Mandragora – Carnal Cage (2012)

With very few bands coming out of the small country of Lithuania, it is to our great pleasure to witness the quality and excellent musicianship behind Mandagora’s “Carnal Cage”. Being the band’s first release in seven years, it kind of seems that it was stuck in Melodic Death Metal limbo, allowing this album to sound like the good old days of the genre. With this old-school vibe and a pristine production, this album is our favorite Melodic DM release of 2012 (so far).

Opening with some funky Middle-Eastern sounding riffs in “Masquerade”, the album sets of on a very well defined path of excellent melodic passages and riffing wizardry. Reminding us a bit of older Dark Tranquility and Dark Lunacy, the band nicely opens with an excellent riffing onslaught the song “In Doubt”. The tempo changes are very well introduced and the drumming is just right, the growls are your typical ‘manly’ melodic DM growls, allowing the music to sound both powerful and very melodic. There is a particularly awesome bass guitar section that made this song even more amazing for us.

Starting off a bit more melodic with “Unconsciousness”, this track creates a very grandiose atmosphere before things start rolling. The minimal use of keyboards through this album is just right, allowing the guitars to shine and deliver the goods, just like old-school bands used to do. The catchiness of “Unconsciousness” is another fact that helps to make this one of our favorite tracks on this album. Song after song, the band delivers excellent guitar-driven song structures that are quite different from each other, making “Carnal Cage” a delightful listening experience that never gets dull.

Tacks like “The Unknown” and “Sand and Dust” feature excellent headbanging passages that should not be missed by die-hard fans of Melodic DM (like ourselves). The instrumental closer “After” shows that the band has more dimensions that only whipping out sick melodic DM riffs, but they can also create melodic pieces that don’t need to be aggressive in nature.

Being huge Melodic DM fans we are very picky with the albums we receive, Mandragora’s “Carnal Cage” is by far the best album we have heard in this genre this 2012. The band delivers 9 very different tracks that are nicely centered on the catchiness of the guitar work. We can only hope that this band does not decide to start playing some modern metal or Metalcore shit in the future and sticks to their already excellent sound.  If you are strapped for cash, this would be the only release I would get in a few months, hands down.

Release: May 4th, 2012

Genre: Melodic Death Metal

Country: Lithuania