Oklahoma industrial metal crew, Black Magnet, started as the solo project of James Hammontree and experienced a rapid rise to the forefront of the underground after the release of their 2020 debut, Hallucination Scene. They’re now signed to Greg Puciato’s Federal Prisoner label, yet album number three is only twenty-five minutes in length. That’s seems a bit underwhelming after three years of inactivity.
Megamantra will intrigue you on first listen. ‘Endless’ starts as an assault of chunky guitars blended into the hyper-aggression of the vocals and bass. Here, James Hammontree projects his voice just loud enough to fume at the nostrils and to produce steam on the forehead. It works as an angry aesthetic where man and machine are indistinguishable. On the downside, you can only appreciate the crunchy guitars on repeat listens. ‘Better Than Love’ has the same features, but the riffing is sharper and more attuned to the range of Ministry. This time, the groove titillates like an autumn stroll in a short sleeve t-shirt. Samples of huffing machines double as snares and then receive a coating of live drums in the mix for extra padding. Code Orange and 3Teeth are the inevitable comparisons, but Nine Inch Nails loom over the action like a taciturn godfather.
It’s unusual to wait until track four to produce the circling synth-bass for the goth dancefloor to erupt. Hammontree approaches the mic stand for ‘Spitting Glass’ like a hardcore screamer with a latent punk snarl. This time, there’s no disguising that The Downward Spiral provides the blueprints for the music. Likewise, ‘Null + Void’ could be renamed “Ministry + Nine Inch Nails”. Yet it’s devoid of merit. Listen to the chromatic chord changes and boiling aggression sustain the tension for the entire two minutes and twenty-four seconds.
Industrial metal used to struggle with maintaining the weight of the guitars in the mix with so many gnarly electronic beats and samples ripping through the tracks – not here. ‘Coming Back Again’ asks if you’re ready to swing your head in a daze of palm-muted riffing and menacing bass notes. The paranoia of Hammontree’s vocals will leave you imbalanced but thrilled by the experience. And any guitarist would love to lean into the jagged groove of penultimate song, ‘Birth’, with one finger ready to bar the power chords like a member of Korn. It’s the only effort to breach the four-minute mark, and it forces the glitchy electronic effects into a hard 4/4 beat in style.
You’ll find enough good ideas to pique your interest but too few moments when you can enjoy their expansion on this record. Observe how closing track, ‘Smokeskreen’, employs an extended threading of guitar over the top of the aggressive beats where you’d expect to find simple staccato rhythms. This has the potential for something innovative, but twenty-five minutes is lightweight for an album, especially when you have the software and the tools to record it at home.
Verdict
Release Date: 25/07/2025
Record Label: Federal Prisoner
Standout track: Better Than Love; Coming Back Again; Smokeskreen
Suggested Further Listening: 3Teeth – EndEx (2023), Ministry – Filth Pig (1995), Youth Code – Yours, With Malice (2025)