AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): MOUNTAIN SHADOW — “MOUNTAIN SHADOW”

As you can see, we’re premiering a full stream of the self-titled debut album by Mountain Shadow. In advance of the music stream we have delectable teasers to offer, beginning with this preview from Fiadh Productions, which will officially release the album tomorrow:

Mountain Shadow… is Pennsylvanian Folk Death Metal, existing between Archaic Death Metal, Atmospheric Black Metal, Funeral Doom & Bluegrass, exalting Appalachian Horror and the melancholic ruins of nostalgic America.

More teasers: The listing of instruments in the credits for the performances on the album, beginning with the two childhood friends who are the band’s members:

KA – Bass Guitar, Vocals, Field Recordings, Synthesizer, Sound Effects
Damian Winter – Guitars, Vocals, Banjo, Mandolin, Keyboards, Farmhouse Percussion, Accordion, Sampling

CJ Yacoub– Drums
Aunt Elizabeth– Accordion on “Raftsman”
Robert Reitnauer– Saxophone on “Raftsman”
T. – Wine Glasses on “Raftsman”

If you’re not intrigued by now, or at least curious, we’ll be surprised. We certainly succumbed to these hints before hearing a single note, and then succumbed to the music on this remarkable album.

As you might guess from the teasers above, the music is an unusual amalgam of sensations and styles, integrating and juxtaposing mesmerizing but frightening acoustic instrumentation with a dark, backwoods atmosphere (most prominently in the intro track); low-end mangling sounds like the excavations of a tunnel-boring machine; maniacally clattering percussion and equally maniacal guitar convulsions; and scalding screams and horrid roars — plus piston-pumping grooves; hulking stomps; eerily wailing and squealing tones of unknown origin; and bursts of demented banjo melody.

And that’s just the first two songs.

From there, the twists and turns just keep on coming, leading the listener through the mesmerizing and raucous “Where Do They Lead to Now“, where the acoustic instrumentation combines with shimmering synths to beckon listeners into haunted woods with ghostly hands before the subterranean turbulence and raging turmoil take over, spurred on by a cacophony of mad voices, and from thence through “Knockers Foretell Doom“, a bone-bruising and mind-bending terror — by turns bestially brutish, brazenly chaotic, and vigorously muscle-moving.

By now you’ll begin to understand the throughlines that bring all the dramatically different parts together — throughlines of mood and atmosphere, of forest hauntings both seductive and chilling, and of terrors lying in wait and then freed upon the land.

As before, “The 13th Son” includes an acoustic introduction, but one that’s bright and buoyant this time, and then it unfolds into music both bombastic and wild, but also dreamlike and sensual. The mandolin dances in “Ghosts of Farmland” as the percussion bounces and fervent voices sing — perhaps the most jubilant phase on the album — but of course things get more ghastly, and then more berserk (and both significantly more elaborate and more brutishly primitive).

Penultimate song “Raftsman” is the one that brings in all the guests — the accordion, the saxophone, the wine glasses. It’s magnificently crazed and exultant, but like almost everything else on the album, it’s equally capable of rumbling your bones and putting up the hairs on the back of your neck. It also becomes soft and otherworldly, like ghost lights across gently flowing waters, and viciously deranged, but also sublimely beautiful.

Mountain Shadow save the longest song for last, “The Boy Who Stared When He Saw the Trains A’Comin“. Here, the band use the long minutes to cast a deep spell, beautifully wistful and wondering in its mood, with the brightness of the mandolin and banjo in key roles.

Yet as the song evolves, forlorn feelings emerge and tension slowly builds, thanks in part to the emergence of orchestral synths. In the final minutes, sparkling apparitional tones whistle and writhe in the upper reaches and something massive hulks and heaves far down below, in the company of vocal torment. In this album, you never escape the horror for very long.

Fiadh Productions is offering Mountain Shadow in digital format, and will also release it on 100 heavyweight black LPs.

ORDER:
https://fiadh.bandcamp.com/album/mountain-shadow

MOUNTAIN SHADOWS:
https://mountainshadow.bandcamp.com
https://www.instagram.com/pennsylvaniamountainshadow/