Funeral Candies — Месу Розпочато (2020)

Poltava based label Sound Fortress appeared only this year, but has already treated us with some quite good releases. 

Those are melancholic ambient by løn, atmospheric black metal – also by Льон, d-beat single by Ukrainian D-Beat Mafia (no longer available on bandcamp, but you can still check it out on label’s YouTube channel — here), and LP by Funeral Candies "Месу розпочато" ("The Mass has begun"). All this music is created by only one person which makes getting into these records even more interesting. And although you won’t be particularly surprised by ambient and black metal, (although both releases are really high-level stuff!), and we are still waiting for more music from Ukrainian D-beat Mafia, because, you know, d-beat scene in Ukraine is tiny. And for me personally Funeral Candies remains the most interesting Sound Fortress release so far, because it’s something you can’t get enough of.

Let us start with tags. When I see "black’n’roll" tag, I first think about Midnight from Ohio and Hellripper from Scotland. But the only things they have in common with Funeral Candies is that each of these bands is a project of one person. Both Midnight and Hellripper draw their influences primarily from the first wave of black metal, meaning such bands as Venom, Sarcofago, Hellhammer, also adding more rock 'n' roll to spicy things up. Funeral Candies band, however, sounds more like "necrogarage" and "deathsurf" – other tags used on the Bandcamp release page which perfectly describe their sound.

Album "Месу розпочато", which is a mystic story about forgotten cult, that rises from ashes to take control over a small town, starts with a spooky almost Halloween track "Меса коло дуба" ("The Mass by the oak"). "Spooky" is nothing new in surf music, if psychobilly culture is familiar to you than you know those two cultures are bonded for their history of existence. But Funeral Candies make skeletons dance to the mixed sounds of surf and black metal, taking all the "true and evil" elitism away. Great lo-fi organ keyboards create the vibes of haunted house by the cemetery, and when you look at the tracklist you realize the song’s name is not far from the association – "Той дім на підварках" ("That house in suburbs"). I just love when you get exactly what is advertised. In general, each track of the album is full of hit hooks and atmosphere of "Are you afraid of the dark?" and "Tales from the Crypt" TV series, but without excessive "category B" and kitsch, because as in horror movies you need to be careful with how serious you take the occult stuff or you might pay for it. And Funeral Candies get that.

I am especially happy about the use of the Ukrainian language. Poltava region has always been famous for its mysticism, so hearing the echoes of Ukrainian-language lyrics through the lo-fi sound is exactly what makes this record even greater. Like Merzotna Potvora, Funeral Candies cling to a combination of scary fairy tales in Ukrainian and ferrous metal and it is the trend which you want to see followed in future.

In conclusion, I would like to traditionally wish inspiration to the musicians, and I hope Льон and Sound Fortress will continue to delight us with more releases next year, because the start was enchanting. Well, it also would be cool if Funeral Candies could gather musicians for live performances, when we will be able to go see live music, so that we have at least one other band with the "surf" prefix, in addition to Amphibian Man, which would look as appropriate as possible at punk and metal events.

The opinions expressed in the reviews convey the views of the authors themselves and do not necessarily reflect the position of Neformat.com.ua

Льон is a musician from Poltava region. He participated in several local projects but began publishing his works only this year. His projects Льон, løn, Ukrainian D-beat Mafia and Funeral Candies are currently known.

Sound Fortress is a young DIY label founded in the spring of 2020 by Льон and Taras Shishichuisky, the owner of SURROGATE Rec. There are currently four releases available on the label: "From the Living Source", "Endless Web Of The Forest Paths", "D Once-Domesticated Mafia" and "Funeral Candies "Mass has begun". All are available in digital format, the first two are also in cassette format.

Sound Fortress in social networks:

https://soundfortress.bandcamp.com/
https://www.facebook.com/soundfortressrecords
https://www.instagram.com/soundfortressrecords/
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCN_Ch-KhHVduRklWg3UWQDQ