''Mental Vortex'' is the fourth album by the Swiss

thrash metal Thrash metal (or simply thrash) is an extreme subgenre of heavy metal music characterized by its overall aggression and often fast tempo.Kahn-Harris, Keith, ''Extreme Metal: Music and Culture on the Edge'', pp. 2–3, 9. Oxford: Berg, 2007, . ...

band

Coroner A coroner is a government or judicial official who is empowered to conduct or order an inquest into Manner of death, the manner or cause of death, and to investigate or confirm the identity of an unknown person who has been found dead within th ...

, released on 12 August 1991.

Musical style

''Mental Vortex'' sees Coroner continuing the experimental formula from its predecessor ''

No More Color ''No More Color'' is Swiss thrash metal band Coroner's third album, released in 1989. Musical style ''No More Color'' was the album where Coroner started to truly "progress", as the songs are still similar to their older, speedy, European thras ...

'' (1989), showcasing a mixture of thrash metal with progressive,

jazz fusion Jazz fusion (also known as fusion and progressive jazz) is a music genre that developed in the late 1960s when musicians combined jazz harmony and jazz improvisation, improvisation with rock music, funk, and rhythm and blues. Electric guitars, ...

and

avant-garde The avant-garde (; In 'advance guard' or ' vanguard', literally 'fore-guard') is a person or work that is experimental, radical, or unorthodox with respect to art, culture, or society.John Picchione, The New Avant-garde in Italy: Theoretical ...

influences, while "unbridled speed and aggression were replaced by highly technical and unconventional songwriting".

Reissues

After being out of print for many years,

Noise Noise is unwanted sound considered unpleasant, loud or disruptive to hearing. From a physics standpoint, there is no distinction between noise and desired sound, as both are vibrations through a medium, such as air or water. The difference arise ...

/BMG reissued the album in 2018, remastered with the same track list in a digipack cd case, with additional photographs of the band and memorabilia.

Track listing

Personnel

;Coroner *Ron Broder (as Ron Royce) – vocals, bass *Tommy Vetterli (as Tommy T. Baron) – guitars *Marky Edelmann (as Marquis Marky) – drums, cover concept and design ;Additional musicians *Kent Smith – keyboards *Janelle Sadler – backing vocals *Steve Gruden – backing vocals ;Production *Tom Morris – producer, engineer, mixing *Sven Conquest – second engineer *Karl-U. Walterbach – executive producer *Martin Becker – photography (cover and sleeve) *Maren Lotz – typography *Robbie Müller – digital image

Notes

*The intro on "Divine Step" (the "Emergency Room intro") is from the movie ''

Re-Animator ''Re-Animator'' (also known as ''H. P. Lovecraft's Re-Animator'') is a 1985 American comedy horror film loosely based on the 1922 H. P. Lovecraft serial novelette "Herbert West–Reanimator". Directed by Stuart Gordon and produced by Brian Yuzn ...

''. *

Lilith Lilith ( ; he, Wiktionary:לילית, לִילִית, Līlīṯ) is a female figure in Mesopotamian Mythology, Mesopotamian and Jewish mythology, Judaic mythology, alternatively the first wife of Adam and supposedly the primordial she-demon. ...

is a female demon of the

Mesopotamian mythology Mesopotamian mythology refers to the myths, religious texts, and other literature that comes from the region of ancient Mesopotamia which is a historical region of Western Asia, situated within the Tigris–Euphrates river system that occupies ...

. *The

sample Sample or samples may refer to: Base meaning * Sample (statistics), a subset of a population – complete data set * Sample (signal), a digital discrete sample of a continuous analog signal * Sample (material), a specimen or small quantity of s ...

at the end of "Semtex Revolution" is from a Dallas news broadcast covering the assassination of

John F. Kennedy John Fitzgerald Kennedy (May 29, 1917 – November 22, 1963), often referred to by his initials JFK and the nickname Jack, was an American politician who served as the 35th president of the United States from 1961 until his assassination ...

. *

Semtex Semtex is a general-purpose plastic explosive containing RDX and Pentaerythritol tetranitrate, PETN. It is used in commercial blasting, demolition, and in certain military applications. Semtex was developed and manufactured in Czechoslovakia, or ...

is a type of

plastic explosive Plastic explosive is a soft and hand-moldable solid form of explosive material. Within the field of explosives engineering, plastic explosives are also known as putty explosives or blastics. Plastic explosives are especially suited for explos ...

. *"About Life" samples the line 'We have to see, we have to know' from the film '' Hellbound: Hellraiser II''. *The cover image is a modified photograph of

Anthony Perkins Anthony Perkins (April 4, 1932 – September 12, 1992) was an American actor, director, and singer. Perkins is best remembered for his role as Norman Bates in Alfred Hitchcock's suspense thriller '' Psycho'', which made him an influential ...

Norman Bates Norman Bates is a fictional character created by American author Robert Bloch as the main antagonist in his 1959 thriller novel '' Psycho''. He has an alter, Mother, who takes from the form of his abusive mother, and later victim, Norma, wh ...

in the 1960

Alfred Hitchcock Sir Alfred Joseph Hitchcock (13 August 1899 – 29 April 1980) was an English filmmaker. He is widely regarded as one of the most influential figures in the history of cinema. In a career spanning six decades, he directed over 50 featur ...

film Psycho. *A music video was made for the song "I Want You (She's So Heavy)".

References

External links

BNR Metal Pages' section on Coroner

Coroner at Last.fm
{{Authority control 1991 albums Coroner (band) albums Noise Records albums