Even without being an expert on American geography, if there's one thing we know about New England in general, the state of Rhode Island in particular and especially the town of Providence, it's that there are dark, unnamable things going on in the gloom. Among them, let's open the case of Corvin's Breed, Martin Corvin's monstrous offspring who first saw the pallid sun in 2014 and have been haunting the cold, putrid atmosphere ever since with their blend of industrial metal, black metal and horrific references. Misanthropy is his second album, five years after The Witching Hour, and was produced by a certain Nero Bellum...
The first thing that jumps out at you is how much the sound has grown between the two albums. Corvin's Breed has gained in aggression and bite, the guitars are much more present and nasty than in the past. The gothic and horrific atmospheres of the first album are less present and have given way to an apocalyptic industrial climate. We metioned the producer of Misanthropy above: the shadow of Psyclon Nine often lurks in the music of Corvin's Breed. Both share the same taste for wickedness, for raging lyrics spat out and the meeting of electronics and vocals that borrow from black metal. Among their influences, it's hard not to think of Deathstars or Marilyn Manson's croaks: Corvin's Breed love the theatrical, the grandiloquent and the grimacing effects.
So we're well on the way to a guilty pleasure (for those who still feel guilty about indulging...) made up of big, thumping riffs and martial rhythms (Straight to the Curb), creeping threats (Dysphoria), catchphrases that lodge themselves in our skulls without any courtesy (Natural Born Killer) and monolithic heaviness full of forbidden mysteries (A Solemn Dirge). The rhythmic approach regularly allows the guitars to express themselves sufficiently to breathe new life into the tracks, and we appreciate the atmosphere imposed by the futuristic synths and spaceship sound design, that little touch of horrific Sci-Fi evoking a demonic summons in the cold of the cosmos that always makes its effect.
If it seems as though you already know the recipe, Corvin's Breed have mastered it and are delightfully effective. If you like grandiloquent gurgles, sinister whispers, biting guitars and mechanical rhythms, then Misanthropy is a rollercoaster that's as satisfying as it is well crafted. There's enough variety on the album not to bore you, particularly in the slower, gloomier final tracks, which remind us that Corvin's Breed know how to provoke a few shivers and summon a few more melancholy spectres into their nightmarish universe.
