New Era Viral Order (Dogma Slaughterhouse and the Children of Anaemia)

Started as Funeral Fog, then changed the name to Maldoror and finally to Thee Maldoror Kollective (TMK) a group of Italian musicians seemed to be quite uncertain on how to label their art; actually, it has become even more confusing since, but this is a different story. Moreover, also the music progressed from the realm of black metal into some Kovenant-influenced electronic extreme metal thing; also noise and ambient make some short appearances – also in separate tracks.

First of all, the music by TMK is oriented on metal and also the structure of some compositions, especially in the first part of the album, are not far away from what metal combos normally perform. The beats are different, the electronic sounds are something one has to get used to and also the distortion of the vocals – varying in respect to the composition – are a bit of an ambiguous experience, but actually not very surprisingly when it comes to this type of music. Characteristic is the variation of tempo, which is expressed through the use of breaks and longer much slower interludes. Moreover, the style of TMK cannot nailed down to a specific set of elements and ideas. Basically is each composition different from the pre-/succeeding one in some respect. Somehow the whole album gives the impression one attempt to break with the early days of the band, while the path into the future is still uncertain and hidden. Experimentation for the sake of doing so... but still controlled in some respect.

What makes New Era Viral Order difficult to enjoy is the absence of a consistent atmosphere. Once the intro is over and two more compositions have passed, the Italian musicians, for no apparent reason, drift away into uncertain waters and their approach becomes quite difficult to enjoy. Everything is in a flux and the listener has to go through a confusing potpourri of ideas; the epitome would be the fifth track. Especially this one is so horribly displaced and outside of what the band has performed in the first part of the album that the question should be allowed what led them to add it in the first place. The industrial/ambient/noise style of it is later recited in some respect, but the atmosphere build up with the preceding compositions is disrupted entirely; from hundred to zero in one second. Aside from this also the general approach is by no means convincing. Actually, the music is a bit shallow and without many ideas. A lot of recycling can be found on this release.

Final bits and bytes
Good? Bad? It is hard to measure it by metal standards, because the band does not really apply to the genre's general concept. Even though the band relied on guitars in order to create heaviness, the main focus lay on the electronic facets; which becomes especially apparent through the amount of non-metal tracks on this album. So from a metal point of view this album is somehow disappointing; not so much because of the amount of electronic elements but rather due to the level of boredom New Era Viral Order is reaching for at times. The reasons for putting a track like La Flamme Vivant on the album seems like a mystery to me. It does not fit into the whole concept and disrupts the atmosphere with its minimalist industrial/noise mixture. Actually, with this track the quality level takes quite a dive and never really recovers from this. Thee Maldoror Kollective attempted to push it more and more without realizing how boring and plain their music became. So, while this release opens with some solid works, the longer it takes the more it is a strain to listen to.

This album gives the impression of being eclectic, a sum of a score of ideas, which were arranged in a loose fashion, unable to create a coherent and sound framework. Or to put in other words: the band set high goals for themselves but failed in reaching them in the end.