Elder Gods

One of the few underground survivors of the 80’s NWOBHM holocaust is still marching… the huge gap between “Primal” and “Predator” made me think that John Mortimer had mostly likely changed the industry; I was expecting to see him resurfacing either as an F1 pilot or as an inventor of a new brand of marmalade… instead the man put all our anxieties to rest by testing the soil some time in 2013 with the “Expander” EP, and later expanded on it with the “Predator” two years later. Dark, primal antediluvian sounds along the lines of the 2003 masterpiece were a distant memory on those, Mortimer feeling nostalgic towards his very roots with an honest albeit somewhat lethargic look back at the NWOBHM years, with a classic heavy metal sound taking a firm grip on the proceedings.

Not the finest turn of events for me who has fully embraced the progressive metal chapter from the man’s career although there must have been a few handfuls of old fans who had rejoiced tearful listening to those tunes, with childhood memories flooding their consciousness among other poignant reminiscences. So it seemed as though this third chapter from the Holocaust saga would be some kind of a wrap-on, with Mortimer going back to where he has started…

not so fast, buddy; not so fast since how can a sane human being possibly expect one of the most visionary and innovative metal artists out there to merely settle for badly-disguised re-enactments of “The Nightcomers” over and over?! No can do. And here we are, savouring this ode to all the Elder Gods, from all mythologies imaginable, including those from the H.P. Lovecraft output. An encyclopaedic conglomerate music-wise as well as Mortimer has provided a summation of nearly all his endeavours through the years the final result easily beating the preceding recording in almost every department.

There’s a little bit for everyone here as the references and nuances have been spread out fairly evenly throughout, the title-track opening the proceedings with formidable dark motifs those taken straight from “Primal”. An album sustained in the same vein would have been a perennial delight to these ears, but Mortimer and Co. quickly dissipate the gloom with winks at their classic heavy metal repertoire (“Children of the Great Central Sun”, “Solaris”) and with imposing progressive opuses like the 9.5-min “Ishtar”, a gigantic academic stroller left out of “The Courage to Be” due to its weighty doomy veneer. The more volatile epic clout of “Astaroth” will invariably recall the sprawling tall-tale “Alexander” from “Covenant”, but ambitious complexity never becomes the order of the day here, the short psychedelic etude “Observer Two” and the sprightly melodic rhythms of “Benedictus” sincere outtakes from the “Hypnosis of Birds” sessions, with “Natural State” naturally providing a fitting spacey 70’s atmosphere crossing early Sabbath with LSD-induced Hawkwind-esque obliviousness.

Although the lack of any lofty, abstract avant-garde thrashisms in the spirit of “The Sound of Souls” initially upset me beyond the point of no return, I invariably learnt to like this diverse, multifarious recording regardless of its intentionally applied nostalgic flair, a not very thorough but pretty adequate retrospection made over a glorious but hardly recognized career. The slightly abrasive guitar sound gives the album a desirable arcane vibe, siding Mortimer’s musings more strongly with the distant past where the man has always resided.

I want to believe that this fair summation is not a farewell gesture… just when the man became more active again, it would be a pity to see him laying down the weapons for good… he survived the Holocaust, survived the gruesome 90’s, survived a self-repetitive compilation-only release cycle earlier in the new millennium as well… nah, he’ll still be around, as long as there are more birds to be hypnotized and more souls to be sonically immortalized.