Pentagram – Makina Elektrika

Pentagram

Makina Elektrika

by Phil Tyler at 29 January 2023, 1:10 PM

PENTAGRAM aka MEZARKABUL are a Turkish metal band who have been around for over 30 years.  Makina Elektrika is their 8^th album and is self-released.

To prevent confusion they are called MEZARKABUL abroad to avoid confusion with the US PENTAGRAM who have been around for over 50 years. However in Turkey they are still called PENTAGRAM. As I had never before listened to either band, I was looking forward to the listening experience not least because of the FOUR (Yes FOUR) vocalists and three guitarists.

Pounding drums and heavy guitar introduce the first track “Bü Düzen Yıkılsın” before shouts punctuate the powerful chorus. There is a definite Turkish vibe 2 minutes through, giving way to a nice lead guitar. Whilst I couldn’t understand the vocals (all sunk in Turkish) it didn’t detract from the music and the production is solid enough.

“Pride” again contributes Turkish rhythms to the opening of the track and the verse particularly has a slow melodic, almost hypnotic quality and it’s generally an engaging track.

Up to now there really isn’t a strong difference in the vocals and I felt that the additional vocalists were pretty superfluous to the sound.

Then “Revenant” absolutely charges out the speakers on a thrash riff and reminded me of the thrashtastic TESTAMENT albeit with a gruffer vocal style (clearly one of the additional vocalists heard me and came to the fore!). The chorus however is much mellower and reminded me of GALACTIC COWBOYS. Later in the track a searing solo flies over the heavy galloping riff. It’s certainly one of my favourite tracks.

“Sensiz” continues the use of different vocal styles where the darker intro leads to a much dirtier, doomier groove with a near death-like vocal punctuating the rhythm. The chorus is OK but nothing particularly memorable.

“Damn The War” is the only track sung in English and it’s a great dynamic track. I have no idea why they chose to sing this song in English and the other songs in Turkish but they did.

“Damn the war
Save the might
There’s no glory
In a field of blood.”

There’s a great Turkish vibe before the track speeds off into a fast thrash rhythm with some great lead over the top. A definite highlight.

After the instrumental “Dunya” which is decent enough with its clean intro, fuzzy guitar and melodic rhythm, we come to the penultimate song “Ödenmez” It’s a ballad of sorts with heavy Turkish instrumentation over a mantra drum beat. It’s very slow-paced and fairly unremarkable though.

The album ends with a decent cover of “Seek and Destroy” by METALLICA

Having not heard any further albums by PENTAGRAM, I don’t know if this is a distillation of their musical output and whilst it is quite a diverse album and the album does (as you would expect) have different vocal styles, it is a mixed bag with some fairly unforgettable tracks. I may have liked it more if I could understand the vocals (I did try and Google them) as that is an important part of the experience.

It’s a good album overall though, just not an outstanding one.

Songwriting: 7
Musicianship: 7
Memorability: 6
Production: 8