ALBUM REVIEW: Age Of The Solipsist – Mother Of All

Solipsism is the theory in which the self is all that can be known to exist; a syndrome characterised by feelings of loneliness, detachment and indifference to the outside world, where individuals feel reality is not real in the sense of being external to their own minds. It can be a cavernous crevice to crawl through in the eyes of anyone watching whilst for the Solipsist, it’s business as usual bettering their own universe. Across seven songs and twenty-nine minutes, MOTHER OF ALL – the brainchild of Danish session drummer Martin Haumann (MYRKUR, AFSKY) – bring about the Age Of The Solipsist on their delightfully dark debut.

MOTHER OF ALL is a death metal devotees dream, bringing together an all-star cast of heavy metal royalty to the proceedings. Journeyman bassist Steve Di Giorgio (DEATH, TESTAMENT) and death metal deity Hannes Grossmann (NECROPHAGIST, HATE ETERNAL) bring buckets of blood-soaked experience to the billing; the former setting their fretboard on fire throughout with finger-picking goodness whilst the latter melds their penchant for pulverisation to their mixing. In many ways, MOTHER OF ALL is a calling card for classic death metal done melodically.

Opener Autumn is as fitting to an evening of flamboyant flamenco dancing with its dirty-dancing Spanish guitars as it is a monstrous moshpit gathering; swinging like a death metal pendulum between pulverising post-hardcore patterns and loop-de-loop riffs a la progressive metal. If you were approaching Age Of The Solipsist as an outsider, you’ll see this as an anomaly on an album of meat-and-potatoes melodeath. If you give it the time it deserves to ingest like your grandmother’s leftovers, you’re in for the best meal you’ve eaten in weeks.

We Don’t Agree is classic CARCASS crossed with a blend of mid-eighties Bay Area thrash; throwing riffs through your eardrums at the speed of light, as blast-beats leave blisters on your brain. Curators Of Our World Scope cries out for a call to arms, unrelenting in it’s aural assault. The title track is a throwback to the glory days of the Gothenburg scene’s golden days; a chorus as crushingly catchy as this should be illegal in death metal, yet does more for the never-ending mosh-pit inducing cyclone of riffs than you’d imagine. MOTHER OF ALL touch on all the tricks of the trade across Age Of The Solipsist’s seven tracks without ever trawling too far into memory lane; instead, Haumann and his hired hands forage a fresh take on a genre continuing to redesign itself these days. 

For an album as philosophical as Age Of The Solipsist, with all of it’s world-weary political pomp, it’s almost ironic that the old adage ‘what goes up, must come down’ applies so easily to it. As much as MOTHER OF ALL’s ability to allude to death metal gone by whilst simultaneously injecting new life into it is impressive, there’s often a feeling that the production pushes much of it’s magic to the side-lines, alongside it’s adventurous ambitions. Feel The Pain should be a five-minute tour-de-force that challenges The Plague Within-era PARADISE LOST for their doomy-death metal crown but instead feels like a muddier wade through a METALLICA mixtape that got mixed up and mis-wired with some old-school KREATOR demos. 

MOTHER OF ALL is a project that punches well above its weight. Age Of The Solipsist possesses the politically-conscious forward-thinking death metal we deserve in the 21st century, and for a passion project penned single-handedly, that’s something to be proud of.  

Rating: 7/10

Age of the Solipsist is set for release April 23rd via Black Lion Records.

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