Missed Album Review: Massen – Gentle Brutality

Style: progressive metal, melodic black metal (mixed vocals)
Recommended for fans of: Ne Obliviscaris, Dissection, Moonsorrow
Review by: Zach
Country: Belarus
Release date: 25 August, 2023

[EDITOR’S NOTE: now that it’s December and releases become less frequent, we’re going to start with covering cool things that slipped past us. As much as we want to be, we are not nearly omnipotent. This is the first review of many in an attempt to make up for that.]

The coveted seal of Hyperfixation Album is not to be taken lightly. This is something I love so much, I’m willing to not only order it on vinyl, but also play it through excessively. When a band’s album enters this exclusive club, they’re amongst the likes of Opeth, Disillusion, and newly coveted Afterbirth. With such great power, they now have a chokehold over me for well over a month, and if you’re Ne Obliviscaris, I’ve basically set aside my entire year for you. These albums need to appeal to all my musical sensibilities, and give me new ones I didn’t even know I had.

This year has been a good year for these kinds of albums, some coming from bands who I’ve heard before and others who are up and coming. Massen is one of the few prog bands I’d never heard of before joining the Subway, and I quickly took a liking to 2021’s Contraesthetic. But as time has gone on, I find it’s a record with a lot of good ideas, plenty of Zach-bait with the violin and folk-esque melodies, but medium-rare execution overall. Marred by brickwalled production, and just barely 35 minutes of runtime, I was ready to write off Massen as a band who wasted huge potential.

So much so that when Gentle Brutality came out, I said “oh, cool”, and didn’t take much notice until about a whole month later. In the time between these two albums, Massen went down from a four piece to just two (and now back to four): Alex, who handles all instruments and harsh vocals, and Kara, who handles violin. Now, usually this is a bad sign, but clearly these two have such writing prowess that they’ve made a Massive leap forward since 2021.

Gentle Brutality starts out with the best song Massen have ever written. ‘Energy System’ slaps really fucking hard, as the kids say.. The startling brutality of the opening screams, the mournful main riff that gives way to an explosive female vocal chorus. Not to mention the catchiest use of a song’s title I’ve seen all year—just look at the comments on the band’s Bandcamp page to see what I mean. In fact, my biggest flaw with Gentle Brutality is that it never quite recovers from how incredible this first song is. Every other song is great, while the opener is firmly excellent. 

Massen makes up for this by writing a bit more adventurously this time around. ‘Corps de ballet’ starts with a riff that sounds almost grindcore-adjacent before leading into a violin filled chorus. ‘Together Alone’ is their first attempt at writing the closest thing to a ballad with absolutely no harsh vocals. For the most part, this really works in their favor, as it keeps the album from sounding like Contraesthetic with better production. The melodic, blackened core is still very much there, but with a bit more focus on creating interplay between violin and guitars this time.

Kara’s violin is without a doubt the highlight of the entire album. I always thought it was a bit of a waste that she wasn’t more prevalent on Contraesthetic, so I’m glad to see that rectified. ‘Energy System’’s verse riff would not sound nearly as massive without it, and it serves most of the riffs so well. However, I would like to see the next album giving her more lead parts, especially seeing how well Ne Obliviscaris’s Tim Charles uses his violin to create vocal melodies and solo around punishing riffs. Letting her shine through  in leads, as she does on the closer,  would help their songwriting even further, but the other instrumentals are truly nothing to scoff at here either. 

People named Alex are clearly really good at making prog, as we’ve already seen in Dessiderium. I had no idea that Massen moved down to just a two piece after 2022, and that’s clearly indicative of Alex’s (not Haddad) talent. I’m unsure if the two other members who came back after 2022 had a hand in writing the album, but if they didn’t, hats off to Alex for his performances. Guest vocalist Nastya Kozel also deserves extra props for how she makes me wish I spoke Belarussian to sing along with her.

This album is pretty fantastic, and pushes Massen straight into the forefront of a band whose next release I’ll eagerly look out for. Sure, it never reaches the heights of ‘Energy System’, but it’s a consistently well-written and overall breezy album to listen to thanks to the runtime. Frankly, after the first song, it was an easy entry into the Hyperfixation Album  ranks. 

Recommended tracks: ENERGY SYSTEM, Disgusted, Together Alone, Our Melody is Not Dead
You may also like: Windfaerer, Winterhorde
Final verdict: 8/10

Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | Facebook | Instagram | Metal-Archives page

Label: Apostasy Records – Bandcamp | Facebook

Massen is:
– Alex (vocals, guitars, bass, drums)
– Kara (violin)