Artist: Mayhemic
Country: Chile
Label: Sepulchral Voice Records
Formats: LP / Cassette Tape / CD
Year: 2024
The “Toba catastrophe theory” posits that the evolution of the human race was significantly influenced by an eruption of the Toba super volcano on Sumatra in Indonesia around 74,000 years ago. There is no doubt about the death-and-annihilation super-eruption itself. According to Stanley H. Ambrose of the University of Illinois, it is possible that early modern humans were then decimated to just a few thousand individuals, who, in the harsh volcanic winter that followed, of necessity learned to work better together, making an evolutionary leap that enabled them to become superior over Homo erectus and Neanderthal, who were naturally more resistant to the cold, and thus had survived the eruption and winter in greater numbers. This evolutionary ‘eye of the needle’ would explain the lack of genetic diversity unique to Homo sapiens.
Chile’s Mayhemic took this intriguing event as the starting point for their first full-length album, which follows a series of short-players, which in turn were all brought together on 2022’s ‘The Darkest Age’ compilation. Keeping that title in mind as well, it’s pretty clear that these Chileans have their sights set on Armageddon-like scenes. Now, mass extinction of the human race is not exactly virgin territory for Extreme Metal, but how would this actually be best put into musical moulds?
If you ask Mayhemic, the answer is exactly as their band name suggests: wild Thrash Metal with the accelerator pressed to the bottom. Where the band had a clear Black Metal edge in the past, this has now been reduced to a minimum and it is mainly Kreator that rings the bell here. The first era of Kreator, to be exact, so up to and including 1990’s ‘Coma Of Souls’. Fast paced riffs, unrelenting drums and an snarly vocal delivery that reminds of a young Mille Petrozza. But it doesn’t end here, while indeed the majority of the music is peddle-to-the-metal and reminds of the likes of Sadus and Dark Angel besides the obvious resemblance to the German Thrash Metal juggernaut, there is an apparent penchant for classic Heavy Metal as well. That is mainly evidenced by a far more prominent sense for melody and guitar wizardry than almost any of those very early Thrash Metal had in their bag of tricks. Listen to ‘Valley Of The Tundra’ for instance, which has an almost Southern/Stoner sort of melody as baseline (including an organ).
Besides that slight shift in musical emphasis, the most remarkable change is that ‘Toba’ sounds way more advanced. It is clear that the band took the time to further perfect their game, not only in terms of song writing, but also in the overall execution and production. ‘Toba’ is definitely a way more versatile and overall mature recording than anything the band has presented us before. With those more melodic parts becoming an integral element in their musical DNA, the band is slowly creeping up to the classic tunes of Death Angel or even Forbidden. While they are not quite there (yet), it is clear that Mayhemic has way more tricks up their collective sleeves than we could have imagined based on those earliest recordings.
