Black Midi
Hellfire
Release Date: Jul 15, 2022
Genre(s): Pop/Rock, Alternative/Indie Rock
Record label: Rough Trade
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Album Review: Hellfire by Black Midi
Excellent, Based on 5 Critics
Based on rating 9/10
Two travellers are stranded in the desert, searching for water and lost friends. When they stumble upon a mine led by a charismatic Captain, they reluctantly eat from the feast he's laid out. When the effects of the poisoned food take hold of the platoon -- and the blood wine operation is uncovered -- it's up to the lone, unaffected traveller to kill the Captain and get him and his infected friend out of there. This scene from "Eat Men Eat," Hellfire's second single, sounds like it's straight out of a horror flick.
Based on rating 9/10
Yes, even after releasing two records that still mangle, muddle and mystify the minds of those who dare listen, the trio like to play musical hopscotch. They refuse to yield to the same ol', same ol' as they're averse to insanity - and yet, they embrace calamity. Simply, they love a good, sudden apocalypse where musical and lyrical depravity abounds.
Based on rating 4
Third album from London trio adds another gem to the crown of a band who are fast becoming one of the very best of their era. black midi (henceforth Black Midi), are one of the most musically proficient bands on the face of the Earth. They have built up an enviable reputation of being as creative as they are virtuosic, and this combination has led to them being compared to a range of iconoclasts from Frank Zappa to Can, and King Crimson to Primus and Tom Waits.
Based on rating 3.3/5
"I'm sorry," he told the alligator. He fired. The alligator jerked, did a backflip, thrashed briefly, was still. Blood began to seep out amoeba-like to form shifting patterns with the weak glow of the water. Abruptly, the flashlight went out. Following last year's avant-snooze Cavalcade ….
Opinion: Excellent
"And this is how I sometimes think of myself, as a great explorer who has discovered some extraordinary land from which he can never return to give his knowledge to the world: but the name of this land is hell." So said The Consul in Malcom Lowry's Under The Volcano , and 'Hellfire' finds black midi fixed on that same idea. Vocalist and guitarist Geordie Greep claims to have drawn as much from the robot hell of 'Futurama' as from Dante's 'Inferno', hence dealing with it in a manner of such cartoon excess. Indeed, as a band EXCESS ALWAYS! is a fitting maxim, an abundance of everything.
'Hellfire'
is available now