Mysteria
Temple Of The Scorn
4.9
Synopsis:
I have to thank Poland’s Mysteria. I have not had to write a negative review for a while and I feared I was getting rusty.
Review:
Described as “death/black metal with folk influences” by the sonically challenged folks at Metal-Archives, I jumped on this review with hopes of discovering a new young act to fawn over and tell you all about. Alas, what I ended up with is an absolutely terrible mish mash of styles on a debut record that will hopefully be the last we hear from thins band unless they improve a hundred fold.
Admittedly, opener “Mulla Xul” is a proficient if standard thrashy, slightly tech and proggy death metal track that actually holds some promise for the album's first four minutes. However, once the second track “Undying” starts, it’s apparent that Mysteria are pretty ambitious yet not quite skilled enough to pull all their desired styles together.
From “Undying” alone, you get the sense the band is trying for this epic, war mongering Behemoth sort of sound, but the use of odd clean vocals/chants and just overall undecided musicianship derail the ambition the overly long track has. “New Nation (We Are)” is a really awkward mix of blackened fury with almost rock/nu metal injections and a sudden style shift with ill advised clean vocals. The first two tracks pretty much encapsulate Mysteria-and not one drop of “folk” to be found anywhere.
But I suppose I should tell you about the acoustic interludes, the choppy attempted tech metal of “Territory (Inside my Kingdom”), Soulfly meets nu metal stomp of “Cold Generation”, cringe inducing Arabic oddness of “Awakening (Folkien pt 3)” or “ Respect For Evil” and “Never Before and After” which I can't decide if they are blistering death/black metal tracks or a rangy Nile/Middle Eastern styled death metal. If that sounds appealing, on paper it is, on practice though, it's confused. muddled and messy. Throw in the album's 50-minute running time and it results in 50 minutes crammed with 100’s of different ideas, and not a one melds into a single listenable, memorable song. I'm not even going to touch acosutic closer "Metamophosis" with Nergal's dick.
Still, I have to give Mysteria credit for not going for the simple Vader cloning and trying something different and ambitious, but they are still a long ways off from achieving a cohesive, enjoyable sound.
