell again and the wife prods the odd banana through a slot in the door every few hours until I’ve calmed down and regained higher brain function. Struck fearful by the prospect that I would euthanised for the greater good of mankind if I had another of my “episodes”, I was compelled to seek refuge in the other domains of extreme metal’s burgeoning cornucopia. A spotify playlist called “Raw Black Metal” caught my eye. It’s been downhill ever since. I’m seldom seen in public without corpsepaint and battleaxes, my kids pretend they don’t know me, and police helicopters now circle the bush I’m hiding in after I got caught trying to burn a synagogue down with one of those cooking lighters with the long nozzle that makes it look a bit like an aadvark’s head. I’ve time enough only to regale you on the virtues of this new Machtklang release before I get tazed and lobbed into solitary confinement again while the powers that be discuss the respective merits of incarceration, lobotomisation, or potentially just being dragged to a field somewhere and shot. Forgive me a measure of curtness then; I have much to say, and even my tolerance for tear gas it’s limits.
After a completely pointless 16 second opening track consisting entirely of a dainty little bell, a mortar shell detonates in the foxhole with “Tief Begraben”. Ignore the fact that the title sounds like a Jamaican describing what “biting” means, because this is a groovy, fuzzy beast of a track. A glorious Mid-paced shellacking of simplistic but obscenely catchy riffs, that kick drum thumping the earth flat as bestial old-school war metal grunts herald the coming of an apocalyptic beating. I’m pretty sure that Machtklang use a drum machine, but it’s so punchy and meaty it fits the music like a lubricated glove. Next up we have the title track, and it starts with either a furious hailstorm of blastbeats or someone throwing Stephen Hawking down the stairs. It sounds awesome either way, and the way the song slams down a gear into classic blackened doom territory, those droning distorted chords ringing out and threatening to dislocate my head from my shoulders is just...*mwah*, beautiful, I could listen to it forever. We even have a solo! There is some nimble fretwork on display here, melodious but technical, complimenting the strong grasp of melody the album has overall. So far then I’m most impressed, and the hits keep coming too – “Panzerbatallion Prometheus” opens with an ominous “South of Heaven” vibe to it’s introduction, bleak and threatening, that hammers into a tungsten-hard mace of a riff that interplays with faster chorus sections; none of this is particularly technically adept, but it’s striking how much goodness Machtklang wring out of the foundational basics of black metal. I’m no devotee of the mantra that “simple is best”, there’s far too much labyrinthine music out there that I worship with frankly undignified zealotry, but the potency of Machtklang’s approach is beyond contestation.
Next up is “Dissonanz”, a brief instrumental respite in the form of dicking about on something or other, it sounds like a humiliated drunk trying to navigate a roomful of windchimes. It exists in spite of it’s utter pointlessness, infuriating in it’s totally needless inclusion in any musical endeavour anywhere ever. Ah well, not to worry, “Herbsthyme” is right around the corner. As a summation of Machtklang’s capabilities for penning epic tuneage you couldn’t ask for more. Resounding tom hits underpin soaring melodies that again, don’t break the mould, but exemplify it marvellously. There’s an imperial regality to it, even the morose German cleans do nothing to eject me from Machtklang’s teutonic grip. You might have gathered that, a few questionable blemishes aside, I’m really enjoying what Machtklang bring to the table here. At this point, I’m pumped, ready for whatever Machtklang are going to slap me about my pendulous jowls with next. But...there’s nothing. We’re done here. 6 songs, two of which are throwaway – one almost literally adding nothing as it’s all of 16 fucking seconds long. The metal may be black, but my balls are blue. I want more, hooked directly to my veins if need be. And that’s really the sum total of my protestations here – there simply isn’t enough of it. So far as I can tell, this isn’t billed as an EP, but it really should be because there just isn’t enough here to justify it being called a full length. Especially considering the addition of “Ein Klang” and “Dissonanz” – what was the point of including these? They add nothing and given how strong the rest of the material is I’d dropkick my gran to have more of it. As a sample of Machtklang’s potential, this is absolutely demonstrative of an outfit to keep an eye on, and I pray to whatever deity has ears for me that they opt to include more material on the next go around.
I don’t know what Machtklang are going to wind up charging for this, but assuming it gets priced like an EP, it’s absolutely worthy of your attention. It’s not new or revolutionary but it takes an established template and absolutely nails it. I query the inclusion of the purely instrumental stuff, but with the exception of those ultimately forgivable missteps I will await the next instalment of their work with a rabid intensity. Keep your eyes on this project.
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