Calgary's Mind Mold will be making their debut this month. The newly-minted avant-garde doom band features members from grind forces Wake and Seminary. Their self-titled debut, of course, sounds nothing like these other bands. Mind Mold is more so a metallic exploration into vintage noise rock and shoegaze. The result is a wonderful blend of experimental doom brimming with vivid atmosphere. Nowhere is this more apparent than on the album's first song "Whimpering Plague".
This new track bears strokes of Neurosis or Swans due to its overpowering spirit. Those acts have spent decades crafting imposing blends of metal and rock. For Mind Mold, they have begun to traverse a similar path. Admittedly, their music is tough to peg down. Even just on "Whimpering Plague" the trio seems to fluidly shift between various metal styles. At one moment, there is a barrage of drums that will give a blackened or deathly tone to the song. Then, in the next moment, all sense of urgency evacuates. Tempo plummets when mammoth riffs overtake the track. It evolves into an ethereal brand of doom metal by the conclusion. A lot happens in three and a half minutes and coincidentally throughout the rest of the album.
Listen to "Whimpering Plague" below. Mind Mold's self-titled debut will arrive through Sentient Ruin Laboratories on April 28. It will be available in digital and cassette formats. The label and the band are also on Facebook, where you can keep up with all of their happenings. A previous track appeared at Decibel Magazine last week. Listen to "Antipath" here.
