Ufomammut
Idolum

A solitary bass line emerges from nowhere, a few beats, and it is immediately followed by a wicked and dirty riff with a sulfuric Sabbath-like progression. Thus begins "Stigma", the first visceral track of the mephistic "Idolum", the latest album by the Piedmontese band Ufomammut. And let me say it, their immense masterpiece.

The first track opens what will be almost a continuous jam session, consisting of dense yellow vapors that suddenly take on dark and psychedelic hues, erosions and tectonic shocks that split your cerebral cortex and your domestic tranquility in two, dusty winds sharp as icy blades, a strange thing since the album projects us directly to the center of the earth, where only fire and lava survive. And demons, the ones evoked by the heaviness of the drums, the mephistic layers of the guitar, the relentless pulse of the bass and a voice, now more than ever as a complement and background of an (almost) instrumental album.

If you're already familiar with the band and have mentally braced while listening to their previous works, this one will demolish you. You must be strong to accept the vision of a pagan cult that has as its priests the mystical Pink Floyd of "A Saucerful Of Secrets", and as the performers of the doom-paced rites the likes of Neurosis, Pelican, certain Isis, Sunn O))), Kyuss, and Tool (among the main ones).

It's impossible to describe track by track, words would diminish the immense quality of the album. "Stigma" represents the gates of Hades, "Stardog" sketches its tumultuous and fiery sky, filled with demons tortured by eternal pain, each holding a guitar, afflicting the souls beneath with tectonic riffs of immense power.

Next is "Hellectric", an immense and infinite electric onslaught, a dark and impetuous Acheron that ferries us to the other shore of Pandemonium, where the core of this journey awaits us.

Awaiting us is an angel with torn wings covered in pitch named "Ammonia". Around it is an atmosphere of relative peace: sulfur is still in the air, carried by the wind, but around us, only the seductive song of this fallen son of God. Suddenly, what seemed to be a celestial lullaby transforms into the worst of Luciferian invocations, if it is true that it represents our end and our damnation, the point where we are most bewitched by the disc and ensnared before the powerful sonic blend created by our band.

From here on, it is just a dark catharsis and passive surrender to the blows of Our Own, which mercilessly fell upon the listener without giving him a breath. The mystical climax of "Nero" has something sacred about it, if only we weren't where we are, "Destroyer" is annihilating, disarming, and destructive.

An honorable mention to the last track, another peak of the album and the peak (or low point) of our personal hell,"Void/Elephantom". We are probably facing a revised and corrected stoner/sludge/doom edition of "A Saucerful Of Secrets" by Pink Floyd, perhaps the most incredible song on the eponymous album by the Cambridge band. A scorching mantle envelops us, and in the reflections of the lava red, glimpses of the universe and a clear starry sky are seen that we will probably never see again, brief memories that still cling to our minds and still refuse to let us fall into oblivion. From here on, nothingness, just the surrender to the music and a few starts from time to time, to which we will now be accustomed.

An album masterfully crafted, an infernal and metaphysical journey certainly not for everyone. But for the few who will manage to see it through, it will be one of the most incredible sonic trips made so far, undoubtedly superior to the other productions of Ufomammut released until now.