OUR LIST OF 2011’S MOST INFECTIOUS EXTREME METAL SONGS: PART 12

This is Part 12 of our list of the most infectious extreme metal songs released this year. Each day until the list is finished, I’m posting two songs that made the cut. For more details about what this list is all about and how it was compiled, read the Introduction via this link. To see the selections that preceded this one, click the Category link on the right side of the page called MOST INFECTIOUS SONGS-2011.

Once I’d decided to include today’s two songs on this list, combining them in a single post was an obvious call: Both bands are from Finland (if you get tired of hearing about Finnish metal, you’re obviously at the wrong place); both songs have almost exactly the same name; and of course both songs are awfully catchy.

MORS SUBITA

Human Waste Compression, the 2011 album by this band (whose names means “sudden death”) was one I reviewed in October (here), but that wasn’t our first mention of the band last year. In May,  I saw an official video for a song from the album called “The Sermon”, and it really got me all fired up with enthusiasm and the words spilled out in a post. At that point, Mors Subita was unsigned and holding up release of the album while they sought label backing.

In August, Violent Journey Records announced that they had signed Mors Subita, and it was cool to see some of my gushing words from May quoted in the Violent Journey press release. At the same time, the band released their second video for Human Waste Compression, and of course I had to write about all that here.

And then came the album review, of course. An excerpt: “The band’s winning formula combines elements of thrash, groove, and Bodom-style melodic death metal. The music moves like a racehorse burning up the track, with slamming beats, frenetic riffs, and swarming guitar solos. Antti Haapsamo snarls like a really pissed-off bobcat, backed by bear-like roars. Put all that together and you get 11 tracks of modern metal that are electrifying and head-whipping. . . . As for the recording itself, there’s a bright, sharp, steely quality to the production that suits the up-beat, groove-heavy, manually dextrous style of the music.”

Every song on the album has an infectious quality, but for this list I came back to the first one I heard. It’s still a killer.

“The Sermon”

[audio:https://www.nocleansinging.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/Mors-Subita-01-The-Sermon.mp3|titles=Mors Subita – The Sermon]

Next up . . .

 

MAGENTA HARVEST

Magenta Harvest was another Finnish band I discovered last spring through their debut EP, A Familiar Room. The band may be fairly new, but its members have paid some dues in other outfits. Vocalist Mathias Lillmåns is the frontman for one of our favorite bands, Finntroll, and is also the vocalist and bass player for a black/death band called Chthonian. Guitarist Timo Kontio and drummer Janne Manninen were together in …And Oceans. Bassist Jonas Frilund is also been a member of Chthonian, and guitarist Timo Hanhikangas also spent time in Total Vomit Experience (you remember them, don’t you?)

I fell hard for the four tracks on A Familiar Room, but fell hardest for a song called “Sermon”. It’s the kind of death metal that reminds me of Immolation. It beats with a multitude of body-slamming riffs, every one of which triggers the headbang reflex, and needling tremolo lines will jump out and catch hold of your affections, too.

I haven’t lost any enthusiasm for Magenta Harvest since I wrote this last May: “For me, the verdict is in: We have a serious new player on the global death-metal scene. This is a band to watch.”

Happily, I can report that Magenta Harvest is currently recording their next demo, with vocal recording scheduled to begin tomorrow. It will be on my must-listen list. But for now, here’s a look back at “Sermon” — one of 2011’s most infectious extreme metal songs.

[audio:https://www.nocleansinging.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/Sermon.mp3|titles=Magenta Harvest – Sermon]