This music lacks electricity. Everything else is there -- complex mechanical parts, lubricated and machined with due precision. There's a smart computer that -- ideally -- should control the entire process. Everything is in place. The only thing missing is electricity itself...
Kostroma's MORTIFER is a flagship of the domestic thrash scene. Metal in their understanding is a perfectly polished blank, with perfect angles, magnetized by many hours of a machinist's work at the lathe. Without such parts, a train won't fly and a plane won't drive... wait, the other way around. Without such parts, a nuclear reactor won't produce the required kilowatts, and a furnace in a steel mill won't fire up.
But what is a part separated from the machine? Something very inconspicuous, something ordinary. Something that many foolishly consider unnecessary...
Perhaps MORTIFER's music doesn't sound too original in the 21st century, but it's hard to deny that it's played with heart and skill. Colorless as it may be, this metal has substance, weight, and significance. It's like bread -- a fine accompaniment to any meal. Perhaps "Total Darkness" lacks melodies, aggression, and bite, but that's by today's standards. After all, it is precisely thanks to MORTIFER that one can say thrash metal exists in russia. And what's your own, no matter what it may be, always feels closer. Postscript -- a patriot's restrained tear.