Kato - Conflagration (2022)

    Even though there have been plenty of experiments since the middle '90s by Americans to play black metal, they rarely succeeded in the preferred way, mainly because of the inevitable influence of the strong American death metal scene. It's enough to think about Miss Dana Duffey's Demonic Christ, or Mr Phil Anselmo's Christ Inversion just to mention some of the bigger names and earliest tryings the same time. Excluding a very few exceptions the situation didn't change much... until present times.
   Kato - a one man project - relesaed a very promising demo in 2020, that seemed very close to skip that mentioned "tradition" by playing black metal in a way that's kind of rare to find in the United States. The upcoming debut EP will make sure that something is definitely about to change in the scene. Excellent and intense blackened themes opening wide perspectives for the listener, that are between the traditional and modern sound of black metal. In this case the great sound quality and the complexity of the songs are responsible for the modern features. The songs are kind of long, and their duration have been used up well by diverse theme switches. In general the main impression is melancholic, melodic and gloomy, but by wild blackened hammering the raw, aggressive side also gets frequently introduced. These changes doesn't seem to build on the contrast, it's more like to create a unified sound from diverse components, that are basically all essential features of black metal. The genre itself went through plenty of changes in the past, and compared to the latest "hipster compatible" wave of black metal, Kato represents a refreshing return to the basics in a genuine approach. In total "Conflagfration" definitely worth to pay attention for the fans of black metal. 

https://katokosmos.bandcamp.com/

Release date: 18. February, 2022

Kato is George

Session drums by Krzysztof Klingbein

Mastered by Greg Chandler, Priory Recording Studios