Few modern artists are capable of scaling the towering heights of the most significant mammoths of the post rock genre, yet there are more and more younger artists that remind us they are also songwriters to be reckoned with. Much ground covered on the new effort from Sofia, Bulgaria based instrumental act MENTAL ARCHITECTS brings in many comparisons, ranging from math rock, post rock and post metal aesthetics, but in their adventurous, technical, urgent, dense, and ambient music they have produced something that is very much their own. We’re proud to give you their newest single “Screamer” that comes soon after the premiere of another new track “Dyno” and gives you a fine example of what to expect from their upcoming full length “Ascend”, explained by the band below.
When you do instrumental music it’s harder to get a message across, in the past we’ve seen a lot of bands (including us) use whole sentences as song titles to try and convey a message, but that has always felt to us like just slapping random words on songs that came from a much more mysterious and uncharted place.
With “Ascend” we wanted to explore exactly that. In 2013 the idea was to climb a 2729 m. peak called Malyvotisa and there on the spot to write and record a song (track 8). We wanted to experience all of this together: the anxiety, the exhaustion, the sense of achievement in order to understand ourselves better and have a common source of inspiration when we sit down and write songs trying to map the whole experience.
When we say that this is a concept record, we don’t want to sound pretentious, because we’re not trying to intellectualize the songs, we just want to be honest to the experience, ourselves as friends and as musicians.
Ultimately “Ascend” is about reaching higher creatively which was made possible only by being honest and relying on each other.
All of the songs were recorded live. Ascend was mixed and co-produced by Andrew Schneider who’s a veteran in doing those types of records (Cult of Luna, Pelican, Daughters). Mastering was done by Carl Saff.
We’re premiering “Screamer” which is the 10th track from the record and is in the part of the album that marks our descent from the peak. This was the point we still had some adrenaline left, but fatigue was getting the best of us. Screamer is a climbing term that simply means a long and loud fall. It’s kind of the beginning of the end of the whole album.
“ASCEND” comes out on May 24th. Digital / European pre-orders are up HERE, while the US version can be reached via Old Press Records.
