Mahr, Odium, Germany, Amor Fati Productions, AFP250 CD / vinyl LP (2023)
Like fellow Prava Kollektiv bands Arkhtinn, Hwwauoch, Pharmakeia and Voidsphere, mystery atmo-BM unit Mahr dropped an album on December 1, 2023, this being its third album “Odium”. Like those other acts too, Mahr’s music is a very intense and cacophonous noisy strain of nihilistic cosmic BM, and the differences among the Prava Kollektiv are to be found mainly in their technical sonic details. Generally though, Mahr’s music appears more death metal / industrial than the others, which is sure to please those Prava Kollektiv fans who want a bit more variety in the darkspace soundscapes than savage grinding monotonous riffs going at close to light-year speeds over synth percussion. Even the production on “Odium” is very clear compared to some of the other December offerings from the Prava Kollektiv folk, and this clarity allows everything Mahr does to be heard distinctly. The result is that Mahr’s work has a depth and an intricacy in its structuring that fellow acts like Pharmakeia and Voidsphere lack – though I do appreciate that each of the PK acts has its own particular aims and themes which determine to some extent what musical entity should result.
“Odium” consists of two long tracks “Infames” and “Maledicti”, and both are extreme, harsh noisy journeys through abysses of bleak darkness where demons rage, howl and scream almost continuously at their deserved fates. “Infames” quickly hits top speed with fast stuttering blast-beat synth drumming and a streaming texture of scrabbling tremolo guitar melodies playing so fast you barely have time to register one melody before it ends, and another begins … and another begins. The speed of the riffing and the percussion has a demented, unhinged quality. Vocals are perhaps not necessary in such an inhuman madhouse of machine-like riffs, rhythms and beats but they do add an extreme alien, otherworldly bent to the music and the moods expressed in the vocals range from monstrous, almost savage and brutal, to desperate and suffering in pain and agony. Synthesiser tones and ambience are relegated to the background where they add a cold and indifferent space ambient edge to the music and enhance its darkly sinister alien qualities. In the track’s final moments, the guitars give way to this cold-space ambient background, where floating effects and ghost choirs join in creating an unsettling and manic scene of skeletal wraiths behind a dark veneer masquerading as stars in the far distant cosmos scheme and plot to come to our little blue planet and subdue and enslave humanity to serve their whims.
If “Infames” was intense and verging on chaotic, then “Maledicti” is an even more crazed and malevolent work with multiple voices snarling and growling, and an occasional lone voice screaming as if falling through a bottomless chasm. Guitar riffs are still super-fast but not quite so much as on “Infames”, so they are more clearly defined in the music and their constant change and variety give the track an evil energy and lively nature. The voices are just as varied in their approach to tackling the lyrics, sometimes slurring them out with relish and sometimes howling and shrieking them. “Maledicti” ends up being an enjoyable immersive atmo-BM / noise work that does demand the listener’s full attention to its complex nature.
At almost 41 minutes in length, “Odium” isn’t a long work but it sure feels at least an hour longer than it is, thanks to a dense style, guitars with minds of their own, solid and dependable drumming even as the drumkit spins around threatening to go completely airborne, and a fair few crazed vocals expressing hatred for humanity and generally behaving in an obnoxious and straitjacket-worthy manner. Though fast and multi-layered, the music on “Odium” is actually easy to follow and its different instruments at least harmonise where expected as they pursue their individual paths.
Of all the PK acts, to judge from their December 1 releases, Mahr rates as a listener-friendly black / death metal industrial noise act whose experiments with sound and structure make it an act worth following.