Labels: Hidden Rainbows – Moment of Collapse – OSK
Review by: Oli Saunders
Marat only existed for eight months, breaking up towards the end of 2006. They recorded four songs during this period, which originally came out on a demo CDr and were later released posthumously in 2007 on a split CD with the Singaporean band Facelift. Now in 2009 they have a deserved vinyl release.
I did not know about the band until I read that Moment Of Collapse were helping to release this 7”. Hailing from the Netherlands, Marat play hardcore containing a mixture of styles. They state their influences as bands such as From Ashes Rise, Mohinder, Yaphet Kotto and Portraits of past, so you can see its pretty wide ranging. And the resulting sound is wide ranging too, there are melodic emo parts, d beat parts, chaotic screamo parts, and over the top of it all there are full on female and male screams that sound amazing. A fair number of Dutch bands seem to mix up different hardcore styles, Shikari were never really screamo and The Last Mile are kind of metal like but with clear hardcore influences. I guess some comparisons could be made with Grinding Halt who also play a kind of screamo infleunced hardcore.
For me the first song ‘The Dirt, That Clogs The Cosmos’ is the best; melodic intro and then RAGE. It’s got a really nice repeating guitar riff throughout. The final track ‘As Close As We Get’ also stands out, it makes feel a bit sad actually, like someone has died or something. Weird. Really great end to the record. Overall I’d certainly recommend this, I spend way too much time listening to generic screamo so it’s nice to check out something which still has that kind of sound but is a fair bit different and distinct.
3rd May 2009