ALBUM REVIEW: Elements - Mind Control
Born in Abruzzo, Italy, Mind Control is a powerful progressive death metal outfit with a decade of creativity and exploration behind them. Their second album “Elements” Released previously in December of 2023 made promise to take the listener on a unique sonic journey and we are here to experience it ourselves.
Opening title track - Elements, feature cinematic drums and shining synths it allows the listener to deep dive into their world and creativity, it is a demonstration of impressive tremolo picking, soloing, mysterious synths and grounding bass making it a spectacular opening track. However, once returning to this, I feel that it is quite deceitful in a way as we dive head on into much dangerous waters in later tracks.
Rage - Treasures its thunderous low end. Again, that marvelous intensive tremolo is the centerpiece. The vocals puts me in awe at how fierce and aggressive they can be, but, with a snap of fingers they become so delicate and operatic with such beautiful rich tones. It’s a classic beauty and the beast contrast.
And goodness those breakdowns at 3:10 mark are so nasty but so glorious! The soloing is a chef's kiss!
Moving on, Flames Opens with a dark mysterious choir before plunging into the iconic thrash of guitars and bass lines. The squeals send shivers up my arms and I'm a sucker for the vocal monologues! The overall ebbs and flows, the layering in the track is genius. It’s like audio cake and I'm greedy for more.
Effluent Has a much bouncier, proggier tonality compared to the previous. Really a stand out track musically. I love that the riffs clamber over themselves before they drop low to grittier levels. 8 minutes of pure poetry, solid story and drama. It’s surely the most impressive in my eyes. The vocals highlight mostly the softer range of Stefania Salladini, however, she maintains her bite throughout.
Once I realised how long this album is, how much gravity it holds, I made the decision to stop taking notes. It truly had defeated me but in the best way I can describe, and, I could just let go and just admire the album as a whole. I Stopped trying to tear it apart for detail as my brain trusted how intricate it is. Holding focus would just fatigue me to the point I couldn’t review this properly. Mind Control is something special and really live up to their name, they really had me under their unrelenting grip.
Overall, Elements is Not for the faint of heart and you'll need some tough skin to really appreciate the beauty that is this album, I admit the intensity was a little hard for me to keep up with, however, this is quite a high compliment. Every track is so much different than the last, morphing into something greater, the energy never waivers and the captivating sonic journey was truly promised.
