HALO MANASH "Par-Antra I: VIR"
Aural Hypnox | AH01 | CD | 2004

Along with the No Xivic release reviewed in this page, Halo Manash are probably my initial contact with the Finnish dark ambient scene. A rather successful meeting it is, though both projects differ much from each other, both musically and aesthetically. Halo Manash is tremendously inspired by the occult, which is out of my interest, although the occult concept behind 'Par-Antra' may have some impact on the general character of the record... Anyway, the sounds that flow out the speakers have a quasi-sacral feeling most of time. The tracks show little diversity in terms of style - spatial, spiral droning guitars are probably meant to set the listener into a trance state, and tribal drumming helps to do so. Halo Manash build up that feeling of "challenging" slowly by avoiding any sudden rhythm changes, or dynamics in the music. To achieve haunted, sonorous osmosis they employ samples, chanting vocals, and analog synthesizers. If I'd point out some points of reference for their music, they would be a resultant of Maeror Tri, and In Slaughter Natives. As I said, the tracks don't differ much from one another, which makes gaps between them almost unnoticeable, everything dissolving into one long stream of music. Quite helpful to get into trance state, but personally, in the long run, it seems slightly boring. The more you listen to "Par-Antra", the bigger impression you get that the group's conceptual focus prevailed over the musical results, which's not good for the music. "Par-Antra I: VIR" is the first part of the trilogy, the further chapters of which are scheduled for 2005 and 2006. In the meantime, they managed to release "SYoMA" CD also on Aural Hypnox. Perhaps, the future release will bring something less monotous ideas...

[krzysztof sadza]