Album Review: Mental Cruelty – Echoes of A Fallen Land (Century Media Records)

Mental Cruelty, the slamming blackened deathcore band, are back with a brand-new album. One that showcases further evolution, while remaining rooted in the brutalist and blackest of sounds. It is called ‘Echoes of A Fallen Land’, and it is out on October 23rd, 2026, via Century Media Records.

A band who never seems to stop evolving, Mental Cruelty continue to move in unexpected directions with this new album. All while retaining an intensity that calls back to their deathcore roots and emphasising blackness. It’s a ferociously heavy album, but by including folk metal and melodeath touches, it really does end up being quite a unique experience.

Of course, evolution is written in Mental Cruelty’s DNA, but to hear them introduce folk metal elements is quite something. I was taken back by the cinematic grandeur of Weltennacht, but Blood for Blood floored me. Especially coming off the back of such a blistering effort as Fenrir. Three tracks, three layered examples of what Mental Cruelty are capable of here. Volatile, extravagant, hellaciously intense, and with more diverse melodies than expected, each can rightfully be called brilliant.

Icy cold blackness pours out of the record, but Mental Cruelty balance the big freeze with fiery efforts like The Serpent of Midgard. The exploration of Norse mythology certainly seems to be opening up Mental Cruelty’s creative faucets and a track like this, Helheim, and Draugar end up being as epic as they are relentlessly heavy. There’s some really cool stuff amongst these efforts too. Such as the killer guitar solo and clean singing in Helheim, and the slamming breakdown that Drauger offers.

I found myself well and truly sold on the quality of the record well before Raise the Raven Banner arrived, but if there had been any doubt, this atmospheric, dramatic, and ferocious heavyweight effort would have put it to bed. Six minutes of chest-thumping and head-banging carnage, it’s an absolute beast of a track.

Things then head off in a grin-inducing melodeath-infused direction, albeit warped by an energised folksiness, with Cry of Batariel. A track with sharp religious undertones (Batariel is linked to fallen angels via the Book of Enoch) and no small amount of catchiness. Followed by epic heaviness, determined and brawny, but covered in gloom, arrives courtesy of Frost. Before a short piece of sad sounding melody arrives via Dämmerbruch.

It is a piano piece that serves as an intro to the finale, a near-seven minute closer called Ride of the Valkyries. Which, like the name suggests, is huge sounding. Mental Cruelty infuse so much creative atmosphere, so much symphonic pomp, and so much blackened chaos into it that it’s easy to overlook how relentless the deathcore side of them is here too. It is one of many expertly balanced tracks but because it is longer, it has more elaborate parts and because of that, it stands out that little bit more.

I’ve loved many a Mental Cruelty album, but this might be my favourite yet. An album of the year contender.

Mental Cruelty – Echoes of A Fallen Land Track Listing:

1. Weltennacht
2. Fenrir
3. Blood For Blood
4. The Serpent Of Midgard
5. Helheim
6. Draugar
7. Raise The Raven Banner
8. Cry Of Batariel
9. Frost
10. Dämmerbruch
11. Ride Of The Valkyries

Links

Website | Facebook | Instagram