Jinjer have an inspiring success story. Hailing from Donetsk, Ukraine (the centre of fighting during the 2014 Ukrainian Revolution and the War in Donbass), they've fought against near-impossible odds to become one of the most exciting bands in metal. Macro is their first album since hitting it huge with 2016's King of Everything, so expectations are high, and Jinjer deliver the goods with grace.
Part of what makes Jinjer so interesting is the almost total lack of reference anyone has for their sound. The influence of Meshuggah and Gojira is there, but songs like "Judgement (& Punishment)" turn on a dime into weird jazz that wouldn't sound out of place on a Snarky Puppy demo. There's also old-school death metal, new school tech-death and several other genres at play, but none of these descriptions do Macro justice. This might be one of the few truly unique heavy bands to come out in several years.
The star is Tatiana Shmayluk, whose voice moves fluidly between death snarl, lounge crooner and alt-rock goddess with ease. But the rest of the band deserve credit for making bonkers cuts like "Home Back" and "Pausing Death" — which would have sounded like an absolute mess in most hands — into brain-bending masterpieces. It's difficult to predict what will come next at any given moment on Macro, but whatever it is, it's never what you expected.
The story of metal so far is one of searching for the heaviest sound. Jinjer aren't the heaviest band, but they shred the rulebook like few have before. If this is the future of heaviness, we're all here for it.
(Napalm)Part of what makes Jinjer so interesting is the almost total lack of reference anyone has for their sound. The influence of Meshuggah and Gojira is there, but songs like "Judgement (& Punishment)" turn on a dime into weird jazz that wouldn't sound out of place on a Snarky Puppy demo. There's also old-school death metal, new school tech-death and several other genres at play, but none of these descriptions do Macro justice. This might be one of the few truly unique heavy bands to come out in several years.
The star is Tatiana Shmayluk, whose voice moves fluidly between death snarl, lounge crooner and alt-rock goddess with ease. But the rest of the band deserve credit for making bonkers cuts like "Home Back" and "Pausing Death" — which would have sounded like an absolute mess in most hands — into brain-bending masterpieces. It's difficult to predict what will come next at any given moment on Macro, but whatever it is, it's never what you expected.
The story of metal so far is one of searching for the heaviest sound. Jinjer aren't the heaviest band, but they shred the rulebook like few have before. If this is the future of heaviness, we're all here for it.
