Rich in mystical warmth and unremitting in cold intensity…
Review by Jason Guest
World Terror Committee (Website; Facebook)
Release date: 27 February 2015
Dissolving Stuthoff and forming Acherontas in 2007 signified a momentous evolution for mainman Acherontas as, after all, the esoteric themes explored and indulged were at odds with a band named after a Nazi concentration camp in Poland. But, well, okay, maybe a concentration camp could have been a metaphor for the stronghold of mortality or morality or whatever from which the individual seeks liberation, but by naming the band after a municipality named after the river of woe in Greek Mythology, the band’s music and philosophy became one.
Since 2007’s Tat Tvam Asi (Universal Omniscene), this unification has been the foundation upon which this band has continued to build its mightily mystical and esoteric empire. With each release, Acherontas’s devotion to darkness has evolved beyond measure, and so with Ma Ion… it’s no exaggeration to say that the desolate left hand path upon which they tread is proffering ever greater riches for the band to explore and exploit.
Exemplified in opener ‘Fire of Prometheus’ is the band’s unerring readiness to tread where few others dare. As one of five ambient tracks ranging between ninety seconds and eleven minutes ( not counting ‘The Awakening…’ which combines the esoterically ambient with a coda of blackened ferocity), to dismiss them as “fillers” would be to undermine not only each as a piece of music but their value as part of the greater whole and the album itself. In fact, were you so inclined, they could be listened to independently of the others, making up an EP on a par with if not better than most if not all esoteric ambient works of this ilk already out there.
Black and bleak and brimming in alchemical and ritualistic atmospherics, Ma Ion maintains the raw and primitive nature of black metal while beautifully crafting labyrinthine structures upon that fathomless foundation. The dissonant, the discordant, the primordial, and the otherworldly coalesce and clash as walls of fire mount ever higher and the intensity of the album swells as the pathway to darkness and enlightenment unfurls. There’s little that can be said about this album other than compositionally, instrumentally, musically, texturally and dynamically balanced at every extreme and intently focussed throughout, rich in mystical warmth and unremitting in cold intensity, this is a superbly crafted piece of work.
9 out of 10
Track Listing:
- Fires Of Prometheus
- Nereid Tide Of Neptune´s Rudra
- Convolut-ion, Manifestat-ion, Secret-ion, Karma-lravatl The Thunders Emerged
- Ma-Ion ´Formulas Of Reptilian Unification´
- Permutation In The Aetheric Void (Ma-Ion Sacred Seal)
- Shaman And The Waning Moon
- Lunar Transcendence & The Secret Kiss Of Nut
- The Awakening Of Astral Orphic Mysteries – Behind The Eyes Of Irida
- Copper Arcana
- Therionic Transformation
- Orgiastic Feast Of Flesh, Beheld Thine Vicissitude
