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Death Metal Album of the Week: Miasma – Changes

The Germanic nation of Austria has not churned out much in the way of quality Death Metal over the years, seemingly annexed from the rest of western Europe such that interesting bands like Disharmonic Orchestra and our summoned entity of the week, Miasma, never really got much exposure beyond the scene that belonged to them and their contemporaries. Nevertheless, their proximity to such nations as Germany and Switzerland has tangibly impacted the music of the unsuspectingly titled ‘Changes’, with the necromanticism of Celtic Frost storming the Alpine borders and charging the album with the same energy levels as the classic ‘To Mega Therion‘. Infact, Miasma launch straight into the opener, ‘Baphomet’ as though they were resurrecting the old Celtic Frost that created majestic, story-telling structures from simple patterns of power-chords, although this introductory instance of Warrior worship serves only as a reference point for the advancements of this form that ensue. Bringing the rhythmic coherence of bands like Celtic Frost and Autopsy together with the exploratory, winding sequences of German Death Metal and even a touch of the Dutch like Asphyx, gives a better picture of ‘Changes’ as an album that holds true to it’s name, demonstrating the symbols of metamorphosis and makes up for the poorly phrased, broken English of the lyrics. Also similar to what Celtic Frost achieved on ‘To Mega Therion’, Miasma break the illusion that the aesthetics of Metal causes the consicion of simple but brutal phrasing to appear more simple (blockheaded) than examples from Classical music, using some twisted variations on the opening motif of Beethoven’s 5th symphony as a point from which to progress into some intelligent and thoroughly morbid riffing, as in ‘Schizophrenia‘. Leading the listener from one perspective to another is a sign of good art and ‘Changes’ does so on a journey through history, through life and through our thoughts, crushing all those inherited, death-fearing assumptions along the way.