ALBUM REVIEW: Mylingar – Út

Sweden’s Mylingar are a personal favourite in the obscure depths of the black / death metal underground. Now returning with their fourth album, set for release via Amor Fati Productions, I am certain this will be a disquieting experience… To be released on the 17th of April.

Bellowing bass and churning guitars instantly wound with vicious riffing and malign atmospherics. Soon joined by punishing percussive onslaughts and equally mean-spirited vocals; the abhorrent assault of the Swedish entity works in unison to conjure the foulest and most depraved concoctions of black and death metal imaginable. Blending dissonance with hard-rocking grooves and all-out ferocity; the serpentine venom is unique and instantly recognisable as their own distillation that builds upon their majestic prior albums with rejuvenated spectral furore. Chiming cymbals add contrast to the darkened abyssal downpour of malevolent guitars and bass. The mix is quite similar to the previous album, which I am grateful for, as it sounds massive and allows each convulsion of discordant flagellation to be truly felt. Swelling and falling, each moment evokes anguish, curiosity and tension to hold you on the precipice of ecstasy and some sort of nervous breakdown. A supremely strong start for a record I knew I would hold in very high regard before hearing a note.

Dancing in lunacy, the combination of intricate blast-beats with more groove-laden drumming gives a tribal rhythm and more classic feel to the record while upholding this unrelenting extremity that the band effortless build. This combined with the warped and inhuman riffing and disturbed vocals gives a contorting and yet still enjoyable progression to the songs where they feel totally deranged and yet still have these clever hooks with some epic bass lines to hammer the point in like a rusted nail trepanning your skull. Each track washes over you with an odious and nightmarish veil of refreshing and intoxicating vapours. While noisy and chaotic, there is never a second where something feels out of place, rather every bludgeoning note or discordant break a statement of malicious intent to be felt with full force. As the intensity continue to rocket skyward, there is no peak in sight, only more sonic flagellations and psychic upheaval.

Blazing dissonance wraps itself around a core of molten vitriol, riding waves of penetrating hammering to sow seeds of discomfort and anxiety. Burning itself from the inside out, the pungent fumes of a veritable nightmare will bend your mind to its will. Following the “Döda” trilogy was certainly no easy feat, and yet “Út” boldly strides out into the unknown while honouring its predecessors. The infinite layers of reverberate majesty all entwine in such a wonderfully insane way, these hexes are totally unforgettable. The simplicity of the song titles speaks to the band preferring action over statement, yet each being effective. This music is an experience that cannot be described easily, but I cannot recommend it enough to those traversing the wilder tides of extreme metal in search of something genuine, explorative and lethal. Poison your mind with these seven hymns from below, allow their coiling misdeed to unfurl in the depths of your mind and witness the revelations of blood and dirt they bestow upon you.

“Út” is a deranged, unwelcoming and inhospitable soundscape of black and death metal’s most disturbing conjurations distilled into a singularity of spiritual destruction. Few bands reach this pinnacle of being so extraordinarily unique, ferociously unhinged and yet still feeling totally rooted in that pure and uncompromising genre known as metal. There is no sacrificing of the old ways here and yet Mylingar have found an unexplored avenue of sound that is inarguably there own, this recording reaching a tendril that bit further into the abyss than they have ever ventured before. This record punches a crack in reality with such profound aggression that you will either adore it, or be broken by it. A crowning triumph from one of the most interesting bands in black, death or any other corner of the metal underground.