Moribund Records reissues the first Mortualia CD later this month, much to the pale delight of the most depressed and unworthy lot on the planet. Mortualia, originally issued in 2007, features Shatraug, whose list of credits reads like a how-to list for black metal. His guitars have been on everything from Horna to Behexen, from Sargeist to Drowning the Light and all ports between. It can also be accurately stated that everything the guy has touched has been pretty damn impressive. This offering is fine, if you like your black metal repetitive with songs that are far too long and tedious.

What is described as cold and depressing can only be implemented with the proper tools of the trade. The grim guitar tone ala early Shining or Silencer is certainly there, yet it goes on for far too long, making this album a chore to finish in spots. Yes, the music is overly fascinating…for about four to five minutes; then what started out as wholly engaging slowly fades into a gray matter that hangs weightily over the head for a virtual eternity. The opening track called “The Blue Silence” is 17 minutes long, about 13-minutes too lengthy for me. I appreciate the aural essence Shatraug is trying to channel here; I truly do, especially with Nattramn-like vocals spewing frothy musical venom all over the senses, but the endless droning of the same chord pattern forces me to space out and seek out external stimuli. Some of the more ‘kvlt’ black metal ‘specialists’ might call me false or otherwise incapable of fully understanding the conceptual specters floating overhead, but I remain steadfast in my assertion that these songs are looping, atmospheric nightmares.

As for the music, there are very appealing passages within “In Bleak Loneliness”, as well as every other track, but the underlying feel of doldrums put to music sadly blankets this otherwise impressive effort. If you enjoy music that manages to rattle around your head for what seems like a lifetime, then please have at this. It’s the musician in me that finds such repetitiveness a bland and generic filler mode that is very easy to get sandbagged into when vying for a coveted spot in the atmospheric arena.  In a venue where everything has already been bagged-and-tagged to death, the arduousness of such an album finds itself lent to much more triviality than serendipity. I know well Shatraug’s impressive lineage; I am a fan of pretty much all of his work, and while I simply cannot find total reverence in this reissue I can find comfort in the fact that some of the dismalness and coldness in these songs rings in your ears for some time after. The negative to that is that the monotonous guitar that seems ceaseless and plodding lulls me into a uniformed submission far too quickly in the album. It just deserves a better fate, as does the listener.   

I hasten to label something boring or ill-conceived, but the former tag certainly fits the bill. While I don’t necessarily find Mortualia a total disaster, it hails such high comments and praise from just about everyone who is a Horna of Behexen disciple, and I get that; the apologists are always out in force. But to be completely forthcoming and void of the influence of past glories one must see past the din of musical complacency and call a rudimentary collective just that: something that settled in the mire of banality when it could have been so much more with much less.

TRACK LISTING

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*Comments:

1.  The Blue Silence
2.  In Bleak Loneliness
3.  Cold And Grey
4.  Devoid Of Warmth
5.  Forgotten Soul
6.  Death Serenity - 2011 edit

Total playing time:  01:10:41

Release Date: June 28, 2011
Record Label: Moribund Records

Mortualia - Mortualia

Reviewer: Chris

June 15, 2011