RSS Feed


MOURNING MIST
Mourning Mist

Forever Plagued (2015)
Rating: 8/10

With that disconcerting violin whine and those eerie drum taps and creaks, I’m finding myself already haunted by the stark raving mad cacophony that is Mourning Mist. The project features Abhor / Profezia bassist Kvasir; the former is an Italian black metal troupe, while the latter also explores the black metal boundaries by dabbling with ambience.

Now, when I heard that this album was somehow going to marry gloomy metal with violin I almost laughed, but now I’ve spun this disc I’m almost embarrassed by my dismissive stupidity. Mourning Mist have come up with a truly mind-blowing and haunting opus that is fronted by Ecnerual, who somehow makes a string instrument sound just as fantastic as a guitar or any other item employed for metallic extremity.

I guess that to a certain extent Mourning Mist’s debut is black metal, but this is black metal thinking way outside of the box by way of implementing some truly avant-garde techniques where a classical style of music – which is at once haunting and foreboding – plays out like some eerie soundtrack occasionally punctured by tortured rasps and odd narration.

It’s neither fast nor heavy and I wouldn’t class it as primitive either, but instead Ecnerual and company have forged a strange partnership where that ever-present violin graces the rest of the musicianship to create a series of textured soundscapes. In one instance we have the almost enchanting ‘Freefall’ which is fleet of foot and nifty in its violin, and yet the music harmlessly gallops along as a tepid black metal plod and yet works to the maximum as far as peculiar catchiness goes.

However, if we look at something like ‘Torment’, we get something close to, say, John Zorn territory where the riff is dense and black but overlaid on these trudging guitars is an almost maniacal frenzy provided by that wayward violin and for extra grey sauce we get those dry vocal rasps. It’s engaging, and there’s been many a time I’ve played this so as to appreciate every instrument. To deem this black metal would be completely unfair, because at times this goes into bonkers territory – evident with that almost drunken, riotous segment on ‘Torment’ just over halfway through and then at the other end of the spectrum there’s that jarring, jazzed up black metal perversity of ‘Rise And Decay’ which is at once haunting, then direct and eventually disco-edged with that catchy drum tap.

Mourning Mist have crafted an unusual album to say the least, and one which revolves around that often sublime violin ping. Of the six tracks offered, only the closer ‘Lament’ brings any sort of straightforward accessibility; the track is merely being a classical soundtrack, but so mesmerising is Ecnerual’s work that the misanthropic lyrics and occasional seething vocals are mere background rackets, and I’m glad of that.

Neil Arnold

<< Back to Album & EP Reviews



Related Posts via Categories
Share