Omega Massif “Geisterstadt” CD

When I wrote about the incredibly promising limited edition demo from Germany's Omega Massif two years ago, I stated that "I certainly hope at least one of those makes it into the hands of an interested label, because this band could do some serious damage with this shit if they find the right home". Well, it would seem that my wish was granted after all, as the killer French label Radar Swarm issued their first full-length, " Geisterstadt", awhile back and was kind enough to send me a copy recently. And much like their demo, these compositions tend to be relatively long (granted they max out at around 10 minutes now, as opposed to stretching out past the 15-minute mark) and centered around absolutely crushing surges of midpaced power chords or, by contrast, soft and spacious clean passages that often take on a more ambient sort of atmosphere. There are definitely a little more of those droning, brightly textured "post-rock" types of influences crawling into place these days, but thankfully the band utilizes those characteristics in a manner that seamlessly blends in against the powerful rhythmic backbone of their work and often transitions over into the dryer, darker clean passages, so they avoid the more tired implementations that so many other instrumental acts have been focusing on in the last few years. Hell, it sounds like they even bring in some accordion or something like that before the first explosive shift in "Nebelwand"!? There's just a really strong balance between that base heaviness and aggression and forceful (if somewhat obscured), moving melodies throughout, so I'll definitely still be looking forward to hearing more from these guys. Good stuff...

Omega Massif "Unter Null" (excerpt)

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Radar Swarm
Crucial Blast