UMUR "Gangrene" is the 3rd full-length studio album by Swiss symphonic/progressive black metal act Mirrorthrone. The album was released through Red Stream, Inc. in April 2008. It´s the successor to "Carriers of Dust" from 2006. Mirrorthrone is a one-man act featuring Vladimir Cochet on bass, drum programming, guitars, keyboards, and vocals. Cochet formed Mirrorthrone in 2000 and released the debut full-length studio album "Of Wind and Weeping" in 2003. Cochet also releases albums under the Weeping Birth and Unholy Matrimony monickers.

Stylistically the material on the 6 track, 64:42 minutes long album continue the symphonic/progressive black metal style of "Carriers of Dust (2006)". Cochet is obviously classically trained and the compositions feature an omnipresence of classical piano and keyboard parts. Not completely unlike what some of the last Emperor albums sounded like. The drums are programmed and while they do feature an artificial digital sound, the actual drum programming is well done, and the programmed drums drive the music forward with the needed power. A human drummer would have been preferable but this is decent enough and doesn´t distract too much from the overall impression of the music. The vocals vary from snarling black metal type vocals, to clean vocals, to choirs, and there is generally good variation in the vocal department.

The tracks are generally very long, the shortest being 6:40 minutes long and the longest being 15:02 minutes long. They are structurally pretty complex and contain many different sections, atmospheres, and changes. A few more hooks to help tell the tracks apart would have been great, but it´s hard not to be impressed by the compositional skills at display here. The black metal parts are of the more polished kind, but that part of the music is perfectly designed to work with the many classical parts. So while I find "Gangrene" a more fascinating/intriguing release than an effectful and listenable ditto, my conclusive opinion is one of being mighty impressed by what I´m listening to. A 4 star (80%) rating is deserved.

UMUR "Carriers of Dust" is the 2nd full-length studio album by Swiss symphonic/progressive black metal act Mirrorthrone. The album was released through Red Stream, Inc. in January 2006. Mirrorthrone is a one-man act featuring Vladimir Cochet on Bass, Drum programming, Guitars, Keyboards, and Vocals. Cochet formed Mirrorthrone in 2000 and released the debut full-length studio album "Of Wind and Weeping" in 2003. Cochet also releases albums under the Weeping Birth and Unholy Matrimony monickers.

While "Of Wind and Weeping (2003)" predominantly consisted of previously recorded demo tracks, and as a consequence suffered from a couple of sound production issues (mainly the poor sounding programmed drums), "Carriers of Dust" is a whole other story. "Of Wind and Weeping (2003)" showed promise. "Carriers of Dust" delivers that promise.

Stylistically "Carriers of Dust" features a symphonic/progressive extreme metal style that is most close to black metal but also features death metal traits (growling vocals in particular lead my thoughts toward death metal). There are quite a few classical elements included in the music and while they are created on keyboards, they sound suitably "organic" (strings, hapsichord, organ) and provide the music with both finesse, sophistication, and variation. The vocals are predominantly raspy black metal type vocals, but as mentioned there are occasional growling vocals in the music too. "Carriers of Dust" also features clean vocals, which Vladimir Cochet delivers with conviction. The lyrics are in both French and English.

The music is very powerful, commanding, and epic and the tracks feature great structural variation. Tempo changes and great dynamic between subtle classical tinged parts and more aggressive yet still melodic extreme metal parts. "Carriers of Dust" features 4 tracks and a 46:43 minutes long playing time. Two of the tracks are around 10 minutes long and "Ils Brandiront leurs Idoles" features a 22:09 minutes long playing time, so this is structurally pretty challenging/progressive music. Cochet is both a skilled and clever composer as well as a great musician fully able to deliver his musical vision in a tight and convincing fashion. As the case was on "Of Wind and Weeping (2003)", the drums on "Carriers of Dust" are also programmed, but this time around they are well programmed and feature a powerful sound production, which really provide the music with the boost it deserves. They don´t necessarily sound "programmed" either. They could just as well have been played be a human drummer and triggered afterwards.

"Carriers of Dust" is one of those albums where my jaw hits the floor several times during the playing time. The high level musicianship, the powerful sound production and the intriguing and adventurous songwriting are all elements so impressive that I can´t help think of Vladimir Cochet as anything other than a musical genius. This is not something any musician can carry out with such a successful end result (I guess I should add here that the album is also recorded, mixed and mastered by Vladimir Cochet) and a 4 - 4.5 star (85%) rating is deserved.

UMUR "Of Wind and Weeping" is the debut full-length studio album by Swiss black metal act Mirrorthrone. The album was released through Red Stream, Inc. in May 2003. Mirrorthrone is a one-man act consisting of Vladimir Cochet who handles vocals, guitar, bass, keyboards and drum programming. The material on the album was recorded at Vladimir Cochet´s home between 2001 and 2003. Most of the tracks (6 out of 8) were released on the "Promo December 2002" promo, which was limited to 100 copies and only distributed to labels. Vladimir Cochet also releases albums under the Weeping Birth and Unholy Matrimony monickers.

The music on the album is symphonic and quite epic black metal. The song structures are progressive with multible sections. The music is synth heavy and often the synths emulate a classical orchestra (albeit with a more synthetic sound). There is generally a very strong influence from classical music on the album. It´s obvious that Vladimir Cochet is a very talented composer and musician and he handles both clean and raspy singing in great style and in addition to that he also handles both bass, guitar and keyboards on a pretty high level. Therefore it´s a bit of a shame that his drum programming isn´t up to par with the rest of the quality elements on "Of Wind and Weeping". I can live with the programming style, which is pretty decent, but I can´t live with the thin, artificial and soulless drum sound on the album. When I try and block out the drums the music sounds pretty good even though it´s more ambient in style, but then the out of place and rather awful sounding drums return and I´m left with a feeling that one element destroys my listening experience.

So the fact that I still want to hand out a 3 star rating to an album where one of the instruments really distract me, should be a testimony to how well composed and well performed the rest of the album is. I´m intrigued and at times impressed but not fully content.