siLLy puPPy After becoming one of underground metal’s most up and coming revered tech death bands of 2016 with their debut album “Mind Cemeteries,” the multi-national COMA CLUSTER VOID unleash their second offering to the world of sonic sadomasochism seekers with THOUGHTS FROM A STONE which while at running length of only 21 minutes and 40 seconds could possibly be thought of as an EP but in reality i haven’t seen any reference to it as such by the band themselves so despite clocking in a roughly half the time span as their debut, i would have to assume that this is in fact their second album. While the time length has been shortened, the number of musical cast members has gone up by two. While the five members on the debut all make a reprise, they have also expanded their roles beyond their retrospective instruments or vocal duties. This meaning that there is more of a classical music approach in the intro and other segments strewn throughout that find bassist Sylvia Hinz also playing recorder and guitarist John Strieder tearing it up on the violoncello. Two guests appear with Alexa Renger on violin and Anthony Lipari adding yet more guttural death growls and other vocal utterances.

Once again COMA CLUSTER VOID are on a mission to create the harshest and most atonal dissonant din there is to be experienced. While mostly centered on the bizarre surreal tech death soundscapes of Gorguts’ “Obscura” for their source of proggy inspiration with flurries of zigzagging math rock time signatures run amok, the heavy bombast also brings the kings of dissonant djent-fueled orotundity, Meshuggah to mind but it’s those slowed down creepy jarring atonal chords and arpeggiations that always point the finger to Deathspell Omega’s most demanding listens. While not quite as murky and layered as bands like Portal and Pyrrhon, the distortion that bleeds to infinity adds an extra layer of tension that only becomes ratcheted up to the ultimate creepy climaxes. While the tech death metal parts are fairly similar to the first album, what really sets this one apart is the use of the chamber rock classical music pieces which start to sound like Kayo Dot’s most experimental earlier albums however it’s the semi-spoken declarative poetic proses uttered by both male and female members that gives it a sense of urgency and unique flavor.

Personally i find THOUGHTS FROM A STONE to expand fairly well from the debut as it takes all the extreme elements set forth and adds new layers of surreality, brutality and technical complexity which all conspire to unleash a startling spine-chilling sonicscape of extremes. Perhaps my favorite is the ending “We Are As Low” which is a jangling distortionfest mess of chords, eerie atmospheric dread and guttural growls trading off with Diamanda Galas-esque types of litanies of horror and anguish. This is the type of complexity that requires acclamation as it is the equivalent of transversing an oxygen-starved environment while climbing Mt Everest. The elements exposed here are built upon the complexities of the high tech arts that preceded and will surely leave the uninitiated into this cult of chaos utterly bereft of any connection to a musical experience whatsoever. Proggy as hell and brutally extreme to the max yet an almost undetectable thread of beauty that stitches the whole thing together. Another winner in my book. COMA CLUSTER VOID is the real deal.

siLLy puPPy If you wish to advance past the avant-garde atonal brutality of technical death metal such as the landmark Gorguts album “Obscura,” then it is not with that band’s following albums that is the path to the ultimate expression of progressive metal orotundity is furthered as Luc LeMay and his pioneering band would tone things down ever so slightly and drift in a slightly more accessible direction. While the desire to one up the great Gorguts has been attempted by quite a few tech death metal bands over the last two decades, very few have matched the intensity and sheer bleakness of that pioneering album of sombre and uncompromising hopelessness and intimidation. Coming from Germany is is the extreme tech death metal band COMA CLUSTER VOID who offer a serious contender for the Canadian classic with their debut album MIND CEMETERIES which delivers a veritable frenetic intensity worthy of its title.

The band is the project of John Streider who plays a down-tuned 10-string guitar and is the main composer of this maelstrom of progressive brutality. The band is completed with the bass playing of Sylvia Hintz (yes! women play tech death metal too) and Chris Burrows’ ferocious percussion attacks that effortlessly groove and roll around the swirling freneticism of the endless stream of dissonant string action swarms. While the music is of the utmost avant-garde experimental death metal most reminiscent of “Obscura” era Gorguts, all the complexities are turned up several notches creating one of the most forbidding musical experiences in the entire metal universe. The vocal duties are shared by Mike DiSalvo (formerly of Cryptopsy) and Austin Taylor (of the band Dimensionless). The pair trade off between in sync frenetic torturously screamed rants to semi-spoken declarative prose that at time sounds like some of the mystic Satanic revelations of Deathspell Omega. There are occasional clean Pagan folk type vocals as well but they are muffled by the incessant din.

The album begins with the bleak ambient atmospheric opener “Prologue: I Am” which sets the tone for an utterly devastating attack of sonic fury to come before the first disharmonious delivery of atonal distortion churns out of the guitar and bass which for better or worse act as a single instrument for the majority of the album’s run making it indistinguishable where the 10-string guitar ends and bass continues in the lower realms of the bass octaves. Burrows is an absolute beast on the drums as he effortlessly keeps the beat to the unsettling time signature deviations at blastbeat speeds with jazzy fills that frenetically outpace the anguished angular rhythmic assault of the guitar riffs fueled with distortion that stretches to infinity. While the album is rather unrelenting in its delivery, a small hiatus occurs in the middle with the slowed down intermission “Interlude: I See Through Your Pain” which while set in ambient mode yet still find the atonal guitar strums interrupting any attempt to regain sanity.

COMA CLUSTER VOID offer up an extremely demanding listen with MIND CEMETERIES and sound like they took many cues from the masters of the extreme by utilizing the compositional prowess of Gorguts, the atonal fury of Deathspell Omega, the distorted multi-dimensional surreality of Portal and Mitochondrion and take it all up a few more notches believe it or not. Personally i didn’t think that could be done but they prove here that this angular zigzagging can indeed be cranked up on the extreme-o-meter. Needless to say, that this isn’t your parents’ heavy metal. This is some sort of freakazoid science experiment akin to a genetic mutilation that occurred from some secret extraterrestrial genetic experiment that got loose and is driven to create as much havoc as the laws of the universe will allow. This one is only for those who can immerse themselves in the most brutal, the most progressive and the most surreal soundscapes that have been crafted by demons. Definitely not a sing-a-long album but one that will surely blow your mind and ear canals to boot.