What better way to murder the most fearsome night of the calendar than to catch an extreme metal show? Granted English technical death metallers Mithras do notpromulgate the formulaic gory, occult and macabre that death metal is traditionally associated with but this show does mark their maiden headlining appearance live in London since 2008 and follows their slot at this year's Incineration Festival. The band's life began under their previous moniker Imperator and 2000 saw them reconceived as Mithras and transmitting their cosmic take on complex death metal. This year saw the four-piece release their fourth album 'On Strange Loops', their first album in almost ten years and the response has been overwhelmingly positive.
Progressive death metal unit Rannoch begin to pummel the audience with their technical yet severe musical weaponry. Formed in the Midlands in 2004, the band has one album 'Between Two Worlds' bearing their name and they are an appropriate compliment to the headliners. Plenty of Opeth influence haunts heavier noodling riffs, alongside Meshuggah chugs peppered with metalcore style breakdowns, contrasting the beautiful and ethereal clean progressive metal wonderings. The vocals are equally multi-faceted and wrestle with a barrage of opposing tones with growls, metalcore-styled rasps and emotive singing not too dissimilar to those heard in Akercocke. Songs are lengthy but the freshness and complexity of the musicianship keeps the show stimulating particularly given the headspace battle between the vicious and the dream-like. The number of attendees is sparse but being assumedly technical metal fans, Rannoch go down a storm and effortlessly win the audience's approval.
The crowd figures remain woefully low tonight as headliners Mithras launch into new song 'Odyssey's End', which begins with gorgeous cosmic clambering through the thoughtful and tender before hardening with distortion and finally heady Vader-esque death metal. Mainman Leon Macey impressively works through technical charm while barking muscular shouts to the venue. The unique point to Mithras' anthems is luscious atmospheric and spacious guitar meanderings that replicate an intergalactic dream. With Mithras, perhaps for the first time in death metal, guitar solos can be classified as beautiful, confectionary for the ears.
The Black Heart's sound impinges poorly on the band's sound, shoving the bass drum and vocals above the complex guitars and rendering the whole sound production somewhat compressed but given the ornate nature of the music, for those who have been to shows at this venue before, it is difficult to expect such a minute venue to do justice to Mithras. Nonetheless, it is impossible not to marvel at the likes of older Immolation-style selections like 'Lords and Masters', 'Under the Three Spheres' and 'Wrath of God' substituting further crystalline wanderings found in newer selections 'When the Stars Align' and 'Time Never Lasts' for blunt-force aggression.
The musicianship is incredible and the audience stands with their collective mouth agape. Macey comes across as a humbling frontman as well as a superb guitarist; his talents can never be understated. The other members are not part of Mithras proper but as live members, they certainly get the audience more enthused and possess a dynamic stage presence. The last song of the night 'Thrown Upon the Waves' utilises Morbid Angel-influenced riffs with melting, watery melodies beamed from another world and rather unexpectedly fires up a mosh pit that punctuates this concluding track. The size of the audience may have been smaller than anyone could have anticipated but it goes without reporting the attendees superlatively enjoyed the show. Mithras truly are one the most unorthodox death metal acts and still bring a plethora of invigorating ideas to their sound. Given the very recent and fervent underground support for the likes of Horrendous and Blood Incantation, this English act truly deserve more attention.
FUTURE GIGS
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