Ehnahre
Taming The Cannibals

February 2011
Released: 2010, Crucial Blast
Rating: 3.0/5
Reviewer: JP

In his book, THIS IS YOUR BRAIN ON MUSIC:The Science Of A Human Obsession, Daniel Levitin states that, ‘Music is organized sound’. Well, somehow Ehnahre never got the memo. When they released TAMING THE CANNIBALS, the American trio serves up a big steaming pile of ‘What the hell just happened to my ears?’ condensed into 35 minutes.



Ehnahre throw out conventional music, songwriting and compositions and get waaaay out in left-field. That’s not necessarily a bad thing but you need to have a high tolerance for experimental music to appreciate what these guys are doing. It’s certainly heavy, perhaps classifiable as Death or Black metal (if you must) but certainly avante-garde fits the bill as well. In fact many adjectives could be used to try to describe the almost indescribable. Drone, dome, ambient, experimental, post-Metal all those weird tags critics like to throw around, but it’s saving grave is that at it’s core TAMING THE CANNIBALS is heavy as well.



Drums and vocals dominate both the sound and the mix, both being way upfront. The vocals range from guttural to screams to the occasional clean, for juxtapostion I suppose. There are guitars here but not in your traditional fist-banging, in-yer-face metal riff kinda way. Solos? This is not really the forum for such mundane things.



The half dozen songs clock in at longer lengths and are loaded with sound-effects, samples, violins, trumpets, extended quiet passages and backed with inhuman shrieks from the hearse. The packaging is minimalist but has lyrics which are mostly adapted from various poems. All of these components add to the mystique of the band.



Not an easy, nor even a ‘fun’ listen but challenging compelling and adventurous. Headphone worthy and for fans of bands like Sunn 0))), Shevalreq, Thursar, and Xynfonica this could be the soundtrack to your death.