Clactonian

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Band(s): Clactonian
Label(s): Self-Released
Release Format(s): Cassette, Demo
Release Year: 2024
Review Date: October 21, 2024
Author(s): FelixS

Forged out of the dark visions of a few like-minded folks from both Finland and Italy comes Clactonian. A band that took their name from an old industry of crafting and using flint tools by some ancestors of Neanderthals some 400.000 years ago. Combine this knowledge to the black/white/red aesthetics of the cover art and you know where to file Clactonian under.

In just over 12 minutes the band cracks your skull with four tracks of unpolished and barbaric sounding caveman Black/Death Metal, right in the style of Archgoat, Beherit, Proclamation and Von – as closer we also get a cover of the latter. However, it would be a little too easy to dismiss the band as just a mirror image of the genre’s icons. Although the genre, with its rather narrowly defined boundaries, does not necessarily offer very many starting points for a sound of your own, Clactonian succeeds to a reasonable extent. The main difference lies in a generally “tidier” sound that this international ensemble puts forth, it’s not nearly as chaotic and it certainly doesn’t sound as dirty either. Archgoat may indeed be the most obvious comparison, but Clactonian has not served itself with an equally heavy and grinding sound.

Now, that slightly more structured nature does not mean that we are not dealing with a solid demo, because ‘Dea Madre’ most certainly is. Clactonian might indeed have been inspired by those musical ancestors, they have just poured their take on the genre into a somewhat different mould. This way they have a more Death Metal oriented sound, which suits the tracks pretty well. The same applies to the guitar leads, they are way less frantic and do not compare to the majority of the bands in this genre that use those screaming whammy sort of leads. All used elements and the way they are executed fit creditably into the band’s chosen frame.

You could argue that Clactonian is indeed a more refined version of the bands that they have taken as their musical examples and subsequently not as pre-Neanderthal as you might have expected, but it is up to the listeners what to think of that. To me it works pretty fine and ‘Dea Madre’ is a promising, solid start for the band.

Country: Finland, Italy
Style: Black Metal, Death Metal
Links: Facebook, Instagram, Bandcamp, Spotify

VM-UNDERGROUND

Extreme Metal Fanzine est. 2012

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Clactonian – Dea Madre [Demo]

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Clactonian

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