Mutiilation – “Black Millenium (Grimly Reborn)” – [Drakkar Productions]

France’s Mutiilation was founded in 1991 by ‘Lord Meyhna’ch,’ the only consistent member. In 1994 he joined the Brittany-based Legions Noires, despite being himself from nearby Languedoc. After 2 years he was exiled from the legendary Black Metal Cult, perhaps, as some claim, because of a debilitating addiction to heroin–or perhaps he was outshining his comrades: Mutiilation’s ‘Vampires Of Black Imperial Blood’ (released 1995 and sadly still missing from the KFJC library as of this writing), is so far as I know the most influential and successful Black Legions release, setting the tone for Depressive-Suicidal BM to come (one track was covered by the divisive Xasthur in 2004; other fans are France’s Deathspell Omega, with whom a split 10″ was recorded in 2002) with its uniquely melancholic riffs and drunkenly dysphoric vocals. After his ejection from LLN, Meyhna’ch endured “4 lost years of decadence and depression,” releasing no new material, before deciding to ‘come back to life’ and record again in the early 2000s, stating that he was “fed up to see children take [his] place[.]” This 2001 release was the 1st full-length album from Mutiilation 2.0, a solo incarnation which replaced the earlier model of rotating drummers with a drum machine. Since this is the biggest turn-off for most fans in approaching the band’s latter-day work, allow me to state up-front that I think he uses it well, often programming it faster than most humans could play, and fully exploiting its cold, lifeless sound. The riffs are a mixture of the old-school melodrama of ‘Vampires’ and a new, off-kilter, angular thrash style. The vocals are sickeningly miasmic as ever, if not more so, and lyrics often actually discernible. Meyhna’ch is a great lyricist: his English (Latin on t.5) verses, no doubt inspired by decadent French luminaries De Sade, Lautreamont and Baudelaire, evoke vampirism and Satanic elitism amid an atmosphere of Medieval gloom, often with special emphasis on self-indulgence and decay. This is an underrated comeback from one of BM’s true visionaries. No bad tracks but T.6 is a spoken-word interlude and 10 is instrumental. “…What a great artist dies with me…”