Filthy Music Review - 'The Unconscious Mind: Where Philosophers Fall'

The Unconscious Mind – Where Philosophers Fall (2012)

CDN Records

Review by Jude Felton

I’ll admit that sometimes technical death metal rubs me up the wrong way. When I think death metal I think raw, brutal and dirty music and not guitar widdly-widdly overkill. However, when it’s done well it can be quite outstanding, with bands like veterans Suffocation and newcomers Beyond Creation delivering the goods in spades.

Now I can add The Unconscious Mind to the list of tech metal bands that do it right, and do it well. For the second time today I find myself writing about extreme metal from Montreal, Canada, and whilst both The Unconscious Mind and Erimha both fall under the death metal umbrella, their sounds couldn’t really be further apart.

With Where Philosophers Fall, this being their debut album, main songwriter and the driving force behind the band, Simon Cleroux, has delivered a crushing blend of death, black and prog metal. An incredibly technical sounding band, they may well be, they also realize the importance of good song-writing and on this album it shows. Sure, they like to indulge a little in the guitar and bass department, but in no means to the detriment of the songs themselves.

Where Philosophers Fall contains 10 tunes, with a mix of older tunes reworked and brand new tunes, and flows perfectly. Shit, if this doesn’t get your head-banging going and your air guitar into mad overdrive, there’s a good chance you’re already six feet under. A highly accessible tech death album, with prog influences? Yes, you read that correctly, with some absolutely furious music on display, The Unconscious Mind have delivered one of the surprise albums of the year, thus far, for me.

This is not an album that you want to slip past your radar, especially if you are a death metal aficionado. They have created the perfect balance between fantastic musicianship and flat-out damned good songs, all of which fall between 4 and 6 minutes in length. There’s absolutely no doubt that Where Philosophers Fall is an album that I will be coming back to time and time again.

Tracklist:

1. After Illusion 
2. My Deadly Sin 
3. The Mirror Of My Punishment 
4. Tale Of Creation 
5. Another Dying World 
6. The Demon Inside Me 
7. Beyond The Black Star 
8. Dream Jailed 
9. All End... 
10. Where Philosophers Fall 

Where Philosophers Fall is available now from CDN Records.