### Kommandant: Kontakt

#### 04/11/10 || Khlysty

You know what? I’m ALWAYS VERY WARY when a band appears to adopt and promote an overly military image. You can call me a pussified paranoid, over-the-top politically correct or any other expletive that you might find appropriate, but nine times outta ten, these super-duper military-image bands hide quite a few “serpents’ eggs” in their nesting. And Kommandant possesses not only an overly militaristic image; no, their image clearly invokes too much of Wermacht (albeit in a kind of S/M mode) for comfort. Are the members of the band neo-Nazis? I really don’t know, but what I see, I find creepy and not in a good way.

Anyway, though, I’m supposed to tell you about Kommandant’s music, which is contained in this six-song E.P., called “Kontakt”. According to information that I found on the Retardnet, some Kommandant’s members have in the past done time with Nachtmystium, which, from a Darkthrone-derived black metal band, has become one of the leading forces in reformism in black metal. From what I hear in “Kontakt”, though, these former Nachtmystium members must have left the band before those monumental changes happened to its sound: see, to these ears, Kommandant sound as trad black metal as it gets, while adding some elements of death metal and industrial overtones to the whole mix, to make things more interesting.

Intro “KK66N6ZT” aside, the five “proper” songs of “Kontakt” contain each and every one of black metal’s trademarked elements: tremolo-picked, high-pitched guitars, blasting drums, raspy vocals,… the whole thing. What makes Kommandant interesting sound-wise is the fact that they ingeniously add elements of groove and an almost death metal aggression to their song writing. There are some huge breakdowns to be found here; some quite engaging tempo- and time signature changes; and some moments that almost reach –but never fully get into- the downtuned ferocity that characterizes death metal. As for the industrial elements I talked about earlier, they are mostly present through the production, which seems too “aseptic” and “mechanized” and as far removed as possible from black metal’s lo-fi murky buzz.

Okay, then, let me be honest: this is pretty compelling. The songs, which have compact three-to-four-and-a-half-minutes lengths, are aggressive, technically watertight (without any elements of show-offy wankery), produced so as to have their ferocity enhanced and as headbangable as it gets. And, even though I’m quite uncomfortable with the band’s image, I cannot but admit that this is one pretty competent addition to USBM’s list of interesting bands. Anyway, to make a long story short, “Kontakt” is one all-meat-no-filler twenty-minutes-long E.P. that will satisfy anyone who’s looking for a quick dose of smartly composed and executed black metal ferocity. As for the band’s image, well, you chose whether to ignore it or not…

- Information
- Released: 2010
- Label: Planet Metal
- Website: Kommandant MySpace
- Band
- Nick Hernandez: vocals
- Jim Bresnahan: guitar
- Marcus Kolar: guitar
- David Swanson: bass
- Garrett Scanlan: drums

- Tracklist
- 01. KK66N6ZT
- 02. Anti-human nemesis
- 03. Codex Gigas
- 04. Der maschinenraum
- 05. Sulphur chariot
- 06. The Genesis reaktor