Review: Mortanius - Till Death Do Us Part

Style: progressive metal, neoclassical power metal (clean vocals)
Recommended for fans of: Heavenly, King Diamond, Symphony X (Damnation Game era), Stratovarius
Review by: Matt
Country: US-PA
Release date: 22 February, 2019

[EDITOR’S NOTE: This review was originally published in the January to June 2019 Missed Albums Edition issue of The Progressive Subway]

Step one: Buy Mortanius‘ new album, Till Death Do Us Part.
Step two: Delete the Christmas cover, optionally reburn to CD.
Step three: Enjoy awesome album.

Mortanius are a band with a tumultuous history. They have shed members with each demo and EP, culminating in this debut with only a singer and bassist. Apparently, a firm guiding hand is all you need, because the album is hardly any worse for it. In fact, while the circumstances would suggest a train wreck being salvaged, this comes awfully close to being a masterpiece.

The genre on offer is Neoclassical Power Prog, but I’m gonna go ahead and call it Castlevania Metal. You know what I mean. It’s somewhere between King Diamond, Heavenly, and old Symphony X, basically a checklist of everything cool in Melodic Metal, with a lot of harmonic minor and a heaping helping of pipe organs, pianos, and choirs on top. Even the more generic bands of this sort tend to be kind of awesome – it’s just a winning formula. Mortanius up the ante with some extremely competent longform songwriting, a bit of Emperor influence, and a singer who instantly carves out a unique identity for himself.

We’ve all heard squeaky power metal vocals before, but there’s something different about this guy. There’s a distinctly androgynous quality to his voice which doesn’t sound quite like anyone I’ve heard – maybe a less manly Geddy Lee, if you can imagine that. It’s as over-the-top as it sounds, but his technique is amazing and not “wimpy” per se. Most of these singers have normal voices and learned to sing high – I think he started with a naturally high voice and just learned to sing even higher. He’s one of those singers who starts out bizarre and becomes a selling point of the band, like John Arch (early Fates Warning) or Mark Shelton (Manilla Road), a huge asset and just inherently interesting to listen to.

What really sells the album for me is the writing. They’ve gone all-out with the epics, and they stuck the landing. It’s one of those cases where the long title track overshadows everything else, but they’re all basically great. Lucas Flocco is able to consistently get extra mileage out of his song structures, keeping the momentum up and bringing things back at just the right time. Towards the end, I ask “are they going to do it?,” and damn, do they ever. The epicness of the title track really cannot be overstated, especially the ending. Then the Christmas song comes on and spoils the vibe (editor’s note: it’s a cover of Wham! – Last Christmas), unless you followed my advice earlier. It’s not that bad, but… There’s a time and a place for everything, you know.

It feels weird to give a 9 to an album with such a strange anticlimax, but ultimately people will just ignore it and play it later or something. So what stops this from getting a 10? Partially the programmed drums – not bad, but fake-sounding in a couple spots, and a good drummer just adds things you wouldn’t think of yourself. Occasionally, the vocals become a little too piercing, e.g. the very loud and very long scream closing out the first track. Mostly, there just isn’t a sense of cohesion, like the album was cobbled together and just happened to be really, really good. I would love to see Mortanius get a consistent lineup and release their equivalent of Operation: Mindcrime or The Black Halo, something with more of a complete identity. Right now they have the songs, but are missing the infrastructure to turn them into something more. Nevertheless, I am a big fan of this band.

Recommended tracks: Till Death Do Us Part, Disengage
You may also like: I DON’T KNOW YOU TELL ME
Final verdict: 9/10