Maa On Syntinen Laulu

When I saw for the first time the picture of the cover, as also the photograph of the back side of this album I said to myself that here something has gone wrong with this particular artist. The band is called Mustamaa and comes from Finland, and if I have understood correctly, the man on the cover is their only member. With all the power that the image has, I put “Maa on Syntinen Laulu”, the EP which was recently released by Bestial Burst, in the cd player with a lot of curiosity. The element of surprise stroke again when the music began. Mustamaa is not a Black Metal band as I was expecting, but in the four tracks that they present us in their first release, they play a very weird psychedelic rock where paranoia reigns.

Overcoming the first weird feeling, the listener will realize that the music here is quite interesting. Darkness and insanity are the two main elements of the compositions that they are combined very well with the psychedelic, sometimes progressive melodies and the primitive, close to nature character and they offer an original and quite interesting. The entire album places the listener inside a wet, warm nightly landscape, during the dance of a primitive, pagan ritual. The tracks last from five to seven minutes and the madness of the composer with weird melodies, the many changes and the intense feelings that he is offering constantly, keep the listener almost nailed for the twenty four minutes of the album.

The instruments are played flawlessly and they try to maintain the character of a live recording. The guitars have clean sound which reminds the sound that someone will find into releases of the ‘60ies – ‘70ies of such kind of bands. They are played with absolute accuracy and their technique, despite the insanity of the artist, is at good level. The bass is clearly audible and it gives that warm and clean character of a summer night to the compositions, while its lines are interesting and the good technique is present in here too. The drums have energy and passion, they symbolize the energy that the dance, which is devoted to the night, must have. The vocals are one of the most important elements of the music. The expressing, insane way that the singer delivers the lyrics, make the character of the band even more special. The sound is clean and has achieved to deliver the felling that the album demands. Finally, the lyrics are contained in the cd and they are written in Finnish.

This band has offered a very special in every aspect album. Either you observe it by the side of the image, either by the side of the music, either by the side of the performance, the listener will come face to face with the primitive, the pagan, the tribal but also with darkness and insanity. All these make the album a unique experience. Surely it is not Black Metal (although in some parts it becomes quite brutal and dark) so I would suggest this album only to the listeners who like dark, good music and they like to listen to various music styles.