Manntra’s Monster Mind Consuming – A Review

Band: MANNTRA

Album: Monster Mind Consuming

Genre: Folk/Industrial Metal

Duration: 35:41

Release: 26.03.2021 (NoCut Entertainment)

Zur deutschen Version dieser Review geht es hier.

You can find all links for the preorder here.

The Album was given to me by NoCut! Big thanks for that to Morgane and to Marko from MANNTRA for passing on my request!

I’m especially happy when I can give you guys out there an insider tipp! Luckily, I have one of those now! On March 26th, the Croatian Folk/Industrial Metal band MANNTRA will release their new album titled Monster Mind Consuming. 

Some of you will know from their gig at Rockharz festival in 2018 or from their tours with bands like IN EXTREMO or DIE KRUPPS.

Monster Mind Consuming is the second album in which we can hear singer Marko sing in English. His distinctive voice is, in my view, one of MANNTRAs main selling point which sets them apart from other bands.

The start of the album, which is rather short with a duration of only 36min, is the overture called Invocation which has a flawless transition to the first ear-worm of this album: Heathens. The aggressive, but also longing song describes battle-like scenes into which the listener is very well brought into. Ferocious lines like „No fear!“ or „War is a sacred art“ in combination with battle songs make this my absolute favorite on this album!

Using Heathens as the final single to be released from this album surely heightened the fan’s anticipation.

The next song gets its name from the latin word „orator“ (=public speaker): Ori Ori. This hymn about fallen heroes, who are despised and loved simultaneously, will surely cater to fans of roman history. Especially with the magnificently made video!

In the following song Slave the listener gets to hear a story about a fortress ruin that has been cast into darkness. The folk elements play a more prominent role, which I quite enjoy. However, with a duration of only 2:55min the song is a bit too short for my liking.

Next is the second single that was released with the telling title Voices of the Sea. This longing song talks about the feeling of fighting your inner demons for years only for you to return home and realizing that you haven’t defeated them. The desire for inner peace with the simultaneous pull into the sea, where the demons lie, is wonderfully executed in this song!

At this point I have to talk about a more general thing: I’m not a fan of putting one pre-released single after the other on an album, because I think that you discourage the listener to really discover your album by doing this. With this, you can put away the album after one half and haven’t heard anything new. Looking at the amount of work that goes into an album, it’s rather sad if that happens…

But now on to song Nr. 6 which was also single Nr. 4: Barren King. Strong folk melodies govern this song which tells the story of a king of outcasts. At times this song reminds me of other songs by IN EXTREMO.

While Barren King was quite folky, the following song MMC is an Industrial/Gothic metal song. MMC shows one of MANNTRAs core strengths very clearly: Marko’s voice is so distinctive that he manages to transport folk songs as well as harder industrial numbers. The content, the song covers the manipulative depths of mankind, makes this song more current than ever in these times. 

I can’t really warm myself up to the next song called I want to eat you. The contrast between harder RAMMSTEIN-like guitar parts and the folky standardesque refrain doesn’t fit for me at all.

All the more strong is In your Eyes. The song is about passion and pleasure and the fight against sin. The eternal struggle between morals and desire is very well executed in MANNTRA’s style and grants the listener another hit.

Somewhat unusual but very beautiful is the next to last song called Let’s invite the Storm. Compared to other MANNTRA songs, this is very soft, but the duet with bass player Maja really conveys the pain of lost love in a very touching manner, so that I am sure that the fans will love this one regardless of its soft touch.

The almost crowning end is the ballad Lipa which is completely in Croatian. It kind of reminds me of a couple songs by TANZWUT. 

I, personally, am very happy that there is a Croatian song. When I first discovered MANNTRA they were exclusively singing in Croatian which changed when they gained more international recognition. The return to their roots marks a very amazing ending point to this album.

To draw a conclusion, we have an album which fans of both folk and industrial should be able to enjoy. MANNTRA manage to continuously evolve and are able to present us with their best album yet!

I can only recommend it!