Shakhtyor – Shakhtyor (2013)

Originally released back in 2012 as an independent album, Cyclone Empire has scooped up Shakhtyor, a German outfit and their very powerful four track self-titled debut full-length. While many people are raving and loving all the new Sludge/Post-Metal releases, we have to say that sometimes they are just plain and dull and unluckily this is album belongs to this category. We understand that being repetitive and ‘crushing’ is part of the deal, but when you have 40 minutes of music revolve around 8 riffs, it is just unacceptable.

Opening with “E. Jasper”, the band sets the mood for the whole song in the first minute and then it just drones around the same for almost nine minutes… WTF. We are aware of the need to build momentum and create a crushing wall of sound, but this band just delivers half and leaves you hanging like when the lights go out while watching porn. The most salvageable track of this release is “Handschuhmann”, a 7 minute piece that actually has some structure and nicely builds-up to a semi-climaxing stage.

During the passable “K.I”, things just start to get extremely dull and repetitive. There are some decent riffs here and there, but the overall structure of the tracks makes for a very boring experience, and we are fans of Sludge/Post-Metal music as you can see in our other reviews. We believe the band just needs a bit more time before getting exposed to the world. Same can be said about “Nyk Phoa”, a 13-minute monster that should have been around 6 minutes and we would have been totally fine with it.

As a clear case of ‘out too soon’, Shakhtyor is not really ready for mainstream exposure. The band has good technical skills and some of their ideas are good, but their songs drag along too long and start to get very dull after the 7th minute. We are looking forward to what the band can do in the future, but if you are expecting something very refined and fully enjoyable, stay away from this release.

Release: May 10th, 2013

Genre: Sludge/Doom/Post-Metal

Country: Germany