Metal Bulletin Zine: out August 7: Messiah

On August 7th, 2020 Messiah (est. 1984; Switzerland) will have the three-song EP Fatal Grotesque Symbols - Darken Universe, and there are plans for a new full-length studio album later on in 2020 called FRACMONT (see the album cover below). On the EP the firs song is new and the other two songs are new versions of 1980s tracks.

TRACKLIST

1. Fatal Grotesque Symbols - Darken Universe (5:14)

2. Space Invaders (3:39)

3. Extreme Cold Weather (4:43)

LINE-UP

Andy Kaina - Vocals

Brögi - Guitars

Patrick Hersche - Bass

Steve Karrer - Drums

The year 1994 was, for all practical purposes, the last time that the world heard Messiah with a full-length studio recording. Now then, Metal Archives does show other releases like compilations, old demos, live albums, and things like that, but the fact of the matter is that, at least according to Metal Archives and Wikipedia, there has been no new music from the Swiss act since 1994, despite being active for some time now. Interestingly enough, their 1985 demo has a review on Metal Archives, saying, in part: "Messiah were an excellent Swiss band that started out playing sloppy, yet awesome, thrash with Hellhammer-like early black metal elements. Then later, around 1986, they had developed an amazing, brutal, death/thrash sound, which eventually evolved into straight-up death metal. The fact that this is an early recording is very apparent, but in all of its raw, rotten glory, it is still a great recording. Considering this was a low-budget demo recorded in 1985, the production is surprisingly excellent. The vocals are front and center with a heavy slap-back delay effect, making them sound all the more possessed. The guitar is double-tracked and has a great fuzz tone, backed up by the cleanly played bass. The drums also have a clear sound, and are appropriately pushed up in the mix.

The main element that indicates the fact that this is one of the band’s first demos and had been recorded within a year of the band’s inception is the underdeveloped nature of it all. But much like Hellhammer, its primitive naivety and inexperienced aggression is partly what makes it so great. The riffing, the songwriting, the musicianship – all of it is at the level you would expect from a young band, but the way they make it all work is what makes the early Messiah material so special. It shows lots of potential, and hints towards what would become the mightiness that is ‘Hymn to Abramelin’."

A reviewer there also says the following about the band's 1986 debut album Hymn to Abramelin: "Commonalities between this album and that of Hellhammer, Bathory, Sepultura, and Possessed (among a few others) are pretty easy to pick out, as this album comes packed with an extremely sinister and wicked sound that was still considered a fringe element even 3 years after the release of 'Show No Mercy' and 2 years after the earliest Sodom releases. The vocal character of this album is a bit more high-pitched than the grunting character of Chuck Schuldiner, which this band would adopt in the early 90s, but what it may lack in guttural nastiness it makes up for in maddened raves. The production quality is laced with enough reverb to upstage the most open sounding of concert halls, and a frequent usage of brief spoken intros with a particularly heavy reverb aesthetic gives this album something of a theatrical quality that isn't too far off from early Mercyful Fate (another indirect tie this band shares with the eventual Norwegian 2nd wave in terms of common influence).

Nevertheless, from a musical standpoint this album is far more centered in the thrashing character of 'Seven Churches' and 'Morbid Visions' than the chunkier, heavier, more consistently chaotic character of the first couple of Death albums, though those were in turn largely closer to Slayer musically than what the style became by 1991. The transitions between fast and slow are a bit more abrupt and extreme than what had been explored by Slayer up till this point, but most of the faster elements at play on here are based in the rapid, tremolo picked riffing character that typified 'Hell Await'. The only area where things get a little bit out of character by 1986 standards is the blast beat utilized on "Messiah", arguably the most overtly death metal leaning of all the songs found on here. But overall, there is still a pretty strong helping of NWOBHM influenced riffing here that plays to the typical evolution of this time period, and along for the ride is the usual fits of fast and flashy lead guitar work, which actually doesn't resemble Slayer so much as it does the speed metal shredding character of the earliest Teutonic thrash offerings.

While overshadowed by the likes of 'Pleasure To Kill, 'Seven Churches' and 'Morbid Visions', this is an excellent formative album that should definitely be considered, and not merely for its historical significance. While it's production quality is a bit low-fi next to what became standard amongst the Bay Area scene, it definitely conforms quite nicely to what has since become a preferred sound within the post-2nd wave era of black metal, and anyone with any level of appreciation for the formative 1st wave black/thrash acts of the early 80s will find something pretty close to what was burning up the underground at that time. The narrations get a little bit comical at times, but what happens immediately after their brief input is not to be missed."

Below is the official information about the new music. Below you will find a teaser for the EP, and some older recordings available on YouTube. At the band's Bandcamp page, it looks like they do not have any music for fans to hear, only how to order the albums, but these YouTube recordings will help new fans. Of course, as we know, to support bands, Bandcamp is a much, much better medium and bands certainly prefer Bandcamp over YouTube for many obvious reasons that benefit the musicians much more directly.

Visit the band's Facebook page to keep up with the latest news from the band.

"With acts such as Hellhammer/Celtic Frost and Coroner but also more obscure outfits such as Fear Of God, Excruciation or Infected Switzerland has always been a fertile breeding ground for Extreme Metal. MESSIAH were formed in 1984 and issued two truly ground breaking records on Chainsaw Murder Records, Hymn To Abramelin in 1986 and Extreme Cold Weather a year later. In the early 1990s MESSIAH signed to Karl Walterbach’s Noise Records label and issued three more full-length albums: Choir Of Horrors (1991), Rotten Perish (1992) and Underground (1994).

A few years back MESSIAH decided to reform in the original line-up of their Noise Records albums with Andy Kaina on vocals, Steve Karrer on drums, Patrick Hersche on bass and band founder Brögi on guitar. The band’s original aim was to just have some fun and play sporadic live gigs for their dedicated fan base in Switzerland. Lavish re-issues of Hymn To Abramelin and Extreme Cold Weather on High Roller Records followed.

26 years after the last studio album MESSIAH are about to unleash the successor to their Underground record from 1994. The album is called »Fracmont« and will be issued by High Roller Records in a short while.

To shorten the waiting time, there will be an EP containing three songs not to be found on the following album. For starters, said EP contains re-recorded versions of “Space Invaders” from the band’s 1986 debut album Hymn To Abramelin as well as the title track of the second album Extreme Cold Weather (from 1987).

The title track of the EP is called “Fatal Grotesque Symbols – Darken Universe”, of which main man and guitarist Brögi says: 'The new song won’t be on the album. It does fit in very well with the re-recordings of the two old tunes. <> sounds pretty much like old school MESSIAH. Even my solo part goes back to the very early days of the band as it is quite chaotic. The lyrics for the song are really old, I did write them for a different project though. Our singer Andy Kaina re-arranged the text and now the whole song is a full-blown MESSIAH tune.'”

MESSIAH - TRAILER 1 «FATAL GROTESQUE SYMBOLS - DARKEN UNIVERSE»