Triptykon — Melana Chasmata

I was into thrash and death metal as a teen, but strangely it was my mid-twenties before I properly got into Celtic Frost - partly, I imagine, due to my early metal explorations coinciding with their ill-judged “Cold Lake” period… I still listen to those first three albums now and they still stand up. I was aware that Thomas Gabriel  Fischer (singer and guitarist) was still pursuing projects, but I admit I had to look into Triptykon’s background a little, to establish what they were. (I initially had them confused with Apollyon Sun, Fischer’s first post-Frost group.) In Fischer’s words, “Triptykon will sound as close to Celtic Frost as is humanly possible”; in this respect, the listener has to salute and conclude: mission accomplished.

“Melana Chasmata” (Triptykon’s second album) feels like Celtic Frost continued; reinvented, yet sounding the same - always the mark of a strong vision. Although there are few traces of that band’s earliest sound across the nine tracks, its still there: the first sections of “Altar Of Deceit” could have been lifted straight from “Morbid Tales”. The overall sound, though, takes Fischer’s previous work with Celtic Frost down heavier, more doomy routes. The term “avant-garde metal” was, I believe, coined by critics to describe some of this previous work and its a term equally valid here. “Melana Chasmata” actually has very simple structures, for most of its duration; but rather than using showy gestures or set-pieces, it achieves an avant-garde “quality” through its obscuring tone. There’s a sense - and there always has been - that Fischer has a somewhat “tilted” or fiercely idiosyncratic take on “metal”; “Melana Chasmata” is testament to this. The majority of its pieces are goth-inflected, doomy marches; enlivened with outbursts of anthemic rage and thunder. Indeed, “Breathing” is nigh-breathless thrash throughout; though it starts with some Godflesh-esque dissonant guitar - a recurring element in the album. But, apart from “Breathing” and the opening track, the order of the day is epic, melancholy songs; which slur between light (the “airy” goth-gaze of “Aurorae”) and shade (the eerie doom of “Demon Pact”). In fact, the devil is in the details, here: the heaviness of “Boleskine House” being provided by “clean” slayer-esque twangs, the perfect, slight synth wails in “Demon Pact” (suspended over simple chords and screams - strikingly effective), the instrumental section of “In The Sleep Of Death” which beautifully draws out the themes and the passage in “Black Snow” where guitar noise/wanderings and distorted female screaming are buried in the mix - again, this notion of no easy gestures.

“Melana Chasmata” is a good album - good enough that I’m actually going to check out Triptykon’s debut as soon as possible. I say this in the light that I don’t follow metal anymore - to be honest, most modern metal leaves me very cold - and this album is most definitely “metal”: something that may well influence your opinion here (some of the unpleasant guitar solo sounds still pain me). The album sounds contemporary, versed in current sounds, but the creative thinking behind it remains the same as it ever was: Fischer is nearly fifty-one years old and sooner or later the non-metal world will have to acknowledge what a body of work he has created. (As a side-note, his vocals remain supremely unrestricted: screams, bellows, whispers, droning chants, “goth” croaking, even a near-croon…) To finish with an odd conclusion: “Melana Chasmata” sounds almost as if Fischer had decided to expand and explore Slayer’s song “Seasons In The Abyss” for an entire album…

Celtic Frost is dead - long live Triptykon!