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TRIPTYKON
Melana Chasmata

Prowling Death / Century Media (2014)
Rating: 10/10

When Tom G. Warrior was confusing critics and admirers alike during his days with Swiss avant-garde metallers Celtic Frost, no-one at the time seemed to realise just how important this guy would become in metal circles. Since the primeval days of Hellhammer and then on to the more bemusing yet influential Celtic Frost, Mr. Warrior has grown from madman to genius.

Whether flirting with gothic dance music, blackened thrash metal, or twisted glam, he has always had a way with words and sound. Now existing under the banner of Thomas Gabriel Fischer – his real name – Triptykon is the latest beast of emotion to emerge from his twisted mind.

Melana Chasmata is the second full-length release from this bunch of musicians following on from 2010’s Eparistera Daimones and the 2010 Shatter EP. As it stands, Melana Chasmata is easily one of the best albums of 2014.

For truly dark and twisted genius, Triptykon is your best ticket for a ride into the quagmires of hell. Still adopting the same ethereal guitar sound that made those Celtic Frost records so darn eerie, Triptykon maintains those high levels of strangeness, only to coat them in a doomy sludge.

Fischer is at the helm, still barking like a tyrant cast from hell, but alongside him there is the delectable Vanja Šlajh on bass – responsible for those spine-tingling trundles and tinkers. Behind their lofty thrones are perched guitarist V. Santura (Dark Fortress), and drum warlock Norman Lonhard.

It has often been said that Fischer’s recorded output has been one of fleeting genius. For some, his previous outfit Apollyon Sun didn’t really take off, but there’s no denying the sheer presence of this man; when he gets his potions together and comes up with the correct formula, the result is one of the most frightening creations in music.

Melana Chasmata lives up to the hype and more in that it’s a dank, suffocating dungeon of a record propelled by such discordant delights as ‘Tree Of Suffocating Souls’ with its thrashy segments delivered via the usual welcome vocal grunt of Fischer, before he spits further words of arrogance, beaming: “Speak to me, my master, Speak to me, come save me, Redeemer, revive me, This black void, through my heart, I can’t see your dark sky, Almighty, above me, By grace, save me, Believe in me, I am your lie, I am deceit disguised”.

The only thing predictable about those opening chords and snarls is the vast amounts of evil energy dedicated to mastering such a gothic tome. It’s horrid black thrash of such arrogance that once it has cast its vast shadow across the room, you cannot help but become one with the titan. And then, as if such a wicked track wasn’t enough, it somehow discards it, in turn presenting us with the creepy tumble of ‘Boleskine House’ – a turgid doom metal fuzz in which Fischer narrates with eerie sneer, “Your eyes that once, Have gazed the waves, Have long been closed, Become enslaved, Within these walls, You lastly climbed, With fear engraved, The walls of time, This is the ground, You walked upon, The soil beneath, Your world long gone, In tortured flesh, Your name is called, Inseminate the bornless one, Invisible Gods on planes apart, I thee invoke, Oh western star”.

This is a mammoth track that incorporates a black metal influence (which seems strange to say, considering Fischer’s first band Hellhammer nigh on created the genre), and fuses them with blackened doom metal circa the swaggering strains of Behemoth. It’s often cold, but fog-enshrouded enough to cause condensation on the trudging strings of the guitar. With the insertion of those haunting female vocals, we’re reminded again of the sepulchral glories of Celtic Frost’s most bizarre meanderings.

‘Altar Of Deceit’ is the third track, another to run for over seven minutes, and yet time passes by so quickly under such dank air. A mere tickle of drum gives way to an avalanche of black silt as the track lurches once again into the nether regions of doom metal.

I find it staggering and scary as to how Fischer has combed the depths of his psyche in order to retrieve such visions of gloom and unrest. What planet this guy was born on we’ll never truly know, but the soundtracks he creates are so alien yet inviting in their melancholic splendour. Vocally, he booms his grimace of the grim above the thunderous drums and clammy bass-lines. Never before have I waded through such plateaus of murk; choking am I on the squirming moss and enveloping icy fog. And it never relinquishes its grip.

‘Breathing’ appears from the cracks with a similarly eerie stature. It’s elusive and monolithic, the riffs slug-like in their gargantuan motions. This initially has more in common with the mist-laced moans of My Dying Bride, until it takes on the form of a full-blown thrash assault. ‘Aurorae’ and ‘Demon Pact’ simply continue the destruction; each of these sullen chapters a mere twist of our fate as we are dragged further into the pitch confines of a place we could hardly imagine.

So nightmarish is the quality of this platter that I see no way that Fischer and company can rival such an obdurate monster; grotesque from its innards through to its scaled skin, cold bones and blackened beating heart. ‘In The Sleep Of Death’ is another eight minutes of serpentine doom metal. Fischer appears to be tinkering with an Ouija board this time as he glares into the ethereal void to speak, “Emily, why don’t you speak to me? Can’t you see, I’m not sleeping. Emily, why don’t you reveal yourself? Can’t you feel my yearning?”

As the hairs on my neck tingle to an erect stance, I feel frozen to the spot as the tentacles of horror drag me in for one last apocalyptic requiem. I wonder if such deranged hymns should be given a warning label, such is their spectral façade.

And with the hideous 13-minute slog of ‘Black Snow’ hiding round the corner like an axe-wielding clown of sorrow, I feel literally bereft of hope after experiencing this menace. When Fischer smirks during ‘Waiting’ that “They’ve come for us”, I’m at once repelled but bewitched by another grim foray into the cryptic mind of what I believe to be heavy metal’s most imaginative of frontmen. The biggest concern of course comes however as the vocalist bellows that “We are the same”, and with that dark image buried deep within my suffocated brain I run from the room, slam the door shut behind me and don’t dare look back over my shoulder for fear that the titan that is terrifying Fischer is still there, escaping from my nightmares and entering the real world.

Melana Chasmata is a work of introspective genius.

Neil Arnold

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