Review: MÜTIILATION – The Lost Tapes

Year of release: 2018
Label: Osmose Productions
Rating: 6 / 10

I will say a seditious thing now, but I always considered MÜTIILATION to be some kind of garbage. Of course, neither I nor anyone else has the right to make any critical judgments about LLN. But looking from my personal bell tower, MÜTIILATION, apart from its (colossal, no doubt about it!) historical and ideological significance, I see as the forerunner of lowlife "DSBM" shit with all the symptoms: mediocre compositions, disgusting sound, sad mood and so further. And it seems that the worst albums of MÜTIILATION are the most popular ones. I can't stand neither “Vampires ...”, nor “Remains ...”, nor “Black Millenium” but “Sorrow Galaxies” I consider decent work. The figure of Meyhna’ch with his participation in all those dubious projects is also not credible. t the same time, for example, VLAD TEPES, no less filthy musically and no less radical ideologically, in my eyes are way better than MÜTIILATION. In short, let's agree that I do not understand anything about monsieur Roussel's works.

“The Lost Tapes” is a posthumous collection of the best MÜTIILATION songs, re-recorded with the sound close to the latest albums. It seems that Meyhna’ch was going to completely redo something there, but it did not work out, but the records remained. Now these 6 songs are collected on this release. What to say ... they sound really better than the originals, and in a good way. This is an underground buzz-sizzling record with smooth corners, perfect for this kind of music. Everything is played a bit more skillfully. Fortunately, Meyhna’ch is still not so distraught to offer MÜTIILATION songs in a clean modern sound. But the very idea of ​​rewriting the old songs seems even more meaningless than “From the Depths of Darkness” of BURZUM. At least Varg's songs possess some uniqueness which more or less justifies his awful compilation of re-recorded material. There is no such uniqueness in MÜTIILATION songs. They are important solely in the context of time, place, and releases that were originally present. Therefore, “The Lost Tapes” can only be perceived as a collection of MÜTIILATION covers made by the project itself, nothing more. It seems to me that such a release can hit the already shaky cult status of the project.