[since I did promise to write a review once in a while for bands and / or projects and / or artists and / or labels and / or distributors (etc.) that I do adore (personally and / or musically), I will finish this older one. This one is for Stu!]
Well, I did surely appreciate Mekigah’s former stuff, offering some sort of hallucinogenic, occult, funereal and ritualistic Blackened Ambient Funeral Drone Metal (hey, if you think that this description does not cover the package, just trust me…). So I was very aroused when Aesthetic Death announced a new effort by this Australian act, run by the noble Vis Ortis. The material was written, performed and mixed by Vis Ortis himself, joined by some guests (amongst whom Ruins vocalist Alex Pope), and co-assisted for the mixing duties by Leigh Ritson (formerly of Thrall). Once again the mastering was done by the notorious Greg Chandler (Priory Studio).
This album clocks almost fifty-two minutes, mainly consisting of quite lengthy compositions (the opener clocks about fourteen minutes, most others about eight-nine minutes). And of course it continues the mad vein of the former releases, and once again too it is a new, next step into aural dimensions unexplored before. Since Vis Ortis remained as sole member, the creativity, development and expansion ever continued, and To Hold Onto A Heartless Heart narrates a new chapter within Mekigah’s history…
Opener Collapsing Under (14:17) starts quite ‘calm’, with field-recorded samples (voices and sounds from unknown sources), psychotic noises and nervous textures that build up an immense tension. I’m not sure, but it might be the rape of strings somehow. After that two-minute prelude, things get nastier, when eldritch strings, evil voices and down-tuned percussions take over the nastiness of sound-sculpting. It sounds funereal, ritualistic, morbid, psychedelic, seductive and sedative at the very same time. This is Doom, and it isn’t. This is Noise, and it isn’t. This is Blackened Sludge Ambience, and it is not at all either. At five minutes and something, it transforms into a militant form of Neo-Folk-laden Ambient with Martial Industrial and Ambient Noise elements, yet once more it is none of these things either. Psychotic and fuzzed guitar lines, un-shamanistic-jazzy drum patterns, howling voices and eerie synth-like waves (hey, isn’t that a killer whale on acid?) continue this sick experience, or is it ‘experiment’, shaking up every musical and acceptable tradition whatsoever. But hey, it works, it does (once more).
There’s no use to analyze the other chapters that meticulously, yet a modest description from undersigned might work therapeutic. Next comes Broken Rhythm Pressure (08:23), starting with a calmer, introvert piece of piano, and soon evolving into some neo-grinding ugliness, expressing industrial-oriented vibes, exhaling mechanoid structures and offering purest hallucinoid rhythms and beats. This rough mixture of Morbid Death Metal, Black Doom Ambient and Death Industrial is hard to digest at first, but luckily we do have effective medication for the stomach, don’t we.
Away Drifting From (08:08) initially sounds like the soundtrack for some horror movie, yet soon the industro-psycho-doomed attitude takes over. This piece of Funeral Noise Metal – hey, I guess I just invented the exact definition of what this sonic debris might be called like. Anyway, Funereal Black Metal, Ritual Industrial, Black Ambient, Post-Apocalyptic Sludge; it’s all part of the deal, isn’t it? That claustrophobic atmosphere towards the end, with these ominous sounds and oppressive ‘melodies’, just accompanies you to a dimension of reverence and dread, doesn’t it?
With the shortest piece, An Infinitesimal Difference (04:31), Mekigah explores somewhat cinematic areas, though they might be of a mostly horrific kind for sure. And an experimental kind as well. For some reason, it initially reminds me of Laibach’s opus magnum Macbeth, followed by a mostly combative expression of Industrial Metal, yet of the most nefarious, lugubrious kind.
It Hisses So (08:48) might be the most ‘psycho-grinding’ piece; with the underestimated definition ‘Psycho-Grind’ referring to that unique sound once courtesy of, let’s say, (early) Godflesh, Scorn, Saw Throat and Pitch Shifter (amongst others). I refuse to call those band ‘Industrial Metal’ an sich, but that’s another issue. Anyway, this composition comes with these unearthly strings, hammering beats, alienated vocaloid-like speeches, and troubled sound-sculpting, one dares not to resist. …a benzodiazepine-induced translation of Streetcleaner, if you want to. Or an Indestroy fragment reinterpreted after being bitten in a major artery in the neck by some rabid squirrel.
The album ends with Eyes Glazed Over (07:31), which actually starts quite atmospheric and dreamlike, but step by step it morphs into a bizarre, scarifying thing, before, eventually, offering a purely militant, martial form of frenzy Industro-Drone (in case this specific stylistic approach exists; otherwise, it does as from now). The second part is more reasonable; no, it is not, yet it’s like more tolerable during certain frequences; and not at all either, then again. The outro, at least, is, in a spooky way, hallucinatively exceptional (despite its short duration), completing this whole adventure with perfection.
Besides a digital edition, Aesthetic Death offers a digipack compact disc (no vinyl copies are available [yet]; maybe in some future?), being a six-panel version with very unique cover artwork (a sepia-colored picture of an old piano) and nice inner visual artistry (partly created by Mekigah and partly by guest musician Richard Ziltch, who also worked with the sweeties from Enbilulugugal before). Cool visuals / photography, excellent color palette used inside…
https://www.aestheticdeath.com/releases.php?mode=singleitem&albumid=6474
https://mekigah.bandcamp.com/album/to-hold-onto-a-heartless-heart
https://www.concreteweb.be/reviews/mekigah
https://www.concreteweb.be/reviews/mekigah-1