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With no advance warning Mesarthim, Australia’s highly prolific anonymous space black metal duo, recently released Ghost Condensate [Editor's note: the review was written in April], their fourth full length in five years. Despite the speed of their releases Mesarthim’s quality has remained consistent and their sound has evolved considerably without losing their signature (and divisive) sound.
The group's 2015 debut, Isolate, introduced the duo’s mix of atmospheric black metal, howling vocals, and spacey synths evoking vintage science fiction and science documentaries. Subsequent releases added to that sound expanding the sonic palette with full blown techno interludes and more melodic lead work on the metal side.
Ghost Condensate furthers this evolution. It draws the most inspiration from their 2016 EP, The Great Filter where they first really dove into the epic. The result is more vintage space opera than science documentary. Ghost Condensate is rife with epic guitar riffs and leads, even breaking out a pick scrape into a face-melting solo, not to mention some truly epic twin guitars. The band’s trademark synths support the guitars while also being given time to shine in ambient and techno interludes
Their fourth album delivers exactly what fans expect from Mesarthim, without rehashing previous releases. Those that object to their mix of synth and metal won’t be won over, but fans of less atmospheric metal that weren’t convinced by their earlier work should check out their current incarnation.