Saturday 4 October 2014

OTEHI - Dead Chants and Forbidden Melodies (Album Review)

Dead Chants And Forbidden Melodies cover art

Album Type: Album
Date Released: Sept 28th 2014
Label: Self Released

Dead Chants and Forbidden Melodies - track listing:

1.Dead Chants 12:06
2.Rotten Sky 11:20
3.Psychonauts In The Forest 09:00
4.August 08:06
5.Dance Into The Sun 09:23
6.Manitou's Mantra / Sleeping King 17:38

Bio

The band starts in brand new mood in march 2011 in the Italian stoner/psych music panorama.

The trio (Macej "wildhand" Mikolajczyk; bass/voice, Domenico "mastino" Canino; Guitar/Effects/voice, Vito "vitus" Zito; drum) approaches to a dirty and granitic sound, sometimes clean and amniotic after has been experimenting in different roman undergrounds.

During their lives they have been projecting videos with prevalent object the nature which has been a perfect psychedelic band’s background added to a mantras stoner’s riffs and melodious surroundings notes. Under the Valle D’Itria’s (south of Italy) burning sun of August 2011, the band locks its self up to give birth to its first low budget self product the EP “Noisy Spirit”, also supported from Cal Scott "Umbah" of the ex “Necrosanct”.

Members

Domenico Canino – Guitar, Vocals & Effects
Maciek Mikolajczyk - Bass & Vocals
Corrado Battistoni - Drums

Review:

Italian Psychedelic Doom/Stoner Metallers Otehi have unleashed something special here. A psychedelic and trippy opus that blends Sludge, Doom, Stoner, Ambient Noises and Tribal Chants for a heavy and crazy ride. Dead Chants and Forbidden Melodies is Otehi's eagerly awaited debut album and they have pulled out all of the stops here. 67 minutes that is full of twists and turns with a dark delicious experimental vibe. We all know that Italian Stoner Metal bands do not play by the rules. Actually, they rip up the rulebook and write their own crazy rules to make music by.

Well Otehi play by the same rules as this is one strange trip that blurs the line between fantasy and reality. Opening track - Dead Chants - is a 12-minute and track that mixes fuzzy stoner rock with murky swamp psychedelic rock with traces of drone/chants appearing at different points of the song. It's one crazy nightmarish stoner rock extravaganza that may frustrate you at times as thrive being different to other bands within the genre(s).They take elements of many different genres and create their own interpretation of it. It makes for a challenging and rewarding listen that may appeal to the more adventurous Psych Stoner Metal fan than the casual one.

Though you cannot deny how talented these guys are as they prove throughout the album they are a force to be reckoned with. Otehi are masters of manipulating sounds, grooves, riffs, melodies, vocals and anything else they can get their hands on. The album makes you feel you are watching a legendary artist at work. They will leave a trail of destructive psychedelic riffs in their wake. Second track - Rotten Sky - proves this very point as it moves from a simply played fuzz based Stoner Rock song before Otehi unleash blasts of violent lo-fi guitar based doom and gloom reverb, which gives the song a more menacing feel. The track is played at a mid-tempo pace, which gives Rotten Sky more time to breathe and unleash finely tuned progressive riffs.

3rd track - Psychonauts In The Forest - sees the band change their style once again though only by a small amount. The band add earthly drone based vocals that feel they are being beamed from another galaxy or dimension. The vocals add a powerful destructive edge that will soon have you under their hypnotic control. The riffs seem to depart from space and time altogether and into an unknown realm. Close your eyes and enjoy the spaced out smokey psychedelic sounds that Otehi have wonderfully created yet again. The next track - August - carries on the warped psychedelics to another level of craziness as Otehi drift from one crazy episode to another. The vocals become clearer while the riffs become heavier and more distorted as time goes by. It has shades of early Monster Magnet running through its veins but that soon changes into an extended jamming session.

5th track - Dance Into The Sun - carries on the progressive jam based riffs that ended the last track for one intense blast of noise that is played at a mid-tempo pace. This is one of the albums slower paced songs. Otehi could of speeded things up a bit or add a few different noises or riffs to the song as it does not really go anywhere towards then. However, that is my only complaint on the album. The last song is where Otehi throw everything at you. Take a deep breath as Otehi are going to take you on a final epic journey that will leave you battered and bruised from the sheer amount of music they will be drowning your hearing with. Manitou's Mantra/Sleeping King is an almost epic 18-minute journey where you are transported to psychedelic volatile world.

Otehi have never heard of the word Overkill as the amount of different noises and riffs will astound you. It is a heavy thunderous ride where experimentation is the main attraction here. Do I hear Peruvian pipes or different kind of flutes being played primarily for the first 6 minutes or so? It is pointless trying to describe this epic tune. It is disorganized chaos from start to finish

Dead Chants and Forbidden Melodies is a wonderful musical odyssey that will last long in the memory. Now if someone can tell me what the album is about then I will be extremely happy!!

Written by Steve Howe

Dead Chants and Forbidden Melodies is available to buy on DD from BandCamp 


Check The Band From Links Below