“Say, Ian…do you like jazz?  How much?”  The eternal question posed in a throwaway joke on Scrubs, and yet it still is relevant to me, because, yes, I like jazz very much.  Not only that, but I find the mixture of jazz and metal to be territory that is relatively uncharted, and especially lacking in big names beyond, well, Imperial Triumphant, Voidceremony and maybe a couple others.  Sure, bands like Cynic and Mr. Bungle incorporate jazz elements, but their sound isn’t defined by them.  Sarmat, speaking of Imperial Triumphant, aims to bring jazz to the forefront of metal with their debut full length Determined to Strike.

The NYC collective of Sarmat burst onto the scene very recently with their Dubious Disc EP, a massive live improvisation on themes that will eventually end up in Determined to Strike and also showed off the lineup featuring Oleg Zalman of Artificial Brain (absent from Determined to Strike) and Steve Blano of Imperial Triumphant in their usual roles, as well as Cotter Champlain on guitar, Andrew Gonzalez on vocals and James Jones on drums, as well as a host of guest horn players.  Sarmat are as equally influenced by Gorguts and Defeated Sanity as they are by Weather Report and the Mahavishnu Orchestra, and improvisational jazz fusion is at the forefront of their musical sound (as opposed to simply throwing a saxophone in one song and calling the whole album jazz), bended deftly with dissonance and progressive death metal tendencies.  It shouldn’t surprise anyone that a band composed of massive talent like this thrives in an area of high improvisation and artistic integrity, but it doesn’t even stop there.  Determined to Strike is not just a jazz fusion death metal album, it’s also the opening piece of a wholly original sci-fi trilogy concept arc.  So, you know, there’s that too.

If we’re going to talk about jazz and improvisation as the core musical tenets of this project, then the first thing we have to address is the musicianship.  You should already know that the bass is well handled.  Steve Blanco, in my opinion, is one of the most underrated, inventive and original musicians in metal (or not metal, for that matter), and his work here is sublime when it needs to be and over-the-top outrageous whenever it can be.  Similarly, Cotter Champlain might not be a household name, but he handles the guitar work here with a style all his own, from the lumbering riffage of “Landfill” and “Arsenal of Tyranny” to the clean jazz breaks and tasty soloing in “Formed from Filth.”  Gonzalez’s unique story is told through bowel-churning death growls and throat-searing howls, as well as unique vocal processing that really digs hard into the sci-fi concept.  In fact, there are a lot of sci-fi elements blatantly on display, as opposed to buried and obscured in the lyrics or the cover art.  The title track is a perfect example of how this all comes together: Blanco’s heavy use of effects colors his bass tones in an otherworldly layer of crud, Champlain’s seemingly atonal tapping lines replicate vintage sci-fi computer aesthetics, the horn section plays theremin-like highs and doubles down on the chaotic bleeping and blipping, and Jones’ drums inject a pulsing rhythm that just barely holds everything in place.  And then, of course, there is the closer “Disturbing Advances,” alluded to in Dubious Disc, that effectively closes part one and opens the door to part two of the sci-fi triptych and features the “everybody gets a solo” mentality that makes jazz so great when people of astonishing caliber come together to make it.

Determined to Strike is more than just an album title: it’s a mission statement.  Going through the pandemic brought a lot of struggles to Sarmat, but this record is them putting themselves out there and poising themselves at the forefront of advanced, high-thinking metal.  And good for them for sticking to it.  This is technical without being techy, chaotic without feeling aimless, dissonant without being alienating, and a damn good record, whether you like jazz or metal or both.

— Ian

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Determined to Strike will be available June 16 on I, Voidhanger Records.  For more information on Sarmat, visit their Facebook page.