No doubt if you are a fan you have been hearing that the new Nachtmystium album is a departure from the psychedelic strangeness of the two ‘Black Meddle’ discs and a return to ‘Instinct Decay,’ even a natural follow up to it. There has also been a lot of talk about it having some industrial elements as well. Indeed the title is taken from a Nine Inch Nail song [Mr Self Destruct from The Downward Spiral] and the USBM band come fromChicagohome of Wax Trax Records so some of their influence has no doubt rubbed off on Blake Judd and the group. However it is best you don’t get too sidelined by preconceived ideas on their sixth studio. Nothing you have read about this is particularly wrong but again nothing in my opinion it is not fantastically correct either. There is a bit less experimentation and perhaps things are not as warped as the last couple of albums and there is a strong back to roots feel about things but it is also a case of a band further progressing rather than going back or sideward’s or any other direction particularly. The best way to approach Silencing Machine is press play and take it as it comes.
Alarms ring like there is going to be a nuclear meltdown and ‘Dawn Over The Ruins Of Jerusalem’ viciously hones in on you. This is uncompromising and a bitter and angry assault with Charlie Fell’s percussive swipes sounding particularly explosive and Judd’s barks unleashed without a hint of mercy. Just as you are getting used to this and thinking the whole album might be a fast and furious blur the pace changes into shimmering psyche guitar riffs and warped and skewed instrumentation over an incredibly catchy melody. This is not going to be a one dimensional listen that is for sure and it breaks up the rage nicely. Bristling and seething (you can certainly feel a hint of the Lord Mantis backbone here) we next have the title track which has one of many stand out moments about it, namely a fist slamming chorus that bursts through the surging charge of the song and has you banging your head and grooving along with it. Finally things slow and you can catch a breath for third number ‘And I Control You’ which robotically takes over, the mechanics behind it are razor sharp and there is an eerie abandoned feel to the harmonic canvas with some Steve Austin sounding barks gutturally spat out from the vocals. It goes very nicely with the artwork making me think that we are in the apocalypse which has happened after the machines have taken over!
It’s one of those albums where each of the ten featured tracks has something you could easily focus on and talk about. There is a lot of personality running through things but none of it is quick to bring itself to the fore, it has taken quite a lot of listens for this to start to sink in. The almost post-punk jaunty riffing on ‘Broken Hope And Borrowed Dreams’ takes away emphasis on the blackness and there are some nice underlying futurist keyboards lurking away in the background courtesy of Sandford Parker. But the early Killing Joke tribal pogo of Decimation, Annihilation is a real stand out moment for me. It is nothing that you would have expected after hearing the first track on the album that’s for sure. There is an obvious magazine cover-mount track in my opinion to be found with ‘Give Me The Grave.’ It has a sing along bouncy chorus that will stick with you like glue. The thick chug of Will Lindsay’s bass line does it no harm either.
Perhaps a dash to the finish would have been good but last track ‘These Rooms In Which We Weep’ is very much the album’s funeral; sombre, moody and with a feel of complete despair and hopelessness about it. Still it does get a bit faster and bruises and pushes its way towards conclusion with an effortless sounding jam moulding into a coruscating noisy explosive climax. And the machine is finally silenced!
This sits well with the rest of Nachtmystium’s output and I cannot see anyone who is a fan of them criticising it at all. However it is not an album that I expect to have them suddenly becoming a household name, as they will always be a band who lurk firmly in their underground roots.
(8/10 Pete Woods)
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