Black Magnet
Megamantra
Federal Prisoner
Regular readers of this site (or at least cribbers of our year end coverage) should already be familiar with our general read on Oklahoma’s Black Magnet: they’re one of the rare industrial metal bands whose use of grinding electronics in tandem with their riffs speaks to as much comfort with industrial as metal itself. Third LP Megamantra keeps that hot hand going with another strong record, while making some changes in lineup and its approach to metal.
At first glance the sludging morass of chug and feedback which makes up first full track “Endless” seems in keeping with Black Magnet’s extant work. But midway through Megamantra‘s brief run-time the more metal focused listener will have cottoned on to the doomy, Godflesh-inspired elements of the preceding two records have been downplayed. Instead, roving syncopated breakdowns make up a good portion of pieces like “Coming Back Again” and others, and it’s hard not to hear them as new additions Ryne Bratcher and Jared Branson bringing their hardcore pedigree to bear on James Hammontree’s previously solo project.
Thankfully this change-up doesn’t push the industrial elements of Black Magnet out of the frame (nor does it end up in the very odd and unsatisfying breakdown vortex of so much current mainstream metal), nor does it limit the sort of aggression the band trades in purely to hardcore. The yobbish swagger of “Better Than Love” and the arpeggio-programming guided thrash of “Spitting Glass” blend elements from the likes of classic influences like Big Black or Nine Inch Nails in with the overwhelming sense of anxious rage that Hammontree’s had on lock since the beginnings of the project. Other tracks dig for a balance between the metallic elements and the electronics, with “Night Tripping”‘s martial lope feeling like the product of both its rattling bass riff and its stripped down percussive programming in equal measure.
Oddly enough, Black Magnet’s shift in its rock elements could easily connote a whole slew of bands who’ve linked hardcore with industrial – from Uniform to Street Sects to Error (Megamantra seeing release on contributor to the latter supergroup Greg Puciato’s label, in fact), but who previously never came to our minds while listening to earlier work from Hammontree & co. And, to be honest, despite the surface similarities, they still don’t. The personality and read on electronics which Hammontree’s earliest work showed is still here in spades, and those fresh and abrasive elements are still Black Magnet’s calling card, despite Megamantra‘s reformulations.
